A Dark Pattern on LinkedIn. I recently found out that, when looking at my post activity, I can no longer go back further than 2 months in time, and even before that the metrics (number of reads) also become unavailable. So I decided to download my personal data set to see if older posts are still in their data centers.
This brings you to the following page:
Here you have 2 options for your data:
- The Works
- Pick and choose
The 2nd option is sort of clear in its meaning, but the first one is not. What does ‘The Works’ mean? Is this all of your data? The Help Center doesn’t help you here. It does not explain the meaning of your choice.
Furthermore - and what leads me to think that the first option yields the most interesting results - selecting The Works leads to a download requests that can be handled within 24 hrs, while the second choice can be done in just 10 mins.
This is another dark pattern, as LI probably expect most people to be impatient and opting for the 2nd choice, rather than waiting this long. IMHO there is no reason the 1st option should take that long (maybe if it constitutes significantly more data, and they want to schedule the data collection to a time when the data center is quiet --> but I received this download already after 5 mins.)
I have received an email notification stating that ‘the first installment of my download’ is available. Let’s see if a second installment is coming later 
Edit: After 10 hrs the 2nd email hasn’t arrived yet. The first download does not contain post history anyway.