Uneasy Rhetoric

I just got finished reading highlights from the latest Digital Future Project report from the USC Annenberg School’s Center for the Digital Future. The findings are mildly surprising: 39.8 percent if Internet users agree that going online can give people more political power while 61.7 percent of respondents, which includes both Internet users and non-users, say that going online has become important to political campaigns.

Interesting to me, of users who sought political information online, 91.1 percent sought information about issues or candidates they supported, while 77.4 percent also sought information about issues and candidates about which they were undecided. That’s a lot of people visiting websites for issues/candidates for which/whom they have already made up their minds.

Other interesting tid-bits:

Internet users are more likely to give up their cell phones (39.4 percent) or their televisions (32.7 percent), before they would give up their Internet (27.8 percent).

Sixty-one percent of respondents with incomes below $30,000/year report Internet use.

The number of people who believe information on the Internet is reliable and accurate continues to decline; 48.8 percent of users say that most or all of the information online is reliable and accurate. Frankly, that’s still too high, although many of those folks may be surfing sites more generally regarded as reliable. For example, established media sites and government sites were widely regarded as reliable (78.5 percent and 78.2 percent, respectively).

More than 40 percent say that the Internet has increased contact with family and friends. Only 5.1 percent say it has decreased contact.