Ning Blog
A running commentary about our service, Ning.
- Last build:
- Tue, 06 Feb 2007 20:35:51 -0800
- Language:
- en
- Feed URL:
- http://blog.ning.com/index.xml
RSS FEED IDEMS: Ning Blog
- In a nutshell...
Tue, 06 Feb 2007 20:35:51 -0800 - Xavier's BlueTube & Student Video Contest
This is pretty cool. Roadtoxavier created BlueTube, Xavier's online video site.
They've got a student video contest going on between now and February 12th. Now, I'm assuming that our Ning blog doesn't have a huge following at Xavier (especially on a Saturday night) so this announcement isn't going to light any fires, but it does show another - and totally different - use of Ning's video service.
Sat, 03 Feb 2007 17:42:19 -0800 - The Class
I'm a sucker for Jason Ritter. Maybe it's growing up on Three's Company. Anyways, CBS just launched another video site on Ning, this time for it's show, The Class.
Not only can you watch some clips from the show, but you can add your own videos too.
So, how would you get your own video sharing site like this one? Easy!It's free and only requires a couple of quick steps:
- Go to the top of http://videos.ning.com. Click on the button, "Get Your Own Video Site!"
- Decide what you want your new video site to be called and what you'd like the web address or URL to be.
- That's it. You've now got your own video sharing site like YouTube for free in a few seconds.
You can change your new video site's colors, make it public or private, and add videos from your new site to any blog or MySpace page. Your new video player will be branded for your new video site automatically.
Here's the video player for The Class:
See that The Class link? It takes you back to The Class video site. Plus, you can also replace that text there with a logo if you'd like.
Cool, eh?
Sat, 03 Feb 2007 15:53:43 -0800 - Do Something
Do Something is a fantastic non-profit dedicated to helping teens with social action projects. They've created an online community of teens working on various social action projects. Clearly there is hope for humanity.
Sat, 03 Feb 2007 15:34:17 -0800 - Scheduled Maintenance Tonight
We'll be down for the majority of the evening doing maintenance. Hopefully this isn't an inconvenience to anyone.
Have a great night!
Fri, 26 Jan 2007 19:37:13 -0800 - Who is Keppler?
CBS and the CSI Team just launched their WhoisKeppler.com video site on Ning. Michael Keppler (played by Liev Schreiber) is the mysterious character taking over for Grissom while he is teaching some insect class at Williams College for 8 weeks. But this Keppler guy is more of an engima than Gil.....(insert mysterious music)
Not only are the folks from CSI posting video clues to Keppler, fans can add their own CSI videos too as well.
Interestingly, CBS is using the same Ning service available to everyone. While they've purchased a few of our premium features, like domain name masking and running their own ads, one thing I really like about our service is that anyone can use us: from big media companies to small media companies to one person media companies.
Anyways, it's definitely worth a whirl for you hardcore CSI fans out there!
Thu, 18 Jan 2007 16:40:57 -0800 - Ning Photos + eBay REST API = Instant Embeddable Slideshows
Our new "eBay Seller Photos" site makes it a snap to drop an embedded slideshow of your auction photos into your auction pages or anywhere else on the Internet It's a version of our popular Ning Photos site that's been juiced up with some eBay-specific features, all made possible by the eBay REST API.
Getting your own eBay Seller Photos site just takes a few seconds (just like getting your own copy of any Ning site) -- visit http://ebaysellerphotos.ning.com/ and click on the big fat "Get your own" link. Enter your eBay User ID into the configuration panel of your new site, and then your site is automatically populated with photos from all your existing auctions. From there, you can add more photos, generate slideshow embeds for one auction or all your auctions, and edit which photos appear in which slideshows.
The eBay Seller Photos site is a modified version of Ning Photos. It uses a few new eBay REST API functions to work its eBay-related magic. If you're an eBay API developer (or want to be one), the site is a great place to start to see how the basics of the REST API work. Inside your copy of the site, take a look at the file /widgets/photo/lib/helpers/Photo_EbayHelper.php to see what's going on.
Especially when combined with PHP's SimpleXML extension, the eBay REST API is a breeze to work with -- the requests you make to eBay's servers are just regular old GET requests, with assorted query string parameters describing what you're looking for: info about a particular auction, all the auctions listed by a particular user, and so on. The responses are XML documents with a predictable structure, so pulling out the information you need with SimpleXML is easy.
Wed, 20 Dec 2006 16:16:40 -0800 - Just in Time for Tonight's Holiday Parties...
We've got a longish planned downtime tonight to give our hardworking Ning platform infrastructure some love.
The good news is that this means you can go to your holiday parties tonight and not feel guilty that you're not glued to your site. Ok, so maybe that's not what you were going to do tonight.
Anyways, our servers thank you for your patience!
Sat, 09 Dec 2006 10:34:25 -0800 - Blogging Sins
I've committed one of the great blogging sins. I let this blog sit idle for the past week and a half. In this case, the blog has been the casualty of alot of hard work on the next major turn of Ning which we'll be rolling out as a closed beta here in the next two weeks and releasing publicly in February.
I'll be talking here in the coming weeks more about the new release and what we're doing. In the meantime, excuse the fact that there will be lighter posting. I think that the result will be well worth it.
