I’m looking for something that combines the group blogging ability of tools like Wordpress, with the social networking aspects of tools like Ning. I want dozens of registered users to be able to blog and comment, and also have user profiles like LinkedIn that show the connectedness between people. Pligg is close, but is more focused on voting about articles. Any suggestions? Free or not free is fine, but I want to be able to host it on my own domain, so I don’t think Squidoo or Zimbio will quite work for me. Thanks!

Are you thinking of running your own website? Or are you talking about a downloadable software program?

If it’s software, you’re out of luck

If you want a website, then you should get drupal (http://www.drupal.org), and it has those features built in. You can even download modules and take it further.

If you run on your own free domain, I would recommend (http://www.freehostia.com) for starters and get a domain name at godaddy.com. When your site gets bigger you can upgrade there or move to a bigger server.