Background
LinkedIn is a business-oriented social networking site mainly used for professional networking. LinkedIn states that “the purpose of LinkedIn is to provide a service to facilitate professional networking among Users throughout the world. It is intended that Users only connect to other Users who they currently know and seek to further develop a professional relationship with those Users.”
The company was founded in May 2003 and within a month the site had 4,500 members. By the end of 2003 it had 81,000 members, and by May 2004 the site had over 500,000 members.