I am intrigued by the latest mini site from MySociety. Launched today Brief Encounters is described by MySociety founder Tom Steinberg as:

“a technology test-bed to help us crack a new design and data problem: how do you make it as easy as possible for users to pinpoint a specific bus stop, or train route, or a ferry port, as easily as possible? There are over 300,000 such beasties, and nobody has ever really tried to build an interface that makes it easy to find each one quickly and reliably.”

As Tom outlines on a recent blog post how Brief Encounters has been developed to provide design input to one of the more challenging projects MySociety has undertaken – FixMyTransport.

Brief Encounters provides a cost effective, fun and engaging way to crowdsource user requirements and user testing. I gave it a whirl and had a few thoughts on how to improve the mini site.

• The site is using Google maps but it could include Google Street View so you can check if you’ve selected the right bus stop.
• Somehow it wasn’t entirely clear when I’d selected my stop on the map and that I had to complete another form – perhaps a progress indicator would be helpful.
• I wasn’t asked to provide feedback after submitting my story. I noticed a feedback link in the footer, but it would have been good to get my feedback while I was in the flow of things.

I’m wondering whether the developers will get enough input from the types of users who are most likely to be the target audience of a service like FixMyTransport. Especially people who don’t have particularly good skills in using interactive mapping and web interfaces.

I was also reminded of the interesting discussion back at UX Camp London a few months back about how UX professionals could (and should) get more involved in projects like this.

Anyway, regardless of who you are, go try it out and give MySociety some feedback!

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