No Depression and Ning
You may or may not realize that the No Depression website is built on Ning, which is an online service to create, customize, and share social networks. Ning recently announced that they are changing their business model and will be phasing out their free service and existing free networks will need to convert to paying for premium services or transition off Ning. Their premium networks (which include No Depression) drive 75% of their traffic so they plan to focus on adding features and functionality that helps those networks further grow and develop while also bringing in more revenue which they need to stay viable into the future.
The changes weren’t articulated very well and there has been some chatter on the internet that has raised a bit of concern among some of our readers as to what this means for the No Depression community. Our goal continues to be providing roots music fans the best place to find out about what’s going on in roots music on the web, and we believe the changes at Ning will only help us better serve the community and make the site easier to use.
We currently pay for Ning’s premium services so we are not one of the “free networks” that will be impacted by this change. I was invited to join a Ning Network Council several months ago and have regular contact with management there. No Depression is one of the many successful networks operating on Ning and we are part of their ongoing strategy to continue developing the platform to make this site even better. Ning will be rolling out additional features in the next few months and this is a positive change that we are very excited about. It will likely cost a bit more to operate the site going forward but along with that will come some great new features that will enhance the site and enrich your experience when you visit!