Ning is rolling out a new feature to network creators today—the ability to charge for premium access and subscriptions. The company says it is one of the most requested features and Ning will be making paid access available to all network creators over the next several weeks.
Ning is leveraging PayPal’s API to allow network creators to simply implement a subscription or paid access on their… → Read More
Ning and live stream video company Ustream are announcing an integrated partnership today that allows Ning network creators to broadcast live video and audio on their website at anytime, complete with live chat capabilities and more.
With the integration, live video content can easily be embedded networks hosted by Ning, allowing users to broadcast via Ustream. Not only can users embed Ustream… → Read More
Mogwee launches this evening, an ambitious new product from Ning unrelated to its core social networking service. It’s a new social/communications tool that’s built from the ground up for mobile platforms, beginning with iOS for iPhones, iPod Touches and iPads.
For now, Mogwee’s main feature is to let you have on the fly public and private instant message-like conversations with people via the… → Read More
2010 was a transformative year for Ning, with the social network platform shuttering its freemium model in favor of all-paid services for network creators. The company rolled out the paid models, unveiled a number of new features for content creators, called Ning Everywhere, and saw an uptick in the number of paid subscribers. CEO Jason Rosenthal says that Ning finished the year with 80,000 paying… → Read More
Social products are an interesting bird. For even the most experienced product designer, social products prove an elusive lover. While there are many obvious truths in social products, there are also alot of ways to design them poorly. Especially when you are deep in the moment making pixel-level decisions trying to remember what’s important, things may not be so clear.
The only magic I’ve… → Read More
Ning is partnering with user management platform for the social web Janrain to offer Ning Creators the ability to add social login and invite friends features to their members
Ning will offer creators the ability to use Janrain Engage, which allows an app developer’s visitors to sign-in to the app with their existing accounts on Facebook, Google, Twitter, Yahoo, LinkedIn or other networks and… → Read More
Here come the Groupon partnerships. In what may be the first of several big distribution deals aimed at cementing its lead in social commerce, Groupon and Ning are launching an affiliate beta program today. Anyone who runs a Ning social network can now add a Groupon widget with geo-targeted daily deals. They will get a cut of any Groupon deals purchased through their Ning sites, and Groupon… → Read More
Tonight, social network platform Ning is giving users a new, more customizable way to interact with their social networks with the launch of Ning Everywhere.
Ning CEO Jason Rosenthal says that network creators were asking for three major improvements in the Ning experience. First, users wanted to be able to take experience of Ning and bring it to any device. Second, creators wanted to take data… → Read More
Hoping to cash in further on Ning’s shuttering of its free version, competitor Grou.ps is upping the ante with the launch of “WinWin”, a referral program directly targeting so-called Ning exiles.
The service claims to have already migrated more than 50,000 Ning networks, making it the largest “do-it-yourself social networking platform”, and hopes to continue this trend by rewarding new converts… → Read More
Hoping to cash in further on Ning’s shuttering of its free version, competitor Grou.ps is upping the ante with the launch of “WinWin”, a referral program directly targeting so-called Ning exiles.
The service claims to have already migrated more than 50,000 Ning networks, making it the largest “do-it-yourself social networking platform”, and hopes to continue this trend by rewarding new converts… → Read More
When Ning shuttered its free service for creating social networks back in April, educators and schools who were using the platform expresses their concern at the company’s decision to include educations networks created by schools and colleges in this group. When Ning eventually rolled out its premium pricing structure in May, the company announced that it had partnered with an education company… → Read More
It’s been no secret that social network platform Ning has been going through a significant transition in both its leadership and business model in 2010. In March, longtime CEO Gina Bianchini was replaced by COO Jason Rosenthal. And in April, Ning’s bubble burst — the company laid off 40% of its staff and killed off its free service. In May, Ning rolled out the different paid models for its… → Read More
The past two months have been tumultuous for social network platform Ning. In March, longtime CEO Gina Bianchini was replaced by COO Jason Rosenthal. And less than three weeks ago, Ning’s bubble burst — the company laid off 40% of its staff and killed off its free service. Today the company, which ended its free service a few weeks ago, is rolling out the different paid models for its platform… → Read More
In the last two months, Ning has been making some drastic changes. In March, longtime CEO Gina Bianchini was replaced by COO Jason Rosenthal. Then, less than three weeks ago, Ning’s bubble burst — the company laid off 40% of its staff and killed off its free service.
