[IxDA Discuss] getsatisfaction.com

[Alexander Baxevanis]

Hi all,

just stumbled upon this website (getsatisfaction.com), which seems to
be a platform for facilitating user feedback & discussion about any
sort products & services. In many cases the people officially
responsible for the product/service participate in the discussions,
see for example:

http://getsatisfaction.com/twitter
http://getsatisfaction.com/dopplr
http://getsatisfaction.com/paypal

Yes, it does seem to be mostly web2.0 companies, on the other hand
many big companies haven't bothered to endorse any of these
conversations with their participation:

http://getsatisfaction.com/tmobile
http://getsatisfaction.com/dell

I know many companies have their own support forums (that are often
difficult to find or overly "moderated") or in some cases company
employees participate (un)officially in generic forums. But this seems
to be better designed and more "public" than any of the other
solutions.

So what do you think, is that kind of conversation useful for
interaction designers? Would you like to participate in such a forum
about the products/services you've designed? Or if you're already
there, have you managed to get any good insights that you wouldn't
otherwise have thought of?

Cheers,
Alex