Moore’s law states that the number of possible transistors in computer chips doubles every 18 months. If this is the case, then new technologies become outdated rather quickly. Some technical experts apply the principle in other areas and not just with computer chips. As a general rule, it is safe to say that all forms of software and hardware become outdated due to new innovations.
Ning is a software-as-a-service that gives users the ability to create and manage a social network. The service has several tiers, depending on the number of members you have. The introductory tier is around $25.monthly for access to all features and a membership community of 1000. For some users, Ning is an excellent option. However, there are some things to keep in mind before making the decision to launch your community on Ning.
My Experience with Ning 2.0
I learned about Ning in 2008, after the company had released version 2.0. I have no experience with the 1.0 release. I got started with 2.0 after one of my software engineer friends and I tried to build it from scratch. We were inspired by Mark Zuckerberg’s journey with Facebook and decided to follow in his footsteps. Unfortunately, for us, we could not build what we needed. The engineer told me the project would be better off using a service like Ning. After reviewing the company and its products I agreed and began the process of building the social network.
Ning has many useful features. It provides a customizable framework through which users can build a web presence that is accessible, reliable and scalable. In order to get started. I would recommend buying a domain name from a marketplace like GoDaddy or Domain.com. You can start building a social network without one, Ning will ask you to name the project you are creating and it will assign it the domain “titleofproject.ning.com”. Once you’ve purchased your official domain, you can add it in the settings section of your Ning account and it will forward everything you create to the chosen domain.
After you’ve got the domain, you will see a blank canvas. Do not be intimidated by this, the development process on Ning is not very daunting. After you sign in, you’ll see a section where you can drag-and-drop features into the framework. Ning offers member profiles, photos. videos, blog posts and monetization. You can select features in any order as well as make adjustments to the appearance of the website.
Before adding all of the features, I like to start with the company logo. After uploading it, I choose the layout and color scheme. This adds creativity to the canvas and makes the development process better because you’ll have brand identity in mind as you’re creating the website.
Next it would be a good idea to add all of the features your social network will need. Due to the popularity of Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok and other social media platforms, most users will think that the more features the website has the better. This may be true for some projects, but it is also a good idea to keep in mind that if your audience does not use a particular feature you can remove it and it may improve the user experience.
When I created on Ning 2.0 I added as many features as possible. At the time, Ning offered music integration and third-party apps that you could drag-and-drop at any given time. I was able to put emphasis on certain features based on how my community interacted with them.
I had a small niche audience of 640 fine and performing artists from around the world, images of over 6,000 pieces of art, and members who actively participated with uploading content like videos and blogs. If you have thousands of members but they are not very active, it would be a detriment to the website. It is far better to have a target audience that is interested in your content and sharing their own.
My Ning 2.0 network was live from 2008 to 2016. Somewhere along the line, Ning decided to phase out support for 2.0 networks in order to allocate its resources for 3.0 networks. The company provided the Ning Archival Tool that copies the contents of a Ning 2.0 network and puts them in files that can be installed on other platforms to bring back the contents of the network.
Unfortunately, Ning 2.0 networks can not be uploaded onto the 3.0 framework. I still have my Ning 2.0 website archived and I recently contacted Ning to see if it were possible to upload it to 3.0. To my surprise, Ning has not implemented this functionality even after years of 2.0 users requesting it. Also, Ning 3.0 allows users to embed videos but you cannot upload them directly like you could in 2.0. Also music and third-party apps do not exist on 3.0.
On one hand having less features probably makes Ning 3.0 faster than 2.0, but with less functionality some developers will bring their projects to other platforms instead.
Two Excellent Features of Ning 3.0
There are two qualities of Ning 3.0 networks that are worthwhile: they are capable of better design than 2.0 networks and users have the ability to replicate features. For example, if you need to have different sections for written content, you can add as many blog instances as you would like. This would give you the opportunity to separate user-generated content from corporate blog posts or any other type. Ning 2.0 did not offer this ability.
Should You Create on Ning 3.0?
If you have an archived 2.0 network, the only option you have in bringing the website back is to upload it on another participating platform. If you’ve never used Ning or tried to create a social network in the past, Ning 3.0 may be a good option for you to start with. Ning 3.0 makes it easier to monetize websites by giving users the ability to charge visitors for viewing certain content in much the same way as a subscription service. Also, visitors can donate or view advertisements on the website. If you want to make a social network with many thousands of users there may be better options available; however, if you want to manage a social network with a niche audience-Ning 3.0 may be a good starting point.