I like the new possibility in M5.5 that one can have JCR content being imported:

• Dropping into a folder
• Pulse message that you can import something new.

Problem:
This would have to be done on all instances, also the public instances.
But Authors are not used to log on into a public instance.

Current best approach:

• Trigger/approve on author the import over pulse message
• Navigate manually to the place of the imported node and activate it manually
  The problem I see is that its maybe hard for the approve to really know, where he can find the imported content.

Improvement suggestion:
Adding an additional action in the pulse message, when requesting something to import:
"Import and Activate."
So the author cold decide if he want to only import that node, or import it and distribute it to all public instances.