Reader feedback mechanism

Very interesting survey, Ravpapa. I think this type of information is very good to have. I do think that readers get less attention than editors when it comes to research, so I'm glad that there is some attention paid to this very important group. Reader feedback on articles is an interesting slice. I'd also like to get a better understanding of the reader -> editor transition. I've seen some academic research on this and we're also gaining some additional texture through the follow-up interviews with people who completed the Former Contributors Survey.

One thing we learned from the Former Contributors Survey is that even our casual users (editors in this case) really like to give us feedback. The overwhelming sentiment from that survey is that these users are a gold mine of information -- they just need to be asked.

Re: limitations of research -- as everyone knows, it's always tricky to find the balance between interpreting research too narrowly vs. too broadly. These types of discussions are exactly what we need to help us negotiate that line. Going forward, maybe we can start these conversations by asking "How can we use this information?" This perspective might help us figure out how to constructively use the data while at the same time keeping an eye on the inherent limitations. Sometimes the answer will be "we can't," which is fine. But other times, we may be able to find an appropriate application of the research that initially escaped noticed.

A specific point about gaming -- I'm not sure if Survey Monkey has this capability, but Limesurvey enables you to restrict survey submissions to one per IP address. While this doesn't prevent the type of gaming described, it does make it a little more difficult.