BuddyPress is free plug-in for WordPress that will convert your WordPress website/blog into fully fledged social network. BuddyPress is an excellent choice for bloggers that have good knowledge about web development. Even the plug-in is free and open source, there are many things that require some PHP knowledge, WordPress/BuddyPress theme development and extensive understanding of WordPress core. BuddyPress Features BuddyPress out of the box features are: user profiles / extended profiles activity streams user groups private messaging notifications It is easy to extend the features with plug-ins which you can download from BuddyPress Plug-ins page: https://buddypress.org/plugins/. Pay attention on supported version of BuddyPress and WordPress, many plug-ins are outdated and can crash your website. Here is a link to list of recommended plug-ins, but again keep in mind to check version supported and possible conflicts with other plug-ins: https://buddypress.org/extend/recommended-plugins/. Web hosting Requirement As it is build over WordPress core, system requirements are the same, however keep in mind, that for large social network, you will need at least mid-level VPS. How to Install BuddyPress Installing BuddyPress is very easy, the same as you are installing new plug-in for WordPress – navigate to Pluins>Add new and search for “BuddyPress”. Hit “Install” and...

GD Star Rating is one of the most popular plug-ins for WordPress - sophisticated rating and review system for post, pages and comments. One of the best things is that there are constant updates and development of this plug-in, as well as GD Star Rating is rich snipped ready. Before I start listing the features and capabilities, I just want to mention that this plug-in work out of the box and in most cases there is no need to touch the settings at all. List of GD Star Rating Features Integration into posts and pages – singe or multi-rating system Comment rating - comment author review using standard, single rating block (thumbs ranking) Author rating and review Multiple rating review – up to 10  different criteria Using standard graphics or custom graphics for ratings (stars template system) Set number of ranking stars IP or cooking protection for rating Rating control (per user, per IP, per comment) Rich snippet support Widget support Template system Multi-language support - English, Serbian, Spanish, Hindi, German, Italian, French, Ukrainian, Byelorussian, Russian, polish Support for cache plug-ins –  (we’ve tested in combination with W3 Total Cache) Ajax dynamic loading Votes moderation Charting support with pChart library Saving...