We've watched with great interest the swirling debate over on-line focus groups. Some decry on-line groups as blasphemy, the ruination of our craft! Others debate nomenclature or engage in semantics - whether to call a moderated on-line discussion an on-line focus group, or something else, given the absence of that telltale body language. We recognize that on-line marketing research is in its relative infancy, though growing at Bunyanesque rates. And since the only rule of this game thus far is constant change, we're loath to state any hard and fast rules. That said, we have an unequivocal opinion on the subject of on-line focus groups (or whatever one wishes to call them) - they work! As a company that has conducted "off-line" focus groups since the early 1980s - and in any given week has up to 10 moderators roaming the country, checking out the body language - it might be understandable for us to be naysayers. After all, why would we get behind a methodology that might cannibalize an off-line business base that has grown for the past 14 years? The truth is, on-line focus groups are not a substitute for the face-to-face thing, and were never meant to be. This is simply an additional tool in the box, meant to productively coexist with "the real thing."