Work is being done now to overhaul Drupal.org's support infrastructure. See Susan's blog post for a more detailed explanation of the issues, and proposed solution - http://binaryredneck.net/node/175 . Some summary is below.
Development site here - http://support.redesign.devdrupal.org/
Issues/Wants
- Helping intermediate users transition to being more advanced users and contributors. (We need an upgrade path!)
"I know how to install stuff and build sites, but I want to do more."
- Provide easy gateways to get people involved in other parts of the Drupal community.
"Look at all those links!"
- Reduce the support demands on active developers and contributors.
"There are 400 new issues in your queue. Uh??"
- Provide faster, more efficient support for all.
"My questions was answered in less than 1 year. Woohoo!"
Solutions
- Move everything to support.drupal.org
- Phase out Drupal.org support forums, and the support mailing list. (Only the support related ones, not all forums or mailing lists!)
- Build an efficient Q&A-style interface.
- Treat posts as long term resources, so they are referenceable and searchable.
- Eliminate off-topic chatter and duplication.
- Improve/add moderation. Moderation to be done by a team for support.drupal.org.
- Ease entry into IRC chat for those who don't know how to use IRC.