Soylent Communications, a sole proprietorship that also hosted the later defunct Rotten.com,[1] describes NNDB as an "intelligence aggregator" of noteworthy persons, highlighting their interpersonal connections.

[2][3] The Rotten.com domain was registered in 1996 by former Apple and Netscape software engineer Thomas E. Dell, who was also known by his internet alias, "Soylent".

[6] Businesspeople and government officials are listed with chronologies of their posts, positions, and board memberships.

NNDB has articles on films with user-submitted reviews, discographies of selected music groups, and extensive bibliographies.

[citation needed] The NNDB Mapper, a visual tool for exploring connections between people, was made available in May 2008.