The war of visuals over actual networking is always running wild ravaging social media, but for those who enjoy engaging with visuals and sharing content rather than networking with each other, you're not alone. In fact the open-networkers are joining you as Pinterest members have just surpassed LinkedIn members. There are more Pinterest pins out there than LinkedIn Groups. Pinterest is not even five years old. LinkedIn is a publicly traded company. What the hell is going on?
There are plenty of arguments for such a dramatic shift, but I'm going to go with shiny-new-toy syndrome. I doubt that it has anything to do with how revolutionary Pinterest has become or how unique it is to the other networks. Tumblr offers more on its blog platform than Pinterest does with its use of boards, but the ease of Pinterest can't be argued. The fact that everyone can share anything with a simple click (and not even source their own content) is immeasurable. Does this mean we're dumbing down social networking and making room for just an exponential content war? Where is the conversation going? Clearly, it's going away from LinkedIn.
We're curious to see how LinkedIn will respond to this data and if we'll see anything from Pinterest in the near future. As Facebook has shown us with their Facebook Homepage Ads and their consistent changes to their interface, nothing is sacred, and Pinterest will most likely be chewed up and spit out adding new features and taking away old ones. Though visuals will remain a priority who knows where the loyal Pinterest members will be when their network is in disarray. Here's hoping LinkedIn can step up to the plate and regain their momentum.