[oae-urg] Native OAE discussions

[Clay Fenlason]

I'm trying to refresh my memory on why native discussion functionality
(as opposed to some flavor of a 3rd-party integration) is needed for
the OAE. If I try to express this as a simple set of things we want to
be able to do, it goes something like:

- grade discussion posts; evaluate participation
- reuse discussion content (or portions of discussion content)
- search discussion content
- surface discussion activity within activity feeds
- embed discussions amongst other content and activities in pages

But it's not clear that we couldn't get all this from a 3rd-party
integration. I see people clamoring for better discussion features,
but have a growing doubt that building out OAE discussion
functionality is the timeliest use of our resources.

I can imagine one other argument: discussion activity is so
fundamental and rich in implication that it needs to be a seamless fit
with the rest of the UX design (think: annotations, sharing content
for comment, assessment). But at bottom that's more of an argument for
a discussion front-end, not necessarily a new OAE discussion service.

This obviously has a bearing on hybrid conversations. I'd be glad to
hear what other people are thinking.

~Clay