Excerpts from http://bit.ly/MdQWu

...I will continue to contend that as previously applied to customer service, Twitter doesn't really prove a scaleable solution. Let's take a couple of the most popular cases, Comcast and JetBlue... The only way to scale is to add more agents ... There's no issue tracking to resolution, no easy way to get answers from Twitter into the company knowledge base, no connection to the customer record to access customer information, history and record issues / resolutions, no issue cueing and routing.

Then I read about Best Buys' new approach to Twitter and I had one of my "ah ha" moments... This approach is about as web 2.0ish as you can get, transparent, spreading input across a wide / broad base, shared control and allowing employees to self select what and when they answer questions while using wisdom of crowds to provide a set of answers and comments for customers to review. The concept could work because it's not replacing traditional customer service but instead augmenting it in a new way, it brings the experience of asking the expert in the store to an online searchable real-time conversation. I suppose this process only works for certain types of businesses where there is a broad set of very knowledgeable employees outside of customer service that could address customer questions. It will be interesting to watch as this service, which is only a week or so old, catches on with customers and employees.