Social Groups are created & managed by TW members, can be open to the public, moderated, private and even invite-only. Social Groups are similar to forums, maybe more like mini-forums. Although they do have some distinguishing features such as group photo albums.
Review the FAQ entry about Social Groups for some additional details.
Social Groups can be used for all kinds of purposes. Generally, they can give members with shared interest a place to converse. Some example uses of Social Groups might be for tennis teams, tennis clubs, tennis academies, fans of professional players, to discuss specific tournaments (both professional & amateur) etc. You're really only limited based on your own creativity.
Geographic based social groups can be setup to help TW members find and keep in touch with other site members from their areas and to help organize meet-ups for playing tennis, etc.
Everyone can view Social Groups, including site visitors who do not have TW accounts, unless the social group is configured by the group creator to be private.
Only members with 1+ posts can join and create/manage Social Groups. Members that create social groups can upload an icon for their group. Groups can be deleted by the group creator as long as the group is empty. Group creators/managers can transfer group management to other members if they decide they no longer want to maintain the group and if the other site member is interested in doing so. Currently, the limit of groups each member can create is set to 5 (we can change that if it becomes necessary).
You can access the main Social Groups page from anywhere on the site, in the site header navigation area. The link is under the "Community" pull-down menu.
On that page is a link where you can view all social groups and sort through them based on group name, the category the group is in, # of group members, # of discussions, # of posts, # of pictures and by most recent activity. Here's a direct link to that page: http://www.tennisw.com/forums/group.php?do=grouplist
Regarding categories, currently there is only one category: Uncategorized. We'll create different categories once we see how Social Groups are used by the membership and then will determine which new categories might be needed.
I think that's it for now. If you have any questions or comments regarding Social Groups please feel free to post a reply to this thread. I hope everyone who is interested can have fun and make good use of this site feature!
