For those of you who saw the Product Manager job at the Yahoo! Developer Network that I posted to LinkedIn (and got posted to CrunchBoard by someone), that position has been filled. I’ll announce soon.
Thanks to everyone who contacted me. There were many excellent applicants and I hope to be getting back in touch with many of you in the coming weeks as I hear of other opportunities at Yahoo! My apologies in advance for not being able to get back to everyone personally.
Incidentally, although I’ve been a user of LinkedIn for about 2.5 years now and I’ve always thought it was “cool” (I even wrote about it in my old InfoWorld column), I had never found the service absolutely essential, but this particular hiring experience suggests that it will be in the future, even though the person who ultimately got the job didn’t come directly through LinkedIn. Still, it’s clear to me that LinkedIn is the most efficient way to reach out to my personal network and get in touch with quality people.
Chad Dickerson's blog 
Congratulations on finding your hire! Up to this point, LinkedIn for me had just been a neat exercise in building a professional network. But yours was the first time I’ve seen it “in action”, so to speak – and you are right. I think the possibilities are endless. The next time I have openings on my team, I will definitely use the LinkedIn connection.