It seems, however, that none of the negative press has affected President Obama’s approval ratings. According to a CNN/ORC poll released this weekend, the President still enjoys a 53% approval rating.

This is despite the fact that those polled knew about the recent scandals and even considered them important. 71% of those polled considered the IRS’s actions unacceptable, while 52% thought the Justice Department’s phone record seizures were unacceptable. Over 60% of these same respondents believe that President Obama’s statements about the IRS scandal have been at least mostly true.

Presidential spokespersons have been aggressively combating efforts to link Obama directly to the IRS scandal. White House adviser Dan Pfeiffer this Sunday hit the talk show circuit, stating that the President did not know of the policy before it hit the media.

The President himself did not address the topics this weekend. Instead, the President used his weekly address to speak about building up the middle class in the U.S.:

The poll, conducted by Public Policy Polling (PPP), surveyed 571 U.S. voters who, overall, did not have a favorable picture of hipsters, though 43% “aren’t sure” what the think about them. While 23% of the voters polled thought hipsters had made “a positive cultural contribution to society,” a full 46% chose the polling option that said, “They just soullessly appropriate cultural tropes from the past for their own ironic amusement.”

The results were split slightly between Democrats and Republicans, with 34% of Democrats having an unfavorable opinion of the group and 18% having a favorable one. 48% of Republicans had an unfavorable opinion and only 9% had a favorable one. Only 2% of Republicans stated they would be more likely to vote for a hipster for political office, while 27% of independent voters stated they would be more likely to vote for a hipster.

The results were even more disparate when taken by age group. 43% of voters 18-29 actually have a favorable opinion of hipsters, to 29% who have an unfavorable opinion of them. Only 6% of voters over age 65 have a favorable opinion, while 37% of them have an unfavorable one.

By race, Hispanics were generally most favorable toward hipsters (46% favorable) while only 8% of white voters were favorable toward hipsters. A full 33% of the Hispanic voters polled considered themselves hipsters, while only 6% of white voters and 10% of black voters considered themselves hipsters.

Of course, if there’s anything we can count on humanity to do, it’s sexualize things. And naturally (unnaturally?), the evolution of androids means that eventually, people are going to start having sex with robots. Duh.

It’s not like this isn’t already happening, but the future could open up so many more opportunities for robot sexy times. The Huffington Post and YouGov recently conducted a poll about Americans’ attitudes toward the future of robots, and our interactions with them.

And the results concerning sex robots tip my bullshit meter all the way to maximum bullshittery.

When asked if they would use a sex robot for its (his/her’s?) designed purpose, only 9% said yes. Nine. As in less than one in ten. Ok, sure.

18% said that they think sex robots will be available by 2030.

Last year, a New Zealand study published in Futures magazine painted an interesting picture of the pay-for-sex world in the next few decades. Researchers envision a version of Amsterdam’s red light district that’s completely run by android prostitutes by the year 2050.

“[They] are clean of sexual transmitted infections (STIs), not smuggled in from Eastern Europe and forced into slavery, the city council will have direct control over android sex workers controlling prices, hours of operations and sexual services,” they said.

These sex robots could be fully customizable and offer a wider variant of body type, ethnicity, age, language, and various sexual features. In their future, it’s goodbye sex trade and hello clean, safe, sex robots.

And there’s obviously no emotional toll to be taken on sex robots, that is of course until they become sentient. But we don’t have to worry about that for at least a few hundred years. Probably.

HuffPost’s poll also asked about whether or not sex with a sexbot is considered cheating. 42% said that it would be. And the younger the respondent, the more likely they were to say it’s not cheating.

In the study, Pew looked at eight different major news events over the past year. They compared each event in terms of positive and negative opinions – on one side stemming from public opinion polls and on the other side Twitter reaction. What they found was that most of the time, the sentiment expressed by Twitter users didn’t align with the sentiment expressed by Americans in national polls.

Take for instance the times in which Twitter reaction was much more “liberal” than public opinion polls showed. When President Obama was reelected, 52% of those asked in public opinion polls were “happy” about it, as opposed to 45% that were “unhappy.” But on Twitter, his reelection generated 77% positive feedback.

And in February 2012, when the California gay-marriage ban was deemed unconstitutional, only 8% of Twitter users had a negative reaction to it. Public opinion polls showed that 44% did.

Twitter doesn’t always lean more liberal, however. Take for instance Obama’s recent inaugural speech. Although 48% of the public opinion poll respondents reacted positively toward it, only 13% of Twitter users did.

In only two of the eight cases studied did public opinion match well with Twitter sentiment.

But in general, Twitter users tend to lean more Democratic and younger.

Twitter users are not representative of the public. Most notably, Twitter users are considerably younger than the general public and more likely to be Democrats or lean toward the Democratic Party. In the 2012 news consumption survey, half (50%) of adults who said they posted news on Twitter were younger than 30, compared with 23% of all adults. And 57% of those who posted news on Twitter were either Democrats or leaned Democratic, compared with 46% of the general public.

