I don't know you, but I kinda hate this new "Latest Activity" look...

[SafeNSure]

...my complain to Ning didn't fly very high, though:

sent 02/10/2009 04:33 PM:
...did you guys remove the individual members icons from the activity list?
I believe the avatar/screen name association is much more powerful than just the screen name, and much easier to immediately associate to the users.
I like the specific activity icons, nevertheless removing the users images seems a net loss, in terms of incentive to read/post/participate.

...since this was their answer:
"In our Feb. 5 release, your social network's Latest Activity feed was overhauled and redesigned, with new icons and much more information, such as summaries and excerpts. This encourages interaction and activity on your network.
While you cannot revert your network's Latest Activity feed to the old style, you can be sure we are taking the feedback we hear into account as we refine this feature and I've added your comments."

So if you are nostalgic, like me, here below you can find the last screenshot I was able to retrieve...
^__^

[hillexallen]

Ok, here's what we're going to do. Everyone who see this will send one complaint note to Ning at [e-mail]. Then, whoever sent a note will post here so we can log how many people have done it. [e-mail]

THIS NEW ALERT THING SUCKS! THE OLD ONE WAS ACTUALLY HELPFUL, BUT THIS ONE IS BULLSH!T!!!

SEND A COMPLAINT NOTE TO NING NOW!!! [e-mail]

[Fyrel]

It looks so.....empty now. :(

[hillexallen]

In that case...SEND A NOTE TO THEM!!!

Use either [e-mail] or the form that SafeNSure posted!

[hillexallen]

HERE IS THEIR EMAIL ADDRESS!!!

[e-mail]

[SafeNSure]

...it's probably better to use this form.

[Fyrel]

Submitted.

[monk]

Note and request sent via the form

[orem]

gave them some commentary through the form...

[Fyrel]

I just got the exact word for word response you had. Oh well, with all of us sending letters (and probably more from other networks) it should change soon.

[orem]

well i'm quite happy with the response i got. check it out:

[The Ning Team - 02/11/2009 12:47 PM]
Hi!

In our Feb. 5 release, your social network's Latest Activity feed was overhauled and redesigned, with new icons and much more information, such as summaries and excerpts. This encourages interaction and activity on your network.

While you cannot revert your network's Latest Activity feed to the old style, you can control which activity displays at the Latest Activity section of your Manage tab.The reason we replaced the extremely small photos with icons in the new Latest Activity Feed is because the photos were challenging to read. We'll be rolling out a better solution shortly. Namely, we'll introduce rollovers/pop-ups of the person's larger photo as well as more information about them. In this way, there will be richer information in the same space.

As always, we appreciate the feedback as we continue to introduce new features and functionality to the Ning Platform. We won't always get things right the first time and appreciate getting the immediate reactions from you all so that we can address the issues.

Cheers!
Courtenay

[hillexallen]

I got the exact same letter from the exact same person!

[SafeNSure]

...they must have been swamped with complains: the ning community platform is -at least- as much about the individual (and active) members, than it is about the content.
Let's keep finger crossed...