Appendix A – Forum Product Brief

Zoe Wake Hyde

Product Feature Brief: Rebus.Community Message Board

Problem statement (what is this solving?)

The rebus.community site needs a place where topic-based threaded discussions can take place, to serve as a community hub and communication tool for users, both to speak to each other and to Rebus staff.

We call this “the Rebus.Community Forum.”

By connecting users and staff, the forum will serve as a channel to develop community engagement, offer support to users from both peers and staff, seed the collaborative development of documentation/resources and establish the ‘best practices’ in OER. It will be a key communication channel for both Rebus staff and the community.

Unlike the project/book specific communications, this will be a place to ask general questions and post requests which will likely include:

Technical questions that are currently handled by support (rationale: this process should be moved to a public platform to model openness, foster peer to peer support, frame Rebus as a catalyst not a service provider and reduce replication of efforts as similar questions are asked by different people)
Requests for guidance getting started with Rebus
Advice on practical tasks like sourcing images/licenses/covers/formats/distribution etc.
Advice on explaining/advocating for OER in your institution etc.
Users sharing solutions for anyone who runs into the same problem
Input on broad conceptual questions about OER
Discussion about OER best practices

See http://www.princexml.com/forum/ as an example, also StackExchange, Reddit etc.

Proposed Solution (how is this solving that?)

MUST

Enable question/answer exchanges
Enable in-depth and long-running discussions (maybe options to pin?)
Double as a support resource by recording exchanges for future use (easily searchable, limited duplication)

SHOULD

Allow ‘best’ answers to surface
Have clear categories/filing system

CAN

Have a built-in incentive mechanism to reward valuable contributors
Allow discussions to feed into resource pages
Allow discussions to feed into book projects (to create guides)

Impact (what change is this effecting in the world?)

The message board will be central to building the collegiate spirit of the Rebus Open Textbook community. With a robust community engaging on the full gamut of issues relating to OER, what will emerge is an engaged community of practice who collectively set the standard of how to do Open Textbooks in the best possible way.

Business (how does this survive & thrive?)

All Rebus users will have automatic access and be directed there for support and discussion
Community guidelines and staff will manage and model behaviour, to foster healthy interactions

Innovation (how is this unique/different from others?)

By positioning Rebus as a catalyst instead of a service provider who is the final word/the expert in the area, we enable the people involved in the processes to develop resources that address their specific needs.
It models Open practices to users – our process around support and development of resources shouldn’t be opaque when we are advocating Openness.

Marketing (how will this enter and live in the market?)

This will be one of the very first pieces of rebus.community and users will be directed to it as soon as able, with onboarding documentation explaining function. It will be a key part of the rebus.community site and actively promoted as a primary support and discussion channel.

Measure (how will we know this is working?)

Number of active users
Number of posts per day/week/month
Average number of responses per post
Emergence of answers and consensus on issues that can be converted to resource pages