bookofjoe.ning.com

What's ning?

I thought you'd never ask.

I first heard of it in a March 3, 2007 New York Times article about the new wave of social networking sites.

ning.com, reintroduced last week after a limited introduction last year, is the creation of Marc Andreesen, who brought us Netscape.

Brad Stone wrote, "Mr. Andreessen's ning, based in Palo Alto, Calif., is fashioning itself as a one-stop shop catering to this growing interest in social networks. Anyone can visit the site and set up a community on any topic, from the television show "Battlestar Galactica" to microbrew beers. ning users choose the features they want to include, like videos, photos, discussion forums or blogs. Their sites can appear like MySpace, YouTube or the photo sharing site Flickr — or something singular. Those setting up ning communities can pay $20 a month if they want the site free of text advertisements delivered by Google."

The Times reporter was spot-on: anyone can do it — because I did.

In about five minutes, with no trouble whatsover.

You can't succeed online no matter how good your idea unless people can use it, and Andreessen et al have succeeded in taking it down to TechnoDolt™ level.

An excellent omen.

Anyhow, bookofjoe.ning.com is now up and running, anyone can join and do whatever people do, and every now and then I'll stop by and see what's happening.

As always, in the end ning's making money with its Google ads and I'm not but hey — what's new?