I'd tend to agree. Getting customer feedback against the UX should NOT be outsourced, though. It's human nature to disregard negative feedback unless it's dire

I'd tend to agree. Getting customer feedback against the UX should NOT be outsourced, though. It's human nature to disregard negative feedback unless it's direct. Contact with customers should be as close to the development and product team as possible to mitigate this. The initial UX and UI design, though, could absolutely be done on a contract basis. Some of the best UX ideas I've seen were through the use of a stable of very talented artists -- several would be selected and pinged by the art director to come up with ideas, and the best idea would be the starting point for UX/UI iterations.