Poll: Huge Majority Thinks Internet Is Having "Positive Impact" On Journalism
February 28, 2008 -- 4:40 PM EST // //

It's a common blogospheric refrain that the American public is way ahead of the commentators on key political questions. Well, it turns out that the public might also be way ahead when it comes to judging the value, impact and significance of the Internet and blogosphere, too.

Via Romenesko, John Zogby has a very interesting new poll out that probes public attitudes towards the Internet and its relationship to the traditional news media. Check out these numbers:

* Web sites are seen as a "more important source of news and information than traditional media outlets." Eighty-six percent say Web sites are an "important" news source, compared to 77% who picked television and 70% who picked newspapers. Obviously, traditional news outlets also have online presences, so the meaning of this breakdown isn't terribly clear cut, but it's noteworthy.

And get this -- some 38% said blogs are an "important" source of news. That's less than the others, and the study also finds that almost no respondents pick blogs as their "primary" news source. But the fact that nearly 40% say blogs, as opposed to Web sites, are an "important" news source seems surprisingly high.

* A whopping 77% see "citizen journalism" as important for the future of journalism, and a solid majority of 59% see blogs as vital to its future, too. While those numbers are lower than the 87% who see "professional journalism" as key, those are still striking.

* And finally, three in four, or 75%, think the Internet has "had a positive impact on the overall quality of journalism."

We all know that the Internet and blogosphere have their share of failings. But these numbers suggest public attitudes that really are at odds with the barbarians-are-at-the-gates critique of the Internet and blogs you heard for so long from certain journalistic wise men, though that critique is getting tougher to sustain and you're hearing less and less of it lately.

Somewhere, David Broder is grumbling.

Update: It's worth noting that this is an online poll, but the numbers are still significant. They suggest a real and growing base of support for the idea that the Internet and blogs are having a salutary effect on journalism and are as credible or more so than traditional media. And the numbers on blogs and citizen journalism are particularly striking.

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