if you're a client like astrazeneca or abbott labs, then being sick is probably a fairly bad thing, but if you're a games company like electronic arts then 'this gameis sick' is a very positive thing. >>reporter: just as you get market leaders amongst companies, in the online world there individuals who carry more influence, for example people with many followers on twitter or friends on facebook. companies like peerindex help firms find them.... >>cast: you kind of know who the top people are, but there is that magic middle of people who are easier to reach and in some ways are much more engaged with your product because they have built up their audience around an interest and that audience really trusts them. >>reporter: the number of online users is growing exponentially which could give serious opportunities for growth, especially as the emerging markets of the east go online. but is it really any more than a overhyped and trendy form of market research? >>barwise: social media is the latest thing for which the marketers are hyperventilating; mobile, mobile advertising is the other.

bank corp and blackrock topped expectations, abbott labs and united technologies posting impressive profiter the closing bell, intel, ebay, america express and qualcomm earnings all coming in better than expected. ebay jumping. small-cap stock, nalco surged on the world that eco lab will buy the company. and zillos scoring 78% in its first day of trading. now back to chris and chris matthews of "hardball." chris? >>> welcome back to "hardball." they're trying to change their laws on voting. are these doing this to prevent voting fraud? or could they be trying to prevent mine order horace cooper is here, and judith brown deanis is here. i want to get perch feeling about a person who would cheat in a voting booth. or engage in planning that kind of thing. what is your visceral reaction, horace? >> that's outrageous behavior. what it does is disenfranchises voters. >> what do you think of those people who do that, the people who do that, just focus on that? >> those people are awful cheaters. >> and they don't exist. >> wait a minute, no, no, judith, first of all, that displeases me, of cours