Could anyone break down for those of us who are engineers what it is that we should be concerned with about this?

It appears to me that LinkedIn is splitting their API into separate categories (Profile API, Company API, etc)

Going forward everyone will have to register and be approved in only 1 of the categories, meaning that if you are in the Company API, you won't be able to utilize features of the Profile API.

I don't know exactly what that means as far as specific features, but my guess is that if you're a company you won't be able to access personal profiles and feeds. I could be totally wrong about this but that's what it looks like.

Yeah. The site had no information on it.

But I wonder, is LinkedIn really "the" way to connect professionally? My personal bit of anecdotal experience is that it isn't for me. I was on LinkedIn for maybe 15 years? I accepted everyone on LinkedIn (I was not discriminating at all). And in that 15 years, I never found one job through it. Right now in Seattle (where I've been for 10 years), I go through my "people I drink beer with" network.

What I'd love to see is a network that would introduce me to people in other cities. I want to move to NYC, but I know no one there. So I don't know the good vs. bad neighborhoods, companies to stay away from (you know there is a list), etc.

I'm a Linux Sysadmin/Automation Engineer/"devops guru". My last 3 jobs (each better than the last) all came from recruiters finding me on LinkedIn.

2 years ago I was trying to move upwards in my career path. I had a good job, but boring and I could go weeks with doing almost no work. I was simultaneously considered a valuable employee while actually operating as fluff. I decided to move into the world of configuration management and "devops". I spent a few months implementing puppet in our lab and in a few places. Then I updated my Linked with puppet experience. A few months later, I got an offer at a local university that was implementing Puppet. I figured I would work there a year and get really solid Puppet Experience. I worked there about 3 months, got much better with puppet, but hated the place. I updated my LinkedIn resume again with my additional Puppet experience (all my responsibilities at the new job were puppet/automation related). I instantly started getting calls. Then I landed an awesome job with a large service company. I loved that job, hated the commute. I wasn't even looking but as I updated my resume, I started getting recruiters from Facebook, Netflix, Google, and finally a work-from-home one from EMC that I jumped on.

That's very cool to hear. I'm glad it has worked so well for you!

Similarly, I've been using it for 15 years. While I don't get jobs from recruiters either, I use it to keep connected to former colleagues even as they change jobs, email addresses, marriages and inter-state moves. This network gets me work.

Ditto. LinkedIn is a self-updating Rolodex for me and it's useful for that. Plaxo sure wasn't any better and I do like having a service of this basic type.

I basically don't use it for anything else and generally ignore emails that they send me. (And only accept connection requests from those who I--within 5 seconds or so--see some reason to connect with. If I don't recognize your name or your company doesn't imply some good reason to connect, I'm ignoring you if you send me a canned request.)