One final thought from Pew:

“At times the Twitter conversation is more liberal than survey responses, while at other times it is more conservative. Often it is the overall negativity that stands out.”

So we can’t always count on Twitter to accurately depict the views of all Americans. But one thing we can count on is that, more often than not, Twitter users are going to give you the cynical side of things.

Today Capcom began polling fighting game fans on who their favorite Street Fighter characters are. The publisher claims that the results of the poll will influence games, marketing, and licensing opportunities (such as Sanrio plushies, no doubt).

“Please be honest in your answers,” states Capcom, and the company seems to be pretty serious about getting only opinions from fighting game fans. The poll ends early if the question “Have you purchased any fighting games for consoles, dedicated gaming handhelds or PC in the last five years (2008 – present)?” is answered with a “no.” Those who have bought a fighting game recently get to go on to choose their five favorite Street Fighter characters from the 67 fighters featured throughout the series’ history.

Future Street Fighter games will certainly feature new characters, and there may not be room for some of the less popular characters in the series. Sure, popular and classic characters such as Ryu, Chun-Li, and Akuma aren’t likely to go anywhere, but if you’re a fan of Rufus you might want to make sure your voice is heard in this poll.

A spokesperson for Harris tells WebProNews that the product “allows businesses, both large and small, to compare themselves to industry benchmarks at a fraction of the cost of traditional market research.”

“Google and the Harris Poll will be performing benchmark studies on an ongoing basis,” she adds. “The benchmarks will be collected and delivered, free of charge, within the Harris Poll and Google Consumer Surveys Platform.”

Google launched Consumer Surveys back in March to offer a solution to the problems of publishers looking for revenue sources and market research lacking in quality.

Google’s Matt Cutts had this to say about the surveys at the time:

When a visitor lands on a page with premium content, they can answer a question to get to the content (much friendlier than asking people to pay for content directly). Publishers earn money and visitors get higher-quality content. Meanwhile, market research and polling gets easier, faster, and cheap enough that almost anyone can do it.

I really like that this is a new option to help produce higher-quality content on the web. It’s like micropayments, but users don’t have to pay with money–they can pay with their time or opinions.

“We are excited to be involved in a venture that has the potential to reinvent the manner in which market research is conducted,” said Harris Interactive President and CEO Al Angrisani. “This is a unique opportunity to bring together Google’s innovative Consumer Surveys product with Harris Interactive’s expertise in delivering credible insights to the global business community.”

Paul McDonald, Senior Product Manager at Google added, “This is a really great addition to our self-service offering. Thousands of large and small businesses, in dozens of industries, have used Google Consumer Surveys to get easy, affordable and precise market insights. I’m thrilled that we’re working with a leader like the Harris Poll to give businesses access to a new benchmarking offering. We believe it’s a huge validation of our technology, a huge boost for businesses of all sizes.”

Mike de Vere, President of the Harris Poll said, “By joining the Harris Poll, one of the world’s most recognized and trusted barometers of consumer opinion, with Google’s new self-service market research tool, we have the opportunity to be a transformative force in the market research industry by making credible, consumer research more accessible, affordable and actionable.”

The first study to utilize the offering looks at customer satisfaction in the banking industry. Take a look.

Following last week’s LA Times/USC Dornsife poll found that most people don’t trust Google with their private information, another poll has revealed that, among tech companies, people favor Google more than Apple, Facebook, and Twitter.

82% of the 1,007 adults surveyed for the ABC News/Washington Post poll said that they have a favorable view of Google, with only 9% stating that their view was unfavorable. More, 53% of responders said they were “strongly favorable” of Google. 4 out of 5 people view Google favorably yet they aren’t so sure they’d want to trust them with their private information? What is so favorable about Google, then? It’s good lucks and charming way it disarmed your parents when you took it home to meet the family? Who are these people responding to these polls and why don’t their opinions ever stay consistent?

Apple wasn’t far behind Google with 74% of people viewing the company favorably. Apple only faired moderately better than Google in the LA Times poll last week, but still didn’t get much higher marks than Google when it came to preserving the privacy around users’ information.

Google and Apple were both the brands of choice among the affluent and the young.

Favorability of both brands peaks among people with household incomes of $100,000 or more; in this group a near-unanimous 93 and 91 percent express favorable opinions of Google and Apple, respectively. Among those under age 30, Google maintains 92 percent favorability, Apple, 81 percent. And both are more popular among college graduates (88 and 84 percent) than their counterparts (a still-impressive 79 and 70 percent).

As for Facebook, a majority of people, 58%, still viewed it favorably although much less so than Google and Apple. However, 28% said they regarded the social networking site unfavorably. The brand ranked highest among young adults as 76% replied with a favorable view. Older generations, however, as only 34% of adults see Facebook in a favorable light. Women, peculiarly enough, view the site more favorably than men, 63% compared to 53%.

