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While a simple Google search will present you with expert and amateur views on almost any subject, those opinions are generally scattered across thousands of websites, blogs and forums. Online polling sites like Ask500People and BuzzDash offer a centralized alternative, allowing you to gauge popular opinion on almost any topic and see the results within hours. Ask500People (“World opinion while you watch”) gathers votes on its own website and through widgets on thousands of other sites. Registered users suggest new questions and those that receive the most votes from other members are moved to the homepage. While in beta mode, Ask500People is limiting itself to 100 people. Each question is open until 100 votes are in, which generally takes less than 15 minutes. Incoming votes are displayed on a map in real time, with ‘yes’ or ‘no’ markers indicating where respondents are based and what they voted. (The voter’s location is retrieved from the IP address of the computer he or she is using. IP tracking also allows the website to limit votes to one per computer.) Recent questions range from “Is America ready for a female president” to “Does honey help to heal a wound?” Although sophisticated formal survey tools offer organizations a more in-depth look into their audiences’ minds, they’re also expensive and take weeks to prepare and execute. No surprise then, that Ask500People is offering premium services. For USD 100-500, a company can poll 500 internet users on any topic, and have the results within hours. Survey results for corporate polls are private, and the company’s identity isn’t visible to the respondent. BuzzDash, meanwhile, takes a more elaborate approach to online polling. While Ask500People’s strength lies in its simplicity (one question at a time, open for a very limited time span), BuzzDash offers an entire dashboard of questions, which can run for months. Visitors and voters can choose from categories like Entertainment and Business & Finance, and can also create ‘buzzbites’ to publish on their own websites, asking their own visitors the questions they want answers to. BuzzDash lets users suggest questions, but editors decide which question will make it to the homepage, “looking for those most likely to reflect the interests and breadth of opinions of users in the given topic areas.” BuzzDash isn’t currently offering premium services. Business opportunities? While global polls are fascinating, there’s definitely value in local versions of Ask500People or BuzzDash, addressing topics that matter in your part of the world, asking questions in your native tongue. And, of course, allowing corporate clients to poll local markets. Websites: www.ask500people.com — www.buzzdash.com