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[gekko]

I have used eCollege and BB as an adjunct in a couple online platforms. I also maintain a private studio of a few students that are geographically dispersed. I am having difficulty finding a platform that would work for this since neither BB nor eCollege have an "out of the box" solution for an individual private educator or business owner. (The closest option with BB costs 10k per year.) Here's what I'm looking for:

-An environment that allows individual sign in with user name and password, not a public forum.
-Ability to chat (asynchronous is fine, no real time chat needed) and upload/download files as large as a small audio file.
-Up to ten users at a time.
-Freeware or low cost purchase/license.

I do NOT need the following features:

-Entering grades of any kind.
-Email student directly from classroom.
-Accept payments of any kind through platform.

I could almost make a social networking site work with the exception of the public aspect. I could probably even forgo the upload/download of large files in the platform and simply use a class email list for this. Any online chat board with individual log ins would probably be sufficient. Thoughts?

[laviniaminor]

I'm experimenting with using a Squarespace.com hosted site for this purpose. Their Pro level option allows you to have up to 250 members who can log in to access pw-protected parts of the site, including file downloads and discussion boards, and the next level up has a dropbox function. I've been tinkering with setting up my site, but haven't tested its members-only functions yet. It's not free, but for the combination of hosting, easy and flexible WYSIWYG design, and features, it looks great so far. And it's all cloud-hosted, so you don't need to install any software, nor do your students/users.

[gekko]

Thanks for the note. I've taken a look at their site and intend to contact them as well. I might post a bit later or pm after having done so.

[laviniaminor]

gekko, if you want to pm me I can send you a link to the site I set up with Squarespace - not fully up and running yet, but you can see what's possible.

[larryc]

Your requirements are pretty basic. I think that Ning or Google Groups would work.

[gekko]

Thanks larry. I'd not considered those options, having never used either but will check them out. laviniaminor, I'm interested in the link and will pm. Thanks.