| Written by Rak-Wholesale.com, on 24-03-2008 11:04 |
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 Social Networking for all -
Like it or not, at least for now, social networking is here to stay. New communities with not so new ideas are popping up like mushrooms and yet their popularity is growing exponentially. Most likely, you're probably guilty of being an active member of at least one such community, if not for the sake of the content, at least for the networking tools and traffic you generate from your participation.
For obvious reasons, this hasn't been overlooked by the giants such as Google, which has released its' Open Social API for eager developers, nor by up and coming start ups trying to build the next great community. Luckily, many developers have joined forces to create open source applications that are available for free download and installation on your servers. Now, with a little forethought, planning, and a lot of innovation - you too can create the next Facebook, Myspace or Digg network (with a twist of course).
It's all too tempting to
hit the ground running with this type of project, running some version of an open source community straight out of the box. But, will it really drive the results you want? The question you need to ask - is what will make your community different? With so many social networks up and running with a much bigger budget and larger community base than you probably have, what will make your site stand out in the crowd?
K.I.S.S - (you all know what that means right?)
Digg for example, was built on a very simple concept - find and rate articles. By no means a new concept. But, the Integration of the commenting and rating system with a community based platform, made it soar in very little time. Let's face it, opinions are like .. well noses - everybody's got one. More importantly, everybody wants to get theirs heard, seen and commented.
If you think you have a great idea that will get the masses in and keep them coming back, check out these free open source community building applications. You never know until you try.
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