Abstract:

The paper examines current and future Internet usage in Europe. It discusses how the Internet is beginning to be used for data collection in market research and its benefits over other methods. More specifically it shows the results of Internet opinion polls conducted prior to the 1997 general election in the United Kingdom. Not only did these polls show exactly the same trends on conventional polls during the election period, but they also accurately predicted the final outcome. The results clearly support the likelihood that the Internet will become an established method of data collection of the future, although the representativeness of the sample for mainstream research is still an issue.