Precision Computing

The community researchers that answer questions on Google Answers make their money off of exactly this type of ignorance. Although some of the answers require above-average searching abilities, others turn up on the first page of search results.

Hence the exhasperated shouts of RTFM, Just Google It, and others. Those don't help, though. They show you to be a pompous jerk who likes to belittle others. The solution is to either gracefully help change the user's habits (so that they do more homework before asking a question,) or seamlessly integrate the research into their habits.

Josh's idea covers the latter. He suggests that sites (such as the MSDN Forums) integrate a little live search feed to the right of the "Post a Question" form. It's a great idea.

Now, here's a little compressed version of the Microsoft product cycle. Being a Program Manager at Microsoft, he was nice enough to even draft a rough mock-up.

Now, being a developer at Microsoft, the next step in a project is to mock up a hack-and-slash technical prototype. At this point, you're really just trying to prove to yourself (and other technical folks) that the idea is possible. These prototypes also give you a basis from which to make a development time estimate for the feature. I've posted it here, although there was really no question that this specific feature is technically possible.

Next, you might want to construct a hi-fidelity prototype to show others. The guts are still hack-and-slash, but the interface is much more functional. Usability tests, and executive demos are a common target for this class of prototypes. I've posted it here.  HTML is a great prototyping medium for UI, as is Macromedia Flash.