Bear with me on this one: it's a bit blue-sky *makes wavey convergence guru hand shapes*
US research firm Knowledge Networks has been talking about the results of an instant poll it conducted for CBS News, just after President Bush's State Of The Union address this week.
The poll found that 82% of people who watched the speech live approved of Dubya's proposals, but that 68% said they doubt he'll be able to accomplish all of his goals. Figures for those who spent the broadcast shouting "Resign you incompetent idiot!" at the TV are as-yet unrevealed.
But here's the thing. The poll was conducted by asking a random sample of Knowledge Networks' consumer panel if they intended to watch the speech, and then grabbing the opinions of those who were immediately after it finished.
Imagine how this could be developed even further using mobile phones. People could download an application that'd constantly ask their opinion LIVE during a political speech (or, indeed, any other live event), and feed the results to a TV studio or anyone else who could make use of it.
It's the logical extension of the sort of SMS voting seen in participation TV. Although given the culture here in the UK we'd be less likely to use this kind of tech for political speeches, and more likely to use it to vote on whether Celebrity Big Brother evictees are telling the truth during their eviction interviews...
Still, I'd be interested to hear of any market research companies who are using or looking into live mobile polling in this vague area.