I just saw the news, Buddypress 1.2 is now available. It’s a plugin (or an ecosystem really) that lets you add a social network to your WordPress installation. The big thing about it was that up too now you needed a WordPress MU installation to make use of it. This new version works on a standard installation of WordPress, which means anyone can make use of it. There are some other great things in this release, like a brand new theme and simplified installation; but nothing as big as the standard installation feature.

So how does it work? Let’s say you had a blog about childbirth and raising kids; you could deploy Buddypress onto the blog, so people can debate home schooling, cocoa butter stretch marks or whatever subject that your network wanted to debate.