Hello everyone,

after having become a LinkedIn member, I have a small dilemma. Let me say first that this is my first "online networking" experience, so I don't have much feeling for what goes and what doesn't.
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I have in my growing list of connections more than a couple of rather important people by big recruiting firms.
They remembered me from the past and have, I am glad to say, accepted me as their connection.
I am currently unemployed and am using LinkedIn, among other things, to build and maintain a net of recruiters in my professional sector with whom to stay easily in contact.
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Some of these recruiters have among their connections people whom I'd love to contact but obviously do not know personally, nor do I know their email address. So in theory what I should do is to ask my connections to introduce me to them and in normal circumstances I would not hesitate so to do.
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Only, my connections are largely recruiters and the most interesting connections I am interested in are invariably among those of the recruiters.
So I ask myself the following questions:

1) If my connection is a person I have, say, not seen in two years, am I not abusing his time and kindness by asking him to introduce me to new people? I mean, I am not their friend, they just remembered having talked to me a long time ago. I know it is a networking site, but I have a feeling that I would come across as "well thank you for having remembered me after two years, now kindly allow me to plunder your connections and bother you every time I need you to be able to know other people....".

2) Does anything change if my connection is a recruiter? By introducing me to a potential employer, the recruiter is possibly giving away fees he could be earning in the future, right? Why should he do that and if he does it just out of kindness, am I morally justified in asking him to go against his interests to introduce me just because he is in a networking site?

Thank you all for your kind answers.

Well, LinkedIn is primarily a business networking site, so I don't think it's an abuse to contact your contacts to see if you can get an introduction. I would call them and see if they would be open to making the introduction. If not, thank them for their time and leave it at that.

A good recruiter is also a good networker. So reaching out to them isn't a bad thing. A recruiter that believes they can help you get a job is going to work with you as if you are in their "stable". Because recruiters are typically very specialized, you may be reaching out to someone who simply doesn't have the connections you are looking for, but may be able to network you to someone who can help you. Either way, it's in their best interest to either help you, let you know up front they can't, or refer you to someone who they feel will.

Regarding Linkedin, I use this to recruit from all the time, and am recruited through it as well. You are not plundering unless you are relentlessly sending multiple aimless requests in hopes of getting something to stick.