There is a new kid on the block – at least new to me. It is called Ning. Yes, that is right, Ning.

I will let the people at Ning give the best description of what they are: “Ning is the only online service where you can create, customize, and share your own Social Network for free in seconds.” It is like MySpace and Google or Yahoo Groups and You Tube all rolled into one.

“Ning is a platform for creating your own social networks. Our passion is putting new social networks in the hands of anyone with a good idea. With Ning, your social network can be anything and for anyone.

You start by choosing a combination of features (videos, blogs, photos, forums, etc.) from an ever-growing list of options. Then customize how it looks, decide if it’s public or private, add your brand logo if you have one, and enable the people on your network to create their own custom personal profile pages.”

Ning is truly innovative, which is why I love it. I have not explored it yet – I just saw it today – and intend to use it. What the people at Ning have done is create what they call a platform, or collection of technologies that keeps expanding and is unlimited to its members. I and other members can create what I define as a social network as I perceive and desire it.

I am excited about this opportunity. They do provide businesses the opportunity to create a branding of a social network. It will be interesting to see how this develops.