Sharing new ideas, design challenges, or discoveries
Overview
The ideas space of BMEplanet is our place for open innovation and crowd-sourcing. We invite you to share and innovate upon emerging ideas, post design challenges for the community, and present recent discoveries to the larger network of potential partners, etc. When the discussion about a particular idea begins touching on intellectual property, you can create a private collaborative project workspace to enter into a confidential discussion.
Viewing and navigating ideas
The main page of the ideas section lists ideas, by default showing those that have been posted to the site recently. For each idea, a title and brief (one or two sentences) summary is provided, along with the name of the poster, the date of last activity (e.g., the last time a user commented on the idea), and the number of comments that have been entered under the idea. You can explore an idea by clicking on its title. You can also view ideas on the main page of this section according to most popular ideas (the popularity of an idea is a function of the number of views and comments that it receives), my ideas only (i.e., ideas you have posted), challenges only (i.e., open-ended design challenges that users have posted), ideas to license only (i.e., technologies or discoveries specifically seeking licensing partners), or all ideas by clicking on the corresponding links on the right side of the page. In addition, all ideas are overlaid on a map of the world; when you click on "world map," you can mouse over any nation and a tooltip will appear that will list the latest count of ideas. Clicking on this number of ideas will take you to a page that will list ideas within just that nation, again in chronological order from newest to oldest.
Upon posting an idea, you may specify the visibility (or privacy) of the idea according to any one of three categories: "public" if the idea may be viewed by anyone, including non-members of BMEplanet; "members" if the idea may be viewed only by members of BMEplanet when they are logged into the Web site; and "private" if the idea may be viewed only by you as the poster of the idea.
Ideas that have been resolved (e.g., design challenges that have been successfully addressed or ideas that have gone through the innovation cycle, etc.) are denoted by a checkmark, and statistics of resolved versus unresolved numbers of ideas are displayed in the right side of the section.
As you browse the idea space, you will be able to click on each idea one by one. You can review the description for an idea as well as prior comments posted by members of the BMEplanet community. You can also add your own comment (see "Commenting on an idea" below).
Posting an idea
To create an idea, click on the "create an idea" button on the right side of the page and complete the ensuing form. We ask that you provide some or all of the following information (required fields are denoted by a red asterisk on the form):
- a brief title for the idea (that will be viewable on the main page of the idea space);
- tags, or short phrases separated by commas that serve as keywords/descriptors for the idea;
- a brief (one to two sentences) summary of the idea (should a user want to skim over the idea briefly to gauge whether it is of further interest);
- a detailed description of the idea that will be viewable to users if they click on the workspace and therefore must be non-enabling;
- the visibility for the idea ("private" indicates that the idea is visible only to you; "members" indicates that the idea is visible only to members of BMEplanet (i.e., the BMEplanet community, or registered users who must log in); and "public" indicates that the idea is visible to anyone (and may be indexed by search engines such as Google or Bing));
- whether the idea is a design challenge that needs to be solved;
- the status of the idea ("unsolved" or "solved"; usually "unsolved" initially); and
- whether the idea is a technology or discovery for which you are specifically seeking licensing partners.
You must agree to the terms and conditions of use of the idea space of BMEplanet upon posting a new idea.
Once you have posted an idea, you can add files to it to further clarify your description or you can be the first to comment on it to increase its visibility within the idea space.
Editing ideas
Once you create post an idea, you can go back and edit it by modifying any of the fields described above (click on "Edit this idea" on the right side when viewing the idea). Note that you will only be able to edit ideas that you have posted. If an idea you have posted is resolved, please update its status to "solved" to maximize the time spent by your colleagues and to help us track the success of our idea space. You may also delete ideas that you have posted by clicking on "Delete this idea" on the right side when viewing the idea.
Commenting on ideas
When you are reviewing a particular idea, you can read the idea summary and description, download any files that have uploaded, and track comments that have been posted in the discussion area. To leave your own comment, enter your message in the "Post a comment" box and click "post." Your entry will be added to the discussion area. To upload a file such as a Microsoft Office document, an image, or a video, etc., click "attach," choose the file on your computer that you wish to upload, and then click on "upload." You can edit (click on "Edit my comment") or delete (click on the trash can icon) any comments that you post and also delete any files that you upload (click on the trash can icon next to the file).
Create a workspace from an idea
In some cases, you may find yourself exchanging comments about a particular idea with colleagues. If this discussion starts to touch on intellectual property, you can create a private collaborative project workspace to continue your discussions behind a firewall and protect any patentable material. To create a workspace, click on the "create a workspace" link on the right side of the page (when viewing the idea) and complete the ensuing form. For help on the "Create a workspace" form, see the collaborative project workspaces help documentation.
For additional help
Have any questions? E-mail support@bmeplanet.org. Alternatively, e-mail us at feedback@bmeplanet.org if you have recommendations for improving this feature.
