When LinkedIn asked thousands of its translator members to complete a survey last month asking whether they would consider volunteering to translate the site, many said no and gathered together in a group called “Translators against Crowdsourcing by Commercial Businesses“.

Linkedin and the product manager who circulated the survey is answering those annoyed by the survey on LinkedIn’s corporate blog.

This case highlights:

1) things to consider when crowdsoucing (I think the error here was asking professional translators that do this for a living, specially considering that LinkedIn is a network created to help out professionals)
2) the use of blogs and other social media to mitigate the backlash