There’s an underground passage near where I work and one of the iron sewer grates in it had collapsed, leaving the sewer shaft open and dangerous. After tolerating that for a week, I sent a complaint to the local authorities, demanding it be fixed. After three more weeks, I had completely given up hope that they will do something, so I decided to organise a group of people and we do it ourselves. I set up a Facebook group, called I Want This Fixed. My idea was to get a bunch of members together and then send them all an email detailing my plan about how we could fix the grating.

This whole idea did not work, because somebody else (not the authorities) beat me to it. But in theory it could have worked. In theory, I could have been the local newspaper. In theory, people could have expressed their dissatisfaction not by joining a Facebook group but by voting in a poll.

So I don’t think your idea is extremely mad or undoable.

Just suppose that at the end of every poll, you asked ‘what would you like us to do with the results?’

Most of these website surveys are multiple choice, so I reckon the first option would be ‘do nothing’, as I know that’s the usual outcome even before I start.

In contrast, the 2nd option would be ‘do something’, simply because it represents the opposing view. What that something is does not matter.

It follows that option 3 is ‘undecided’.

That means option 4 is probably a wildcard, usually with a topical, humorous twist. Possibly something like ‘have another poll’.

All of this is just my way of noting that readers don’t necessarily want engagement – as you’ve noted – or perahsp thaey want their engagement in a different format, such as a campaign, or a reader’s forum.