Tomorrow, Ning intends to announce its plans for the future, including new features and pricing plans. And we think we may have… → Read More
With yesterday’s news of Ning’s move to eliminate free social networks on its platform, competitors are rushing to emphasize their free offerings for building a social network. Today, Grouply, a startup that’s built around creating and managing online groups from Google and Yahoo Groups, is going to try to make it easy for Ning users to port their groups to Grouply’s platform. And fellow… → Read More
One month after long-time Ning CEO Gina Bianchini was replaced by COO Jason Rosenthal, the company is making some major changes: It has just announced that it is killing off its free product, forcing existing free networks to either make the change to premium accounts or migrate their networks elsewhere. Rosenthal has also just announced that the company has cut nearly 70 people — over 40% of… → Read More
The list of people I interviewed at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland earlier this year is starting to look like more like a hit list than a VIP list. Two of them have been relieved of their current positions – MySpace CEO Owen Van Natta and now Ning CEO Gina Bianchini. If I were Jeremy Allaire, Max Levchin, Sheryl Sandberg or Evan Williams, I’d watch my back. They may be coming for… → Read More
Ning CEO Gina Bianchini is being replaced as the CEO of Ning by COO Jason Rosenthal. Bianchini founded the DIY network of social networks with Marc Andreessen. But after five and half years at the helm, she is ready to try something new. She will transition to an entrepreneur in residence role at Andreessen Horowitz, the venture capital firm started by Andreessen.
In a blog post, Andreessen… → Read More
Up next in our series of tech interviews at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland last week: Gina Bianchini, the CEO of social networking service Ning.
Ning has never had the press attention of Facebook and Twitter. But there are 41 million registered users on Ning, and Gina says that 92 million people a month worldwide visit Ning sites.
We spoke at length in the interview about how the… → Read More
Each year the World Economic Forum at Davos holds number of technology focused sessions. Last year I moderated a high profile discussion about the next digital experience. This year, Loic Le Meur is hosting a discussion on the growth of social networks.
Participants include Reid Hoffman (LinkedIn, Greylock), Owen Van Natta (MySpace), Gina Bianchini (Ning), Evan Williams (Twitter) and George… → Read More
Former Ning exec Jay Parikh left that company in October 2009 after two years as SVP Engineering and Operations. By November he was working at Facebook.
Facebook confirms his employment, saying “We’re pleased that Jay Parikh has joined Facebook. Jay joined us in November, and will play an integral role in our engineering efforts.” What Facebook won’t say is what his title is, what he’s working… → Read More
GROU.PS, a do-it-yourself social network focused on moderated online collaboration has steadily gained an impressive amount of users and added compelling features to its application. The social network platform has just hit 2 million users, adding another million members in just 6 months.
And GROU.PS has amped up its offering for publishers by launching Elastic Modules, which gives publishers the… → Read More
This is an overview of what was said during the panel conversation at Le Web on Platforms, which was moderated by our own Mike Arrington. (right)
Lots of panelists for this particular discussion – the conference organizers managed to get all of these people on one stage: Ethan Beard (Director, Facebook Developer Network), Cristian Cussen (Director of Business Development at Ning), Brandon Duncan… → Read More
Today Ning, the platform that lets users build their own social networks, is launching a new feature called Ning Virtual Gifts, bringing a built-in virtual goods store to the site’s 1.6 million networks. Virtual gifts have become increasingly popular over the last few years, largely thanks to their popularity on Facebook, and I’m sure plenty of Ning’s Network Creators are eager to cash in on the… → Read More
The idea of adding a social network to any site is a compelling one. Currently, most sites do this by creating their own networks using service like Facebook Groups and Ning. But those obviously aren’t actually your own site, they are other sites set up under your site’s name. Stribe’s goal is to move the network back onto your site.
The service, opening to the public today at Techcrunch50… → Read More
Ning, the social network platform that lets users build their own social networks, has launched its application platform Ning Apps to the public. The platform allows Network Creators to customize the features on their networks by adding apps that have been created by third party developers, which include the likes of Ticketmaster, WordPress, Hulu and plenty more. The platform made its debut back… → Read More
A lot of readers were incredulous over last week’s news that Ning raised another $15 million in venture capital from Lightspeed Venture Partners at a $750 million valuation. That comes despite the fact that Ning traffic appears to be flatlining, and revenue to date is likely very small.
A typical comment to that post: “What an ASTOUNDING way to waste money.” Others pointed out that venture… → Read More
Do-it-yourself social network Ning has added another $15 million to its coffers from LightSpeed Venture Partners, the company has confirmed to us. This brings the total capital raised to $119 million. Its other investors include Allen & Co., Legg Mason, chairman and co-founder Marc Andreessen, and Reid Hoffman.
Ning offers a counterpoint to the uniformity of Facebook, allowing anyone to… → Read More
GROU.PS, a do-it-yourself social network focused on moderated online collaboration, has raised $1 million in an extended Series A round of funding from Golden Horn Ventures. The company previously raised $1.1 million in Series A funding from Golden Horn in 2008.
GROU.PS currently has 1 million registered members and 40,000 social networks on the platform. The DIY social network is growing fast… → Read More
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