世論 What Japan Thinks

Widgets are now even finding their way onto mobile phones (now that would be an interesting survey!), but this survey from RealWorld RealResearch and reported on by japan.internet.com looked at widgets (or gadgets) on computer desktops.

Demographics

Over the 21st and 22nd of January 2009 1,020 members of the RealResearch monitor pool completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 51.6% of the sample were male, 7.3% in their teens, 27.4% in their twenties, 30.9% in their thirties, 25.4% in their forties, 7.5% in their fifties, and 1.6% aged sixty or older.

I looked a while ago at widgets according to MyVoice, which might be a useful cross-reference for this survey.

I don’t use widgets as they clutter up the desktop; I keep all my add-ons under control in toolbars. Perhaps if I invested in a wide-screen monitor I could afford to reserve some space, but then again I cannot think of any widgets I actually want to use! However, at work around half my colleagues run a desktop calendar widget, however as far as I can determine it doesn’t feature (or nobody uses) any schedule reminder functions.

In Q2, you’ll note it interesting that an RSS reading widget did not appear explicitly on the list. Although RSS is not that popular in Japan, I would have thought it merited its own category rather than, perhaps, being lumped into the “site or service latest information” category. I’d also have thought music players would be more popular.

Research results

Q1: Do you know about widgets or gadgets? (Sample size=1,020)

Yes	22.5%
Just heard the term	22.5%
No	55.1%

Furthermore, 87 people currently had widgets installed on their home computers. They were asked the following question.

Q2: What kinds of widgets have you ever used? (Sample size=87, multiple answer)

	Votes	Percentage
Clock	78	89.7%
Weather forecast	62	71.3%
News	40	46.0%
Tools (calculator, CPU temperature, etc)	38	43.7%
Search	27	31.0%
Video	18	20.7%
Music	11	12.6%
Site, service latest information	9	10.3%
Entertainment	7	8.0%
Communication (SNS, etc)	4	4.6%
Offical corporate tool	4	4.6%
Other	7	8.0%

In addition, there were 89 people who used to have widgets installed on their home computers. They were asked the following question.

Q3: Why did you stop using widgets? (Sample size=89, multiple answer)

	Votes	Percentage
Slowed down the computer	37	41.6%
Desktop got cluttered	32	36.0%
Lost interest in the widget	14	15.7%
Took time to download information	2	2.2%
Widget I wanted to use wasn’t supported by my OS	0	0.0%
No particular reason	2	2.2%
Other	2	2.2%