Can the Web predict the next president?

27.10.2008

In short, despite an apparent sampling bias that significantly exaggerates Obama's advantages when using the online numbers to infer candidate support in the general population, it certainly looks as if both online and offline metrics are reflecting real trends in underlying popular opinion, with common causal bases. The strongest conclusion we are prepared to offer is that the Web can be used by technically savvy individuals to obtain direct, detailed insight into real campaign trends. The first Tuesday in November will tell us how relevant such insight is to the actual outcome.

Thomas Powell (tpowell@pint.com) is a member of the Network World Test Alliance. Joe Lima (jlima@port80software.com ) is director of Product Development at Port80 Software.