From the Live Q&A:

Q: Do you have any plans of implementing an efficient and easy-to-use party formation feature? Currently, everyone is shouting in town and it takes quite some time to efficiently form a party...
A: This is a very important topic for us and we are currently looking into creating a system where it is much easier to form parties.
A minor adjustment has been made to the party formation system when Dzemael Darkhold was implemented but we consider that it's not yet complete. I believe that the Market and the party formation system are the next big issue so we are planning to use FFXI's system as a reference and make an adjustment as soon as possible. Schedule and details on this will be announced once they are ready so please hang on.
As it stands, it takes a full party to survive most exp camps with the new link system. In addition, those wishing to find a party still are tethered to Ul'dah, as that's where the shouts occur.

Doing any DoH leves that need advanced facilities, DoL leves/farming or just general solo/farming means you have no chance to try and find a party at the same time. And if a party looses a member or two out in the field, all the remaining members must wait while the leader returns to Ul'dah to shout for more members.

Needless to say, a useable seek function is desperately needed.

That's why I was hoping to suggest that a global chat function be implemented in the interim. This way, we at least do not need to make a choice between sitting in Ul'dah and doing something elsewhere in the world.