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Social Networking - Monday, August 13, 2007

Ning Competitor KickApps Raises $20M

The a:c backs the own your own social network concept being popularized by Ning, Kickapps and others. We just think that if you own a social network you will do a better job of managing that niche than Myspace or Facebook ever will. Ning seemed to have surprised a lot of people with its big $44M round recently and now Kickapps has raised $20M.

The company provides a hosted, turn-key, customizable white label community platform with MySpace/YouTube functionality, primarily to major media websites.Founded in 2004 by CEO Eric Alterman, KickApps is based in Manhattan and was originally funded by Spark Capital and Prism Ventures. It has won some nice endorsements from big media companies that are using Kickapps such as Vibe Magazine and Scripps.

The a:c and others tend to group Ning and Kickapps together and while their concepts are similar we doubt their target users ever overlap. Ning is really not for large media companies to integrate into their current sites - although it may be in the future - and Kickapps is really not for small groups like regional volunteer fireman associates, which is a great fit for Ning.

Like Ning, Kickapps seems to have launched with some big features missing, but both have added functionality at a fast clip.

View - Kickapps site