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Public Roadmap

We separate two very different kinds of progress: building the platform (engineering) and producing reviewed content (research + human review). The platform is substantially complete. The content is honestly still being produced — and we would rather show you an empty, trustworthy shelf than a full, fabricated one.

RKB is in an open, honest beta. The platform is built; the human-reviewed care content is still being produced. See exactly where things stand on the launch dashboard and how content earns publication in our editorial standards.

Engineering platform

Complete Done

  • Three-layer data model (source-backed facts, community layer, consensus)
  • Full editorial workflow: draft → internal review → scientific review → approval → publication
  • Public site: species, care sheets, taxonomy explorer, references, search, comparison
  • Community contributions, moderation, verification, and consensus surfacing
  • Research & specialist-review workspaces for human researchers and reviewers
  • Deployment, backup/restore, and account-lifecycle operations (rehearsed end-to-end)

Planned next Planned

  • A user-initiated “report this content” flow for community posts
  • A committed moderation response-time expectation and staffing plan
  • Self-service account deletion and correction/appeal flows
  • Automated accessibility (axe/Lighthouse) and cross-browser testing
  • A real external staging/production host with TLS and automated backups

Reviewed content

Complete Done

  • Editorial pipeline proven end-to-end on a real candidate species (Ball Python)
  • Reusable species editorial playbook and evidence-review process
  • Research and specialist-review packets prepared for the first candidates

In progress Now

  • Recruiting human researchers with lawful access to authoritative sources
  • Recruiting and verifying qualified specialist reviewers
  • Ball Python: awaiting the first human specialist-review cycle
  • Corn Snake, Leopard Gecko, Bearded Dragon: research in progress, not yet publishable

Planned next Planned

  • First published species once specialist review completes
  • A coherent starter set (~5–10 common pet species), each specialist-reviewed
  • Rights-cleared images and a scientific media library per published species
  • An established review cadence for keeping published content current
Why no published species yet? Producing content to our quality bar needs two human capabilities an automated system cannot provide: lawful access to authoritative sources, and qualified specialists to review welfare-critical husbandry. We will not lower that bar or fabricate content to appear more complete. Track the live numbers on the launch dashboard.

This roadmap reflects the state recorded in the project's own launch documents (docs/rkb/LAUNCH_READINESS.md, LAUNCH_BLOCKERS.md). It is a direction of travel, not a dated commitment.