Working On A Social Networking CMS
I've been working on a two in one project in my free time. I've been working on a Social Networking web site for gamers. I also plan on releasing the custom CMS (Content Management System) I've been working on that will be the backend/infrastructure of the site.
Why bother creating a new CMS, rather than adopting an existing Open Source solution? Because from what I've found in my research, none of the existing Open Source CMS's out there focus on Social Networking features specifically. The CMS I'm working on is specifically designed for Social Networking/Many-To-Many interaction web sites.
Right now, from what I gather from my existing research, Drupal is the most well known Open Source CMS out there that barely even comes close to the features that I'd like to have when it comes to building multi-site/multi-user web areas. If you take a look at Drupal Groups, that's not bad when it comes to plug-in Social Networking features. But that's just add on features that allow you to put together a few Social Networking features, and it's very limited at that (I'm no expert when it comes to Drupal's Multi-Site system and Organic Goups modules, so please provide any feedback you have regarding it).
The CMS I've been working on is designed for Social Networking web sites from the ground up.
Right now the majority of Open Source CMS's out there focus on a One-To-Many relationship: One person or organization reaching out to the masses. One organization blogging to many readers, one organization selling goods to many customers, one organization offering services to the masses.
And that's just fine and dandy, we need that functionality, and there are plenty of solutions that excel at One-To-Many interaction, e107 and Drupal being just two fish in a very large sea.
But when in comes to Social Networking web sites, everything takes place in a Many-To-Many user space. Many people can create their own web presence and interact with Many other users on the same service/web site.
I think it's great that Drupal makes efforts towards the Many-To-Many user space, but I want to develop and use a system that focuses on this type of Many-To-Many interaction from the get-go, where every feature focuses on Many-To-Many interfaces, from the Log-in System to the tool set 3rd party plug-in developers will use.
I'm looking for volunteers to help design and develop this system, so please let me know if you'd like to lend a hand, and please stop by the forums and throw out any suggestions or feature requests you may have.
I am in the process of adding two new sections to jbWebWare.com. One for collaboration regarding the Social Networking web site for gamers, and one where we can work on the Open Source CMS. I'll be sure to let you know when they are complete.
Till then, feel free to use the forums to post any feedback you have. Thanks!