My intension for My Microsoft Life has always been to set some kind of community, whether that be through a forum or some other social system, as the comment system just doesn’t lend itself to real social interactions.

I have often thought of setting up a forum but to me they don’t seem as social or as useful as some services will allow. To make a useful community I thought about setting up a MML wiki where enthusiasts can add information and keep pages up to date with all the latest news and rumours, but that takes a lot to get it going and it might not prove to be that popular. For the time being I shall be updating a few tables of Microsoft information such as 2010 News, but this lacks the social aspect I am hoping for.

I first used Ning about a year ago to set up a social networking site for university society and over that time they have added quite a few more features and functionality and can offer most of the things I want a Microsoft community to be able to do. So today I have set a Ning site with the sole intension of being the social part of My Microsoft Life where any level of users of Microsoft products can come to share ideas, help each other out and speculate on future releases.

I shall review how the social network is doing in weeks to come and I am open to alternative suggestions for a social element for the site. Aside from some absent features Ning seems to offer lots of ways that Microsoft enthusiasts can interact with each other.

I look forward to seeing you on the social network and hearing what you have to say about the idea.

Take a look at Our Microsoft Life.