I disagree with this. I'll take advice from 2 people that I trust and admire before I'll poll 10,000 people. In my opinion, it's a distraction. That's why I believe it to be more valuable to have a couple of very smart & helpful investors rather than a lot of people with individual opinions and voices.
Maybe a little off-topic, but in some ways, this is what I admire about Steve Jobs, is seeing what people wanted before they realized they wanted it. I don't know if it's real or not, but the quote attributed to Henry Ford, "If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses" does hold a grain of truth. He could cut past the noise of the crowd to see the potential of an idea. Ask someone in 2004 what they wanted in a phone, and "bigger" probably wasn't on the list.