Just because I've been remiss in posting doesn't meant here hasn't been a ton of new sites popping up on Ning. Here's a smattering for you to check out:
MittSpaces
This is a Ning Group site for supporters of presidential candidate Mitt Romney.Linerider
This is amazing, if not sort of trippy. You come, you draw, and a little dude on a bike rides your lines. Hence, linerider. Have a look:
And a personal favorite due to my unhealthy obsession with French Bulldogs (despite not actually having one), FrogDog has created a host of sites from entertaining to informative around all things Frenchies.Checkout French Bulldog Cuteness Wars, Frenchie Vets, and Frogster in the French Bulldog network.
Enjoy!
Sat, 09 Dec 2006 09:35:40 -0800 - portadoAmigos
This is cool. Portado has translated the Group site entirely into Spanish.
He used the Edit Source Code function to make his Group site just what he wanted. In this case, one in Spanish.
I'll leave you with some photos....
Wed, 29 Nov 2006 13:54:26 -0800 - Ning is Hiring!
I just finished updating our Ning Jobs page and wanted to put the word out that we're looking for a few great people to join the team:
If your interested (and qualified!), drop us a note and resume at jobs@ning.com.
And for some background on us, here's a bit of our philosophy and some photos of our digs:
- Run fast, fly low, and be cheap
- Have working social sites that you can point us to today
- Keep everyone informed, both on the good news and the bad news
- Organize based on a cell structure for both developer and non-developer teams
- Flat organization with small, iterative teams of highly productive people
- Transparency – review projects often and keep an open dialogue among different groups
- Reward innovation, ingenuity, and hard work
- Meritocracy
- Evaluate and reward managers based on development of people
- Top down reassignments of high achievers
- Build a team with potential, drive, curiosity, intelligence and ambition
- Take chances on people without a track record – grow together as a team
- Train people
- Everyone teaches
- Honest, frequent feedback
- Weekly 1:1, staff, and all hands meetings
- Written career development plans
Tue, 28 Nov 2006 16:59:37 -0800 - Ning & Force One Networkz Featured in Business Week!
Derek Simmons and Force One Networkz are featured as a part of a story in the latest issue of Business Week that talks about people creating their own social networks and social websites.
Congrats!!!!
Mon, 27 Nov 2006 15:35:42 -0800 - This is Viral. Ning
Dustin Thacker has created a cool social network for artists at This is Viral.Ning, a place for lowbrow & subversive art.
Here's a hit of some of the amazing work:
He's also added a videos site to the mix with some really cool experimental videos like this one:
Have a whirl!
Mon, 27 Nov 2006 15:02:47 -0800 - Cutecast is Live!
Meg is rocking a new facet in her growing empire of cute: CuteCast. 100% cute videos, 100% of the time.
Here's a little of hit of a baby sugar glider....
Does anyone know what a sugar glider is? I think it sort of looks like a possum...
Update: after a trip to wikipedia here, a sugar glider is in fact a possum-like animal. God, I love the Internet...
Tue, 21 Nov 2006 16:38:23 -0800 - Your Own Branded Empire
One of the nifty new features we just rolled out to the Ning Videos and Ning Photos sites (Ning Group has had it for a bit) is a small "About This Site" module that sits at the top left column of the page. This little area can be easily customized by clicking the "Edit" button (no need to dig into any code), and can accept regular text or HTML.
Why is this cool? Good question. Well aside from providing site owners with a handy place to describe their site or drop in embeddable content, it's a great way to link together multiple Ning sites and create a Branded Empire (patent pending - ok, not really).
Here's an example:
As I'm in the twilight of my twenties, my ten-year high school reunion is coming up in a few weeks. Since I'm not going to be able to attend, I thought it'd be cool to create a Ning Group site that'd give Libertyville High School Class of '96 members (go Wildcats!) a place to reconnect without paying fees or digging through countless MySpace pages trying to find someone from their class.
Well, the official reunion committee picked up on the site and it caught on like wildfire. Pretty soon I created LHS 1996 Videos and LHS 1996 Photos companion sites. This resulted in even more interesting stuff, including this video from a former classmate's FOX-televised "Wedding on Ice," and plans to send cameraphone pictures to the site "live" from the reunion, which you can do on any photos or videos site on Ning with the handy unique email address we provide to people automatically.The one drawback, however, was that as my little empire grew, there was no easy way to cross-link the three sites so that users could wander from one to the next without leaving my magical branded reunion theme park.
No more! As soon as the new "About This Site" module debuted, I pasted in some simple HTML and linked 'em up.
Some other situations where this cross-linked setup is/could be cool...
Blogs: Extend your personal brand to some Videos, Photos and Group sites. I've done a bit of this with House of Kyle Videos and House of Kyle Photos.
Weddings, Births or Vacations: Similar to the reunion, you can quickly and easily organize sites around an event.
Fansites: Love Lost? Maybe Veronica Mars? Create an instant fan empire.
Groups at Your School: Be it a fraternity/sorority, a club, a team, whatever...the potential is endless.
As always, we love hearing about the creative things people are doing with their Ning sites, so drop us a line and let us know!
Tue, 14 Nov 2006 14:46:27 -0800
