LinkedIn announced the end for its iPhone app, LinkedIn Intro, even though the app was only around for a few months. Intro launched in October 2013, and it input LinkedIn contact information onto iPhone Mail. Intro was a cleverly designed app, but it was also critiqued for being invasive, which may be why LinkedIn is sending it out to pasture. The professional social network put a more positive spin on things: according to LinkedIn, Intro is retiring so the company can focus on other projects.
Not sure you can retire if you’ve only been in operation for around three months, but OK. In a blog post titled “Doing Fewer Things Better,” LinkedIn announced that Intro would shut down March 7.
Intro isn’t the only service LinkedIn cut. Say farewell to Slidecast, LinkedIn’s audio-enabled slideshow feature; it will go gently into Internet heaven on April 30. And LinkedIn is also eliminating support for older versions of its iPad app.
LinkedIn Intro used technology that the company gained when it acquired Rapportive in 2012. Rapportive is a desktop app (you can still use it independently of LinkedIn) that inserts extra information about the people you’re emailing into your inbox. Rapportive is an enormously helpful tool, but it looks like the technology just didn’t translate in the way LinkedIn used it.
This may not be the last time LinkedIn tries to create a mobile app for email, though. From the blog post: “While Intro is going away, we will continue to work on bringing the power of LinkedIn to wherever our members work. Email, where the average professional spends more than a quarter of their time, is one of those places, so we’ll continue to look for ways to bring this kind of functionality to our members through existing partnerships.”
Here’s hoping LinkedIn comes up with a more worthwhile use of Rapportive’s technology.
