世論 What Japan Thinks

Unfortunately what this survey by Marsh Inc and reported on by japan.internet.com into mobile search omits is what search provider people are using, but still it is quite interesting to see what people are searching for.

Demographics

Between the 17th and 19th of February 2010 300 members of the Marsh monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. The sample was 50:50 male and female, 1.7% in their teens, 18.3% in their twenties, 20.0% in their thirties, 20.0% in their forties, 20.0% in their fifties, and 20.0% aged sixty or older.

I’ve only had a fleeting experience with the default search engine built into docomo’s iMode, but it was pretty terrible. Now I directly use Google and its iMode front-end, although it’s barely once a month that I use it, and then it is always for “<restaurant name> coupon”, which usually gives me a hit in one of the top three entries.
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A recent survey from goo Research, reported on by japan.internet.com, into mobile devices (the fourth time this regular survey was conducted) found that the iPhone far outsold ASUS’s Eee PC, the top netbook.

Demographics

On the 9th of February 2010 1,080 members of the goo Research monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 53.1% of the sample were male, 17.0% in their teens, 18.7% in their twenties, 21.2% in their thirties, 16.5% in their forties, and 26.6% aged fifty or older.

It is useful to compare the outcome of this survey and the other survey I published yesterday on mini notebook computers.
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In the US and the UK I get the distinct impression that the netbook market is in a rush for the bottom, but here in Japan, premium-priced mini-notebooks seem to be the norm according to this recent survey from Media Interactive reported on by japan.internet.com.

Demographics

Over the 16th and 17th of February 2010 1,000 internet users completed a survey, although the means of gathering this sample was not described. 53.1% of the sample were male, 0.8% in their teens, 13.8% in their twenties, 31.3% in their thirties, 28.3% in their forties, 17.9% in their fifties, and 7.9% in their sixties.

I’ve now had my MSI Wind for about four months; I picked it up for under 300 dollars in the US, and it works great as a second PC that I can use when my wife’s busy with the main computer, or for stuffing in my rucksack whenever I have a solo train ride with 20 minutes or more to kill.
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The 50th installment of the regular goo Research mobile upgrade needs, reported on by japan.internet.com as usual, found that price was the most important factor, which goes some way to explaining the 25% drop in mobile sales last year.

Demographics

Between the 26th and 29th of January 2010 exactly 1,000 mobile phone-owning members of the goo Research monitor panel completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 50.3% of the sample were male, 1.9% in their teens, 12.8% in their twenties, 36.9% in their thirties, 29.8% in their forties, and 18.6% aged fifty or older.

I met a couple of guys from Nokia this week and they were carrying their latest model of smartphone, the N900, and I want one! I hope Japanese manufacturers can bring out a smartphone that works and addresses customer needs, not the carrier’s wishes.
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Or indeed, what you wish she didn’t, or what women wish their boyfriends would or wouldn’t do, the subject of another entertaining ranking survey from goo Ranking.

Demographics

Between the 20th and 22nd of January 2010 1,071 members of the goo Research monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 51.1% of the sample were female, 19.9% in their teens, 29.5% in their twenties, 30.5% in their thirties, and 20.1% in their forties. Note that the score in the results refers to the relative number of votes for each option, not a percentage of the total sample.

For men’s second choice, getting their woman to email once a day, I don’t know it that implies at least or at most once per day…

You’ll notice that for the men, the two answers at number six are contradictary, and 14= explains why she does 12 and 13!

The sticking a photo on a battery refers to the habit of getting photo seals from puri-kura machines.

My wishes would be to stop asking me to talk to her while she’s emailing and to properly use her unlimited plan or switch to another.
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iBridge Research Plus recently conducted a survey into family phone bills, which was reported on by japan.internet.com.

Demographics

On the 12th of January 2010 300 married female members of the iBridge monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 6.0% of the sample were in their twenties, 38.3% in their thirties, 34.3% in their forties, 15.7% in their fifties, and 5.7% in their sixties.

Both our phone bills come out of the family budget. I personally run up 2,600 yen per month on just about the cheapest plan going, wifey 8,000 yen or so depending on how many voice calls she makes.

Without knowing the number of people with school-aged mobile phone owning children, it’s difficult to judge if the 41 people in Q1SQ1 who pay children’s bills is large or small.
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It’s been a while since I’ve posted the results of a survey on QR Codes (these two-dimensional bar code things) but this one from Marsh Inc and reported on by japan.internet.com is worth the wait.

Demographics

Between the 20th and 24th of January 2010 300 members of the Marsh monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. The sample was exactly 50:50 male and female, 2.7% in their teens, 17.3% in their twenties, 20.0% in their thirties, 20.0% in their forties, 20.0% in their fifties, and 20.0% aged sixty or older.

A number of PC internet-targetted services - Yahoo! Maps springs to mind, and I think I’ve seen them for hotel bookings - display a QR Code that contains a URL that summarises the data on display in a mobile-friendly format. They also offer an option to email the URL to a mobile, but perhaps people worry about submitting their mobile email address and ending up being a spam target.

My two “Other” places for reading a QR Code was from a friend’s corporate PC inventory tag and from my health insurance card, just to see what information was encoded in both places.
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In a survey on mobile phones from goo Research, reported on by japan.internet.com, they looked in particular in cleaning the screen, a subject that I have actually covered over two years ago.

Demographics

Between the 22nd and 24th of December 2009 1,070 members of the goo Research online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 53.4% of the sample were male, 15.7% in their teens, 18.4% in their twenties, 21.3% in their thirties, 16.3% in their forties, 16.1% in their fifties, and 12.2% aged sixty or older.

I too most often wipe my mobile screen on my sleeve, despite having a mascot screen cleaner dangling from my phone. The screen cleaner does a better job, of course, but one good wipe on my sleeve after a phone call is far quicker!
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It feels like ages since I’ve had the opportunity to flog you tat feature high quality wares from Strapya, so I make no apologies for littering this post with affiliate links, but please follow them anyway as Strapya do sell some strange stuff… Anyway, the survey in question was from Point On Research and reported on by japan.internet.com and looked at the matter of mobile phone accessories, looking at straps in particular.

Demographics

On the 5th of January 2010 800 mobile phone users completed a mobile phone internet-based questionnaire. The sample was exactly 50:50 male and female, 25.0% in their teens, 25.0% in their twenties, 25.0% in their thirties, and 25.0% in their forties.

I’ve not recently changed any straps on my mobile, but mostly due to neither my wife nor I upgrading phones.

I don’t know why I keep promoting Strapya as I make almost zero money out of it, just a few dollars a month or so…
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This recent survey from iShare into 2009 usage patterns for mobile phones revealed a few surprises for me, not least that One Seg terrestrial digital broadcast decoding and music playing features were quite low on the lists of both used and useful features.

Demographics

Between the 2nd and 7th of December 2009 541 members of the CLUB BBQ free email forwarding service completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 56.6% of the sample were male, 35.1% in their twenties, 28.7% in their thirties, and 36.2% in their forties.

In Q1 I’m really surprised to see over 15% of the iShare demographic does not have a mobile phone. As far as I am aware, and refering to other survey companies like goo Research and MyVoice, penetration is around 95%, so I’m not really sure what makes iShare so low. Are people being too smart for their own good and answering no because they have a PHS-based device, or is there a lot of data card and 3G dongle users?

As I’m married, my main voice and email partner was of course my better half. The most used and most useful feature was of course email. Answering for my wife, she probably exchanges more email in total with friends, although counting them individually I’m probably her main mail contact. As for voice, her mother wins by 1.6 kilometres.
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