User:Keegan (WMF)/Agreement4

It's good practice for product teams to issue calls for feedback at various points in the development cycle. These calls provide documentation and other information for users and provide an opportunity to help shape the software, all of which empower users. Generally speaking, however, the primary goal of a Wikimedian's contributions to the projects is not testing software, so the response to calls to feedback may be limited and volunteers cannot be forced into testing anything. Product teams can expect a few things from communities after issuing a request:
 * 1) There isn't really an expected or average feedback response time or rate - if volunteers are interested enough to comment, they may leave useful feedback. This cannot always be expected, and should not be taken for apathy.
 * 2) You'll hear from the users when software is deployed into production - calls for feedback prior to release of a product may attract some attention but there is little guarantee; however, if your product does not behave as expected when released the users will let you know.
 * 3) Users will likely respond with lack of familiarity with the technology - this applies to both what the user expects from the software and what its actual intended behavior is, as well as a lack of technical lingo.