Q. Who is the co-op for?
A. It's for Caravel users who want access to services specific to their market segment, or who are interested in a cost-sharing mechanism for web services development.
Q. Where does the co-op membership fee go?
A. The co-op membership defrays the administrative costs of the co-op and underwrites core CMS development.
Q. How is the development agenda decided on?
A. Each voting co-op member contributes agenda and can vote on the cumulative agenda, each member having 100 total voting points that can be spread across any number of projects.
Q. How is the development agenda paid for?
A. Each project must have a detailed specification that is approved by the co-op members, which includes a cost/hours estimate. Members can elect either to pay for projects or code them. At the end of each quarter, the total cost of development is divided among member schools with schools making in kind development contributions begin credited for the number of hours spent developing times the average hourly rate.
Q. How do you ensure a quality product?
A. Finished projects will be anonymously ranked by co-op members for turnaround time, efficiency, bid accuracy, code quality, aesthetics, documentation, and reliability. Highest ranking programmers and teams will get preference in awarding new projects.
Q. What if a project has appeal across multiple co-ops/market segments?
A. For projects with broad appeal we will make every effort to have them developed as part of the core CMS agenda. The Caravel CMS board has the right to release such features under an open source license if deemed approporiate, or to reserve them for co-op members.
