I’m currently in the middle of building a feedback tool for my own SaaS projects, and I wanted to gut-check a UX/Architecture theory with this community.
When I was looking for existing tools to handle feature requests and user feedback, I noticed a depressing pattern. Almost every "Feedback Board" I visited felt boring and like a ghost town.
You know the vibe:
You land on the page.
There are a dozen posts from 8 months ago and a few recent ones. Most are tagged "Under Review" (and have been for a year). It feels silent. Static. Dead.
As a user, my immediate reaction is: "Nobody is home. Why bother typing my idea?"
The Theory: I think the problem is that we treat feedback like tickets instead of conversations. We are building "suggestion boxes" in dark corners when we should be building "town halls."
The Tech Stack / Approach: I decided to code a solution that tries to flip this using a Nuxt 4, focusing heavily on real-time presence. I want to know if you guys think this technical overhead is worth it, or if I’m over-engineering a simple problem.
Here is how I’m handling it:
Forcing "Aliveness" with Real-Time State: Instead of a standard CRUD list, I’m using Server-Sent Events (SSE) to sync user presence.
The Goal: Show "Staff Online" indicators and "User is typing..." bubbles in the feed.
The Tech: Leveraging Vue's reactivity system to broadcast updates instantly. If a user is viewing a post, I want others to see their avatar there. I want to psychologically trick the user into feeling like they are entering a live room, not filling out a form.
Killing the Silos (Unified Inbox): I realized that having "Support" in email and "Feedback" on a board creates a disconnect.
I’m building a unified admin stream that merges Email (via parsed webhooks), Chat, and User post submissions into a single view.
It’s designed to be keyboard-first so admins can clear the queue faster, keeping the "Last Activity" timestamps fresh.
The Question for you builders/users:
If you landed on a roadmap/feedback page and saw a green dot saying "Staff is Online" or saw live activity happening (comments updating, viewing counters ticking up), would that actually make you more likely to engage?
Or do you prefer the standard "Submit and Forget" style boards like Canny/Uservoice?
I’m squashing the last few bugs (mainly edge cases with the real-time sync) right now, but I’m really curious if the "Dead Board" vibe bothers anyone else, or if it’s just me.