This article looks at what constitutes an open educational resource and considers the issues and benefits to an educational institution that is moving to participate in open educational resource development and to adopt more open educational practices. It describes the initial steps in these directions being made by the Educational Development Centre at Otago Polytechnic, a tertiary educational and vocational training institution in Southern New Zealand. (The original, unedited version of this article is also available online at Blackall (2007b)). (Contains 3 figures.)