世論 What Japan Thinks

I hang out occassionally on the Yahoo! Answers Japan board, and I would rate the reliability of the best answers as moderate as best, which is how most Japanese users view these sites, according to a survey conducted by JR Tokai Express Research Inc and reported on by japan.internet.com into Q&A sites.

Demographics

On the 2nd of June 2008 330 members of the JR Tokai Express Research online monitor group employed in the private sector completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 81.2% of the sample were male, 10.0% in their twenties, 29.1% in their thirties, 43.6% in their forties, 15.5% in their fifties, and 1.8% in their sixties.

Although trust levels are high, as with Wikipedia the problem is that the casual reader doesn’t know how good the chosen best answer is (on Yahoo! at least; I’m not sure of the others) as it is often the questioner who chooses the answer that sounds best to them, or if it goes to voting then trolls and those gaming the system can outweigh genuine votes. Even with no trolling, a more palatable answer may be chosen over the truth.
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A pet hate of mine is that in the UK the idea that you don’t store meats or fish over fresh vegetables is common knowledge, yet despite many television programs on the contents of people’s fridges I’ve never heard a word of warning about this in Japan. To find out what things the Japanese do, MyVoice conducted a survey into how people store food.

Demographics

Over the first five days of May 2008 14,241 members of the MyVoice internet community successfully completed a private online questionnaire. 54% of the sample were female, 2% were in their teens, 14% in their twenties, 38% in their thirties, 29% in their forties, and 17% in their fifties.

Cling film reminds me of an awful series of advertisements that would get banned in the UK, as they feature a kid of around ten years old running around with cling film, wrapping things at random, and using static electricity on the film to attract her hair.
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I’ve not been to an arcade myself for ages, nor have I really had the time (or quite frankly, the inclination) to play any games recently. To see what the Japanese are doing, MyVoice took their second look at game usage, although I’m not sure when the first look took place!

Demographics

Over the first five days of May 2008 14,373 members of the MyVoice internet community successfully completed a private on-line questionnaire. 54% of the sample were female, 2% in their teens, 15% in their twenties, 37% in their thirties, 29% in their forties, and 17% in their fifties.

The last two times we were in arcades (or game centres, as they are known in Japan), we spent all our cash on the UFO Catchers with nothing to show. That falls under the category of “prize games” in Q6, and before I next go I’ll be sure to study this video on how to win at them!
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A significant milestone in the penetration of electronic cash within Japanese society has been reached, with this survey conducted by goo Research and reported on by japan.internet.com into electronic cash showing that now over half the population (of internet users) carry some form of credit-card form-factor electronic cash. This is the first of a new series of regular surveys by goo Research into electronic cash.

Demographics

Between the 19th and 21st of May 2008 1,091 members of the goo Research online monitor panel completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 52.9% of the sample was male, 16.3% in their teens, 18.2% in their twenties, 21.4% in their thirties, 16