People Who Need People

"Online communities can get an issue on the table. TheInternet allows broad communities of people to form and actin concert," says O'Reilly.

The Trouble with Chat: K2

Like O'Reilly, the folks at K2 get ideas for new productsfrom people posting messages on their various websites'bulletin boards (the company operates more than 10 differentsites). The board on K2's ski site has been hugelysuccessful, in part because the company makes it easy forpeople to use. Unlike many sites, K2 doesn't require alengthy registration process.

The bulletin board on Web Business 50 winning siteK2skis.com accumulates as many as 800 new postings a dayduring peak season. Its bicycle site, K2bikes.com, humsalong with a few hundred postings per day during peakseason. Managing such popular forums presents challenges,the most pressing of which is to what extent K2 shouldmonitor content. The lessons the company has learned havemade it a Web Business 50 winner.

When the Vashon Island, Wash.-based manufacturer launchedits bike site in 1997, it also built a threaded bulletinboard known as the Tech Forum where customers could askquestions and get answers about their bikes from otherowners. Instead of listening to Muzak while on hold,customers could simply sign in to the message board and typetheir question. K2 customers took to the application likeboots to bindings. The problem was, bike owners weren'talways getting the best advice.