Hi,
So what I'm looking for is something like a free version of 37signals Basecamp thats less project/todo based and more community based.
I want somewhere people can collaborate. At the moment we use google docs/forms, a forum and IRC.
Does anyone know of any such web applications that bring these features and perhaps other under one roof?
Thanks, Denis
Pinax is a stack of loosely-coupled reusable Django applications billed as "a platform for rapidly developing websites".
Elgg is (was?) geared toward higher education and integrated nicely with Moodle as a portfolio system.
Drupal is a CMS written in PHP that has numerous plugin applications that allow it to be configured as a social networking site.
Plone is a CMS on top of Zope that has numerous plugin applications that allow it to be configufed as a social networking site.
Ning and SocialGo are two platforms that allow you to create social network websites TTW (er, "through-the-web") and manage the hosting and database. These are "low-hanging fruit", and can be a great way throw together a proof-of-concept. Ning owns any data you host with them, and I don't know SocialGo's policies, but they are attempting to be less evil than Ning. (That is, if you consider Ning evil.)
Pinax would be my first choice based solely on my own experiences with each. They all have their strengths and weaknesses. YMMV.
I found another good one myself: http://www.ning.com
Very simple and customisable social network creator.
Cheers, Denis
Build a Social Network Using Joomla! is a nice little tutorial on nettuts website. The article walks through the how and why different items were used to create a very functional social networking website.
A second walk through describes how to use BuddyPress and the multi-user package to turn wordpress into a nice social networking application.
Both of these might be of use to you in determining how you want to forge ahead with your project.