Social Networking Software

3Jun10

Elgg Set to Offer Hosted Social Network Solution

Curverider, the company behind the Elgg open source social networking software, will begin sending beta invites for their hosted social networking service, Elgg.com, on June 14th. This is a paid service, with monthly subscriptions start at $29.95, competing head-to-head with Ning. Unlike Ning, Elgg.com will feature a full export tool, letting site owners who want [...]

22Mar10

Beware of “feature creep”

When many people set about starting a social networking site and comparing social networking software, they often get caught up in Feature Creep. Thinking that more is always better, they try and cram every possible feature — videos, blogging, RSS feeds, music, etc. — into their social networking site. The funny thing is that even [...]

6Jan10

Interview: SocialEngine’s Charlotte Genevier

Webligo, the company behind SocialEngine and the upcoming Advious, began when Alex Benzer and Charlotte Genevier met at Pasadena Polytechnic high school in 2002. The two quickly became friends and began programming together. As they were putting the finishing touches on the SocialEngine v4.0 beta last month, Charlotte took some time to answer my questions [...]

25Oct09

SocialEngine announces free upgrade for 3.x clients

Great news from the folks at SocialEngine, who just announced that they will provide a free upgrade to the upcoming 4.0 release to all clients with current 3.x licenses! The beta demo should be launched within 4-6 weeks. Looks like a pretty substantial overhaul to the base code. Here is a partial tentative feature list [...]

6May09

Leverage free apps, APIs, and web services.

I noticed the other day that Flixster is now using Meebo for their Instant Messaging feature. With all of the free apps, APIs, and web services out there, there’s no shame in relying on other services to build out your service. In fact, for a start-up social network, it would be crazy not to. It’s [...]

5Oct08

Open Source Social Networking Platforms Based on Ruby on Rails

At least two open source social networking platforms based on Ruby on Rails are out there (if you know of others, please post a comment). Insoshi is by Michael Hartl, author of RailsSpace: Building a Social Networking Website with Ruby on Rails. LovdbyLess is by less everything, and has a great story behind it: Along [...]

7Sep08

Elgg and SocialEngine Updates

With their recent version upgrades, both Elgg and SocialEngine are getting plugin upgrades. Elgg, which has the best support for open standards (OpenID and OpenSocial, and their own OpenDD initiative) and is arguably the most flexible, has posted several plugins on their site. More are being posted in the Elgg Google Group. A key plugin [...]

14Aug08

WordPress for Social Networking?

If I was a developer of social networking software, I’d be a little nervous right now. BuddyPress is essentially a set of WordPress MU-specific plugins that switch WordPress MU (Multi-user) from a blogging platform to a social platform, with features like: Extended Profiles Personal Blog Private Messaging Friends Groups The Wire Status Updates Albums It’s [...]

4Aug08

Not the way to launch new Social Networking Software

The page says… “Orbit is a popular social networking software that makes uploading videos, finding and making friends and communicating with other internet users very simple. You can share your favorite videos, audios, and pictures with your social networking groups.” So I click through to the demo, and this is my reward: Not a good [...]

4Aug08

Elgg Pegged as Best Social Networking Software

Elgg as been named the best open source social networking platform in InfoWorld’s 2008 Best Of Open Source Awards. Elgg took the opportunity to announce that version 1.0 is set to launch on August 18th.

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