Dead Man Networking

Linked In has its uses and many find it a powerful social tool.

However, it has a creepy side.

(I should say that not only a member of Linked In, I am a premiere member, meaning something or other).

A day or two ago, Linked In suggested that I congratulate a former colleague for a work anniversary. The problem: I was pretty sure the man was dead.

Why would Linked In suggest I communicate with a dead person? Maybe he's not dead. Perhaps I had misunderstood. So I sent him a congratulatory note. 

Then I called his listed phone number, half afraid that he would answer and I'd have to explain that I thought he had passed away but decided to call him anyway. After a few rings a woman answered and I apologized for my wrong number.

Then I Googled the guy. Sure enough, he was dead. He had succumbed to an autoimmune disease. However, his blog was still active and one of his final posts was a self-validating promise to fight and overcome the disease. I read it sadly.

How could Linked In sill consider him alive and well, and having a work anniversary? A buggy algorithm? Outdated information? He never informed Linked In that he had died. He probably had weightier matters on his mind. Besides, dead people cannot make Linked In entries. I assume.

This was all more than a little creepy, not to mention, pathetic. 

And what's up with Google and its blogging system? Doesn't Google know everything about us?

Didn't our virtual Big Brother notice that this particular person had stayed in the exact same spot for several years? That he had stopped using email, stopped shopping online, stopped purchasing books from Amazon, stopped bidding on eBay?

Should I look up "slow monkey brain virus" Google would hit me with ads for safaris. I would start receiving solicitations from Lumosity. You know how it all works.

How many other dead people are in Linked In, I wonder. How many messages have I sent to them? "Congratulations on working at self for 10 years!" (Should a member be self-employed Linked In terms them "working at 'self.'")

Will Linked In notice when I have hopped off this mortal coil? 

Perhaps when my payment for premium service runs into trouble at MasterCard. 

Because if MasterCard know anything, it's actuarial precision. If you pay the minimum amount on our debt at 30 percent APR, you will finish paying it back in 5,000 years at a cost of $ trillion.

What a bunch of sweethearts.