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LIFESTYLE

33% Say Internet Good for American Culture

Americans have mixed feelings about the Internet’s impact on the nation, but they appear less optimistic about it than they were several years ago.

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that just 33% of Adults think the Internet has had a good impact on American culture.  Twenty-eight percent (28%) say the impact has been a bad one, while 30% say it’s neither.  (To see survey question wording, click here.)

This is comparable to what Likely Voters said a year ago.  In October 2007, however, 52% of voters felt the Internet had had a good impact on U.S. culture.

Thirty-seven percent (37%) of Adults say the Internet’s impact on journalism has been good for the nation. Twenty-one percent (21%) say the Net’s impact on journalism has been negative, and another 31% say it’s neither.

Fifty-three percent (53%) of voters felt the Internet had been good for journalism nearly four years ago.

While fewer Americans are buying the print version of their local newspaper, they still believe their local paper's reporting is a bit more reliable than news they read on the Internet.

(Want a free daily e-mail update? If it's in the news, it's in our polls). Rasmussen Reports updates are also available on Twitter or Facebook.

The national survey of 1,000 Adults was conducted on May 12-13, 2011 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.

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