Ning is phasing out "free" and communities will die

If you're one of the hundreds of thousands or even millions of people running an online community on Ning, it's time to pull out your credit card or look for new digs.

The company announced earlier this week that the free model is going away. TechCrunch published the memo issued by Ning CEO Jason Rosenthal and I encourage you to read it. You may recall that I interviewed Mr. Rosenthal back in November when he was Chief Operating Officer of Ning and he had nothing but great things to say about ...