Discussing the vision, plans and improvements for this new Office 365 Network.

Thanks for kicking this off. I'll share what I can at the moment and please remember that we have many things in the works. Also, thank you for highlighting that this is in Preview, so many things are subject to change. We wanted our community with us on this journey, and the nearly all of the feedback we've received has (in some way or another) been incorporated into our issues logs, immediate fixes, ongoing fixes, and long-term planning. Many of these features also help bring in even more internal PMMs and Engineering, which will make the network a more valuable place for everyone.

Please keep in mind: This thread is to discuss our plans and improvements for this community on this network. We'll try to share as much as we can. Let's stay positive if possible.

- Will there be a mobile app? As @Jeff Medford noted on the announcement thread on the old site, we are developing a responsive mobile web experience. We are looking at the need for an app, but don't have anything solid to share right now. 

-What are current and future features of the platform that will help create community? Following, collaborative groups, co-authoring spaces, a feed for all conversations and people I follow.. Too much to mention everything, but I will make note of some big ones. 

1. As you can see, I am already using a neat feature here that improves readibility, emphasis and ultimately accuracy of information exchange. Rich text editor! We can embed videos, use bold + italics, <insert code> and even add spoilers. While tangentially related to community, I did want to call this out.

 2. Scale. As many of you know, this community helps us scale and helps us reach the many, many folks who are in the Office 365 Community but not the Office 365 Network. 

 3. Discussion styles. We have numerous ways to have conversations here. Including blogs, boards, idea exchanges (vote on it!), contests. We can pick the right medium for the right time. 

 4. Permissioning. I may have just created that verb. We can set a large number of permissions for the styles in no. 3 so that the right folks can see the right information. We can pin, read-only, set as private, stage things, open things and lock posts. While this has obvious community management benefits, it also helps us find, surface, and promote solutions and discussions, which helps us all. 

5. Search. Try it. The search is powerful and will help new members and unathenticated members discover what they are looking for. If content is king, this is the red carpet. We also have analytics relating to search results (and when no results are shown). This helps us fill gaps in content, documentation, and product needs.

6. Community structure. This helps EVERYONE navigate the network. By having a structure of nested groups, our community now has clearer paths to information and subcommunities. Please note: we are currently working on this structure to surface more information (like the nav menu links) and reduce scrolling, clicks, etc. Please be patient here. 

(Coming Soon).

UserVoice Integration. An integrated way to share your ideas and feedback, all within this community experience. This also means there will be a whole lot more MS engineers patrolling these waters.

UI Improvements. Improving the functionality, look and feel. We’re hearing this feedback loud and clear. We don’t want to hold the release of Preview until the details were hammered out. You’ll see changes every day. Some big, some small.

Events. Have a User Group meeting or other industry-related event you’d like to promote? We’re building an events area and process to help you highlight your events.

Ignite. Big things here. Stay tuned!

Thanks for reading and I am excited for the things to come! There are TONS of other features to make note of, and I'll do my best to respond to as many people as possible, but now we need to get back to work building and improving this network. 

-Mike (Community Team)