世論 What Japan Thinks

goo Research recently published the results of some detailed investigation into the use of portable music players. Over four days at the end of March they interviewd by means of a private internet questionnaire 2,183 members of their monitor group. The respondents were 48.2% male, with 19.1% in their teens, 17.5% in their twenties, 19.7% in their thirties, 21.2% in their forties, 16.6% in their fifties, 4.8% in their sixties, and 1.2% seventy years old or more.

Note that MP3 player refers to either memory based or hard-disk based players only like iPods or D-Snaps, not CD players that support MP3 file formats. I am not sure under what category phones with music playback support are recorded; perhaps they are “Other”?

I’ve recently been testing a Sony NW-A3000 but I couldn’t really recommend it to anyone. The 20 Gb hard disk is nice, of course, but the PC-based software is unwieldy to say the least, as is the player software. Pet hates include that random shuffle seems not as random as it should be, doing Pause then Play will result in a one-second or so skip, and recharging the player resets the player back to the first track. I’ve heard that the iPod balances out the volume, but the Sony doesn’t, so I have to keep fiddling with the sound levels. On the other hand, I did manage to find an almost complete archive of Just A Minute, but on the downside I perhaps scare the other train passengers as I try to stifle laughs during my commute.

Q1: What types of portable music players do you own? (Sample size=2,183, multiple answer)

CD player	47.1%
MD player	42.9%
Cassette player	35.6%
MP3 player	33.4%
Other	3.6%
Don’t have any	17.2%

As one might expect, the younger people were more likely to have MD or MP3 players, the older cassettes and CDs. In fact, over half of the over seventies had both portable CD and cassette players.

Q2: Which type of portable music player do you use the most? (Sample size=2,183)

MP3 player	29.3%
CD player	20.6%
MD player	19.5%
Cassette player	4.4%
Other	2.6%
Don’t use or have any	23.6%

Note that I am a bit sceptical of this result above; looking around the train on my commute, MDs perhaps just beat MP3 players, and CDs are quite rare. Perhaps there is some bias built into this survey; since the respondents are all internet users, they tend to download rather than dub to MD?

Looking at the usage trends by age, they are very similar to the ones noted above for ownership.

Q3: Which type of portable music player do you want to buy? (Sample size=2,183)

MP3 player (to SQ)	52.8%
MD player (to SQ)	5.8%
CD player (to SQ)	1.7%
Cassette player (to SQ)	0.1%
Other (to SQ)	1.9%
Don’t particularly want to buy any	37.7%

Again, similar age trends are noted; the younger people want MP3 players, older ones tape or CD, or just nothing at all.

Q3SQ: When do you hope to buy this player? (Sample size=1,152)

Within a month	2.6%
Within three months	8.8%
Within six months	13.6%
Within a year	17.8%
Within two years	4.0%
Not thought about any time period in particular	53.2%

Q4: What type of mobile phone do you have? (Sample size=2,183, multiple answer)

Standard mobile phone	90.1%
PHS-style mobile phone	4.9%
Have neither type	7.6%

Q5: What features of your mobile phone do you use? (Sample size=2,017, multiple answer)

Voice calls	97.1%
eMail	95.3%
Still camera	76.0%
Web	65.3%
Ring tones	52.9%
QR code reader	37.8%
Movie camera	36.0%
Video phone	11.9%
Radio	6.5%
Television	4.6%

Q6: Tell me about your mobile phone’s TV and radio features. (Sample size=2,017)

Mobile phone has TV or radio functionality, and I use it (to SQ2)	6.1%
Mobile phone has TV or radio functionality, but I don’t use it much (to SQ1)	7.4%
Mobile phone has TV or radio functionality, but I never use it (to SQ1)	5.9%
Mobile phone doesn’t have TV or radio functionality	76.9%
Don’t know	3.8%

Q6SQ1: Why don’t you use your mobile phone’s TV or radio features? (Sample size=269, multiple answer)

It costs money to use	33.1%
I read a book or listen to other music instead	28.3%
No good programming	20.8%
Signal is weak and keeps cutting out	11.5%
Using the feature is forbidden	0.4%
Other	27.5%

Q6SQ2: What types of programs do you watch or listen to on your mobile phone? (Sample size=174, multiple answer)

Music	54.6%
News	50.6%
Variety	25.9%
Talk show	23.6%
Entertainment	17.8%
Sports	17.2%
Educational	4.6%
Other	3.5%

Q7: If a mobile phone had music playback functionality, would you use it? (Sample size=2,017)

Definitely use	20.2%
Sometimes use	22.8%
Wouldn’t use	25.3%
No particular interest in music playback features	21.0%
Other	1.7%
Don’t know	9.0%

Q8: If a mobile phone had music recording functionality, would you use it? (Sample size=2,017)

Definitely use	15.2%
Sometimes use	22.5%
Wouldn’t use	30.6%
No particular interest in music recording features	19.7%
Other	1.0%
Don’t know	11.1%