Welcome to UmbriaElection2004.com, an analysis of the 2004 presidential race developed by Umbria Communications. The research analysis provided here draws from the comments included in over 3.5 million weblogs and is based on technology that helps us better understand what people are talking about, as well as the characteristics of the people doing the talking. We don't know any personal information about who is speaking, just the amalgam of what they are saying.

The technology that Umbria Communications' uses to determine demographics, the topics being discussed and the perspectives being provided is a new application of linguistic analysis. This technology looks at a wide range of indicators, including clusters of words, parts-of-speech and recurring terms and the context in which those terms are used, to make its determinations. All market research has a margin of error dependent upon the type of analysis being conducted. Likewise, Umbria Communications' analysis of weblogs and other online opinion sources is limited to the perspectives of the pool of individuals who have gone online to offer opinions on the election and the candidates.

In addition to the graphs you saw at CNN.com, we provide here a deeper analysis of the data collected so you can better understand what the buzz is about, the sentiment and the demographic characteristics of the speakers. More in-depth analysis is available from Umbria Communications.

Throughout this site you will find analysis by candidate as well as breakdowns by market segment and gender. Market segments are defined as Boomers (age 41 to 60 years old), Generation X (age 26 to 40 years old) and Generation Y (age 10 to 25 years old).

The graph on the left represents the number of individuals who are posting on a candidate who have not posted about that candidate for at least the previous 10 weeks. The red line represents the number of individuals who have posted comments about President Bush. The green line represents the number of individuals who have posted comments about Mr. Kerry. The graph on the right represents the percentage of new voices posting about President Bush or Mr. Kerry.