I’m looking to base my next community launch on a social networking script. I’ve just started looking into this, so I’m kind of new.
Are there any great ones that I should know of, and some I should stay away from?
I’m willing to pay ‘decent’ money for a good script.
Or…should I have one coded from the ground up?
I agree. 5-6 members online for a community that size is a problem. A BIG problem.
I’m with you Strawberries…the lack of members on the izabi sites is troubling. The only good site seems to be the DogMeet site. (Lots of members, and it seems active)
Does anyone know if Alicia will integrate with vBulletin?
I’ve been looking for a couple of days. There is Community Builder for Joomla at joomlapolis.com. There is another version for Mambo (Joomla and Mambo being closely related). There is a social networking module for Drupal at drupalution.com. Finally, there is osDate, a bit less than a social networking site, but an honorable mention. What I have yet to find is MySpace-like profiles that allow user’s to insert HTML code and modify CSS tags.
you guys maybe read the newsweek article ? 
Nope, but heading to check it out… (did you mean the one about kids and predators?)
I think that I have discovered that the best solution is a combination of CiviCRM (a flavor of Drupal) and the MySpace module at www.drupalution.com. However, the Drupalution site seems to be adrift, there is no forum activity and you can’t register as a user. More than half the modules that the site promotes are still in design, so the site is very new. Hopefully it will warm up. Interest in Drupal.org is starting to gather.
Here’s something that’s open source:
http://www.phpizabi.net/?L=cms.infos.about
(and still in beta, but it looks interesting…)
Well, it isn’t quite open source, although they say it will be soon. At present they are still using Ioncube to encrypt portions of the code. I couldn’t get Ioncube working to test their code.
What do you think of this application?
http://www.alstrasoft.com/efriends.htm
It’s not open source, but I’d still like to hear your opinion on it… 
Has anyone had a chance to look over this option: http://www.vastal.com/full_desc.php?soft_id=39
I talked to someone from there about a month back and was told that it’s not encoded. A bit expensive, but it’s the only script I found that works like myspace
Well, neither is open source. I can’t say much without running the code, but I doubt that either allows users to put HTML code in their profile. That is what has made MySpace so wildly popular.
I am finding a drawback in Drupal, their forum is a disappointment and they don’t support integration with any other open source forum like SMF or phpBB. However, it is certain that I could make profile pages that allow people to use HTML, even PHP if I were so foolish.
I’m pretty sure the script from vastal allows users to to put html code in their profiles. Where did you see that it was encoded?
I won’t purchase another encoded script again
STAY WAY FROM ALSTRASOFT!
They make absolutley atrocious software, and you’d be extremley lucky if the software even partially worked.
Wow, you’re the second person today to tell me that their products were problematic. Thanks for the warning!
I’m taking a closer look at vastal’s scripts now. I also like the Vastal’s shaadi script. I think one could do some interesting things with it.
Here’s something that claims to be an open soure myspace clone:
http://www.popscript.com/view_item.php?ItemID=769&CategoryID=6&SubcategoryID=58
Your thoughts?
ETA:
I don’t think I like it…
Does anyone know what’s being used to power: http://www.christianster.com ?
Regarding phpIzabi, they’re about to release ‘Alicia’ which is supposed to be ‘worth the wait’…
I still haven’t found the solution I’m looking for, so I guess I can wait another couple of weeks to see what “Alicia” is all about…
What did you think of Drupalution’s MySpace module?
As to popscript, I’m a developer and so my biggest concern is learning the system and being able to modify it, so I get the willies from any solution that isn’t Open Source. But I find a $60 script to be especially dubious. Sales for such a script can’t be of high enough volume to afford the programmers, unless they’re in India and did it really fast.
I haven’t looked at it yet…
Right now I’m looking at adapting vBulletin into a combo ‘matchmaking/myspace’ -style community.
I’m a webmaster, as opposed to a programmer, so I need something that’s easy to admin, and vB is easssssssssy.
But a friend says I sould really wait for the release of Alicia from the phpIzabi folks. PhpIzabi is really cool, and Alicia is supposed to be even better (and open source)
What is the topic on the forums of your websites? Thirty THOUSAND is a huge number of members. :smash: Its sounds like you’ve done no promoting/market to get such a huge number, given the lack of financial incentive. This makes my eyes light up :bouncy: because I have a critical mass problem. In my SNS search engine I want to use a predictive indicator that rules out more than 99% of people, so I need a lot of people in the system for matches to start showing up. Do you do any kind of promotions, or does google hits on archives do most of your promoting for you?
I really like these little gifs, I’m about ready to give up on Drupal since it won’t support them.