There are more social media sites out there than you can count.
Social Networks can be very powerful. For those who know how to tap into them effectively, social media websites are are greatly accelerating businessesby expanding their reach and influence in a cost effective way.
There are even tons of options for those who want to create their own networking groups. If you want an all-in-one solution you might look at Ning or CollectiveX. To add social modules to an existing web site, KickApps is an option. Or if you just want some basic message board like communication you can look at a free Google Group or Yahoo Group.
But what if you want more control than any of those options offer?
Up to now your only option would be to spend a huge pile of cash hiring a crew of programmers to develop a custom solution. That’s out of reach of most small business owners.
Open Source to the Rescue
Leave it to the good folks at Automattic to come up with a solution. They are backing BuddyPress which builds on their WordPress MU (multi-user) platform to create full blown social media sites. For those who are familiar and comfortable working in the WPMU environment, BuddyPress is a very cost effective way to get a new niche social media site up and running relatively quickly.
And BuddyPress moved one step closer to being ready for prime time today with the release of Release Candidate 1, which means it is getting more stable and most of the bugs have been worked out of it.
This is really good news. Having an open source option for creating social media sites really opens the doors for organizations that can really benefit from providing a way for their communites to better connect.
I’ve been working with BuddyPress for a couple months now and I’m impressed. Something tells me once word gets out about this project we’re going to see BuddyPress sites all over the place.
Update: Here is a video intro to BuddyPress so you can see what all it can do.
Chris, its good to see that finally someone has some up with a somewhat user friendly version of a mu blogging system. Maybe a year or two ago I was looking for something like this (had a cool idea) but just couldn’t find the right application. I even looked at customizing some open sources CMSs to no avail. Once they continue to hone this I’ll take a look and maybe rehash some of my old ideas.
Thanks,
Kerry
Buddy Press definitely have the potential to become one of the most successful Social Media sites, although it might take some time to achieve this goal…
BuddyPress seem like an interesting social community to make friends.
Now, I just got to squeeze out some time from StumbleUpon to explore this application.
I checked out the site as well. I wonder what effect this will have on forums, as it seems to convert your wordpress blog into an active forum in itself.
Cool stuff anyway you look at it!
I tried buddypress but its giving me many problems (too advance for me)… In my case i am using some easy modules and they are working really good. people like it and i increase my time on page…thanks for the post
I’ll actually be checking out Ning later today for the all in one feature. It seems BuddyPress might be a little too confusing for my tastes. Definitely something to keep in mind though down the road.
Haven’t heard of this type of social site until I came across this post. Sure sounds interesting.
Hi Cris,
Good to see something about buddypress on your blog.
My team has benn working with buddypress, kaltura etc.
Check out this link for BuddyPress-Kaltura Media Component that we have developed. http://www.wpveda.com/buddypress-kaltura-media-component/
I hope you and fellow readers find it useful.
I’ve used BuddyPress & Kaltura both. Putting them together is a great idea. I think you’re on to something with this plugin, Vick!
How do you keep the admin account on Kaltura from maxing out space and bandwidth if everyone’s uploads fall under the admin’s? Seems like things could get expensive for the admin fast that way.