I was just starting to use LinkedIn to research customers/people I was going to meet with. For example, if I was to meet with XYZ company I would do a search on their company and take a look at the employees and their roles.
I had a paid account, but lower level, only $30 per month which I think is still expensive.
Boom! LinkedIn started limiting the amount of searches I could do unless I paid for a $60 / month account. I immediately started reaching my search limit within 5 days of the start of a new month. This meant I had to wait 25 days before I could do another meaningful search.
I cancelled my paid account. Boom back at ya.
You would really think a "social" site would to create an environment in which users "lived" on the site and it became ingrained in the process of their daily lives, in this case work.
But NO! LinkedIn is so incredibly short-sighted that they limit your use of the site and prevent it from becoming useful. Unless of course you pay a pretty serious fee.
The strange thing is, I was comfortable paying $30/month for what I got. I also regularly used advertising, posted job ads, and would have been totally comfortable paying for other services.
Not now. Goodbye LinkedIn. You could have been great, but you somewhere you really got lost.
IMO anyways.