Does anybody know what that stupid "endorsement" feature is on LinkedIn? I have gotten emails that say "Joe Blow endorsed you for Project Management!" but when I ask Joe he hadn't done a thing. I am sure others get emails saying I endorsed them.
Like you, I use it to keep track of colleagues both for recruiting and potential job-hunting purposes. I have FB but only use it for keeping track of family and closest friends. As much as I hate both sites, they have enabled me to touch base with peoe I thought I'd lost contact with forever. Sad that they have to use it for data mining but they have to pay the bills.
Most people are using the "endorsement" feature wrong. When you look at somebody's profile who is a "first level" contact of yours, you will likely get a pop-up asking if you endorse that person for certain skills. Some of those skills will be in the pop-up and might have nothing to do with what that person does at all. What Linked-in wants you to do is to delete the skills that don't apply and add those that do. But most people click "endorse" just to get the box out of the way.
What they should do is click "skip" to make the box go away or at least make the effort to ensure that the skills they are endorsing this person for are accurate.
It's LinkedIn's attempt to make their site "more sticky" but it's mostly annoying.