I first came across ELGG several years ago when part of a national support network. We were looking for a platform that would enable individuals involved in projects around Australia to have a presence and be able to pick and choose and create groups of interest. At that stage it was simply too complicated. We had trouble finding our way around so we were certainly not going to recommend it to busy teachers. I revisited it a few weeks ago to find that it’s had a complete code rewrite. It’s worth another look for both teaching and team use. What attracted me then, as now, was the bottom up social network philosophy.  Individuals create an account and profile, and dare I say it, portal type space and then join or are invited to join groups and sites.

On Jane Knight’s ‘All things ELGG’ blog I found a useful introduction to ELGG that includes the following slideshare presentation:

Here’s an interesting Comparison of ELGG and Buddypress, and another of Facebook, Ning and ELGG.

It’s the plugins, and their relevance or not to our community uses, that can make or break its usefulness. Of particular interest to some of our UNSW community I’m sure,  is the Tidypics Photo Gallery Plugin which I’m trying to find some examples of in action.

In the meantime I’ve applied to join the Social Media in Learning: Community and will explore further.

[FlickR CC image: CDSessums]