Since the rise of online companies and social media companies have struggled to make sense of online feedback.  When these online opinions can make or break the success of a new product, no company is immune to the words of the people.

This has left many wondering how to interpret the onslaught of new data. And you can bet that software that attempts to translate human emotion into usable data is becoming more sophisticated each day. It has the potential to transform online business and searching.

The way it works is an algorithim is used to identify sentiments in a statement and to identify the most influential opinion holders. For instance “love” is always good and “evil” isalways bad. Translating human language into a binary code is difficult and an imprecise science. There is no accounting for nuances like irony, sarcasm, idioms or slang. For instance a word such as “sinful” would register negatively but when used with choclate it has a positive connotation.

Companies are hopeful the software keeps improving.  The results could mean  they could anticipate customer reactions to specific issues and in turn respond with appropriate PR strategies.

For more about this check out this NYtimes article. 

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/24/technology/internet/24emotion.html?_r=1&em