Update: LinkedIn has reinstated the feature due to popular demand. Here’s a follow-up post about their announcement.
If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Or, in this case, don’t change it.
LinkedIn (LNKD) is dealing with some very unhappy users after making it more difficult for them to export contacts.
Business Insider reports that users can still download their contacts for the site, but it now takes longer. As of Thursday, LinkedIn users had to get an archive of their data to do the procedure, and that can reportedly can take up to 72 hours. Before, users could download user contact information immediately.
“Our members can continue to easily request an export of the data LinkedIn has stored on their account, by visiting our help center,” LinkedIn told Business Insider.
The publication sifted through social media to find some users unhappy with the changed process to easily export their contacts:
this is absolutely horrible, even by @LinkedIn’s normal walled garden standards: https://t.co/AVAlQv03Qn
— Mitali Pattnaik (@mitali) July 24, 2015
https://twitter.com/conrey/status/624224844859723776
https://twitter.com/juzzie/status/624285749215657984
We asked what format the contacts are made available in as part of the data archive, and the spokesperson confirmed that they are put into a CSV file. In short, what’s really changing here is that you can no longer export your contacts immediately. Now you have to get them as part of a data archive request, which can take up to three days.