We’ve got fun and games!  Well, close enough anyways!  Today I want to introduce you to some of our new community features that we’ve been launching (not so) silently over the last few weeks.  With the help of my lovely assistant Rachel, I’ll show off some of the key features and talk about how they can be used to maximize involvement with your readers.

So we’ve launched two new key pieces of software out into the b5 wild: forums and our very own basic social network.  This comes in two software packages: bbPress for forums and buddyPress for our social network.  As you’ll probably notice, both of these are [insert catchy name here]press solutions, because they’re both based off of the Wordpress code base.  As a result, things like themes and backends are either integrated into Wordpress (buddyPress) or are extremely similar (bbPress).

Together, we have branded these two solutions “Community” and we’re releasing a distinct community for each site (Blisstree community, Bizzia community, etc.).  We believe that these extensions of our existing sites is essential to growing out into new areas and both solutions have distinct uses.

We all know Wordpress is an amazing piece of software, but it doesn’t do everything we want it to do in the grand scheme of things.  For example, Wordpress doesn’t have an open discussion area where users can bring up topics of their choice and talk about them.  This is where bbPress and forums fit into the big picture.  Frequently users in comments will break off onto a separate tangent and it can detract from the core topic of the article.  The author is then faced with the difficult decision of allowing it to continue in a new direction, driving away from the original article points, or to stifle the flow of conversation.  Having forums gives our users a place to take those conversations and a place to start new ones. 

All of our bloggers will certainly play a key role in this.  There are very few leaders in any given community; it is one of those miniscule percentages of total users, in the 1% range.  We have a clear advantage because our bloggers are already our community leaders.  There is no one who knows the subjects discussed on these sites better than them.  And as a result, they are free to encourage discussions about any subject, without having to worry about research and being authorative and owning the content.  Most importantly, it allows bloggers to interact with their readers outside of the author/commentor relationship and allow readers to start discussions about their favourite topics as well.

The second key piece of the puzzle is buddyPress.  For the longest time, Wordpress profiles have been limited to your name, e-mail address, website and possibly your gravatar.  buddyPress literally creates a social network of b5 users and content.  As you can see on my lovely assistant’s profile page, it not only records and displays all of her activity on one site, it shows her activity across all of the b5media network.  This allows users to discover all of the other content that Rachel is writing, even if they’ve only ever known about her Splendicity articles!

Of course the first thing you likely noticed is that Rachel even HAS a profile.  This software allows us to greatly expand on the default author information stored in Wordpress.  You can include links to outside profiles like Twitter and Facebook. 

The other thing you’ve likely seen appearing across b5media’s sites it the so-called “buddybar” at the top of every page.  This is our user’s new gateway to their profile and social networking options across the network.

It also brings with it several other major features common of social networking sites: sending messages, friends, groups and a wall.  Since I’m feeling quite backwards, let’s discuss these in reverse order! 

The simplest of these is the wall.  As with Facebook, it allows users to send you a public message (”LOVED this article today!”) and is like a comment stream for your profile (or a comment stream all about you!). 

Next up is Groups, and as with most social networks, it simply allows users to group together around common interests.  It features its own wall and going forward will include a special forum section to host discussions as well. 

One of the most important features is that you can befriend other users.  Right now this provides a link to a friend’s profile just a few clicks away.  In the not too distant future we’re going to implement a news feed style community home page, giving you access to see all your friends’ latest updates in one place.

Finally, you can send private messages.  buddyPress features it’s own e-mail style system, just like Facebook, complete with an Inbox, Sent Messages, etc.

To get the ball rolling, between these two new systems, we’ve added several integration points.  All of our logins are now Wordpress logins (with fancy new logos there or coming!) and every user who comes to the site can now sign up for an account!  This gives them access to the forums, makes comments easier, and of course gives them access to their own profile.  We’ve also linked your username in the forums to your profile page on the site as well.

We have lots of exciting features planned around our community moving forward, but they all focus on one similar goal: discovery.  Discovery of new users, new content, and new discussions.  As we move forward we’re going to integrate these solutions much more tightly with Wordpress and outside networks to make sure we can all get the word out about the new and exciting happenings on out network.

There will certainly be more information to come.  For now, feel free to ask any questions and throw out any suggestions and I’ll try to answer as many questions/comments as possible!

In the meantime, check out some of the existing community pages below (and join in the fun!):

Splendicity Community
Blisstree Community

Also, a big hand to Vanna.. I mean Rachel for her assistance

Network News bbpress, buddypress, community, forums, social networking, wordpress