Ravelry

Ravelry is a free social networking service, beta-launched in May 2007. It functions as an organizational tool for a variety of fiber arts including knitting, crocheting, spinning, and weaving. Members share projects, ideas, and their collection of yarn, fiber, and tools via various components.

Development

Husband and wife Casey and Jessica Forbes founded Ravelry in May 2007. Their idea was to create a web presence for all fiber artists.

In addition to serving as a social network site for users to discuss their crafts, Ravelry facilitates micro-business, allowing crafters to sell their knitting patterns or yarns. Both large- and small-scale businesses are able to advertise their wares on the site. The site has been also used by some for market research.

Ravelry has been mentioned by Tim Bray as one "of the world’s more successful deployments of Ruby and Rails technologies."

Features

"Ravelry has become the Internet tool to help the typical needle-wielder navigate through the woolly wild."