Twitter has the most mixed opinions and it’s the only brand that had a higher percentage of people with an unfavorable opinion than a favorable opinion. Even among the youngsters, who usually drive up the numbers in these types of polls, only 42% see Twitter as favorable.

As mentioned at the beginning of this article, take these results with a grain of salt. For one, Microsoft, maker of Windows, which may not be seen as hip and suave as Apple and Google, is still the most-used operating system around the world by a crushing margin yet Microsoft wasn’t included in this study.

And then there’s the caprice of the poll respondents. Not only do previous polls cast doubt on the validity of this poll, but the inconsistency between polls makes previous polls appear to be less reliable for gauging the public’s opinion.

Do your personal opinions reflect the ABC/WaPo survey? Think these polls are meaningless or is there actually something significant going on here? Let us know in the comments.

[Via Cult of Android via BGR.]

Okay, I don’t really think all of that is true. But since those claims have been leveled at those respective companies, you’d think that there would be a significant amount of animosity towards them. But on the whole, Americans are quite favorable toward those big three. Especially Google.

According to a poll conducted for ABC News recently, 82% of respondents said they have a favorable opinion of Google. Only 9% reported an unfavorable view. The dichotomy is a little less-pronounced when we talk about Apple and Facebook – but favorable views are still the norm (74% and 58%, respectively).

Those are interesting figures on their own. but the striking thing about this study isn’t the favorability of those three companies – it’s the relative lack of favorability of Twitter.

So, what’s wrong with Twitter?

Well, first off it’s newer than these other companies and has yet to grow into a social powerhouse for some segments of the population. Sure, Twitter is booming in some areas of the population – in fact it’s now growing three times faster than Facebook. But as you can see, 31% of people aren’t even ready to give an opinion one way or the other about Twitter. Some Americans just don’t fully grasp the service yet.

Seniors are especially ignorant of Twitter, as 51% said they didn’t have an opinion either way on the 140-character microblogging network.

But what about that unfavorability percentage of 36%? According to the survey results, Twitter may have a young male problem as well:

There’s also a 10-point gender gap in views of Facebook, with the site seen favorably by 63 percent of women vs. 53 percent of men. Twitter’s got a similar gap, 11 points more popular among women than men, though it’s rated lower than the others among both sexes, at 39 and 28 percent, respectively.

Even among young adults, Twitter is seen favorably by just 42 percent, and unfavorably byequally as many, 43 percent. Among seniors its positive rating drops to 18 percent; while 30 percent in this group see it unfavorably. For them, apparently, tweeting is for the birds

Personally, I love Twitter as a medium for real-time information. What do you think drives this feeling about Twitter? Is it social media fatigue within some parts of the population? Let us know what you think in the comments.

[h/t The Atlantic]

“A lackluster investment in science and innovation is driving fears among Americans about our world dominance in the years ahead,” said ResearchAmerica Chair and former Illinois Congressman John E. Porter. “These concerns will likely increase unless policy makers take action to avoid serious consequences, such as a major loss of U.S. jobs, business, medical breakthroughs and output in innovation.”

Only 23% of Americans consider the U.S. first in medical and health research today. And an overwhelming majority (91%) say it is important for the U.S. to maintain its world leadership role, as other nations such as China and India ramp up their investment.

Americans are especially concerned about funding cuts to medical and health research. Upon hearing that federal spending for medical and health research (after adjusting for inflation) has declined over the past five years, more than half of likely voters (57%) had a negative reaction to the cut in spending. Moreover, 54% think that federal spending for medical and health research should be exempt from across-the-board cuts outlined in the Budget Control Act of 2011.

“With the threat of automatic cuts on the horizon, a significant amount of federally supported research and innovation will be shelved, impacting the pace of scientific discovery in the U.S. and forcing patients to stand aside as other priorities dominate,” said Mary Woolley, president and CEO of ResearchAmerica. “We simply cannot afford to jeopardize our leadership and settle for second best. Elected officials and candidates must make stronger commitments to sustaining our world-class status in research and innovation.”

More than half of likely voters (64%) say they would be more likely to vote for a presidential candidate who supports increased government funding for medical and health research. A vast majority of likely voters also think it is important for presidential and congressional candidates to debate issues relating to science, innovation and health.

Poll highlights include:

“In the new poll, 46 per cent approve of the way Mr. Obama is handling his job, while 50 per cent disapprove. That’s a mirror image of his 50 to 46 positive split in early February.”

Some are speculating that this is because of rising gas prices, which Newt Gingrich has pushed to tie to Obama. Others say it is because of the mandate to pay for birth control in insurance plans. They theorize that women are turning against Obama because of that.

Whatever the cause, the numbers are in and some people are celebrating. A cursory perusal of Twitter reactions takes the temperature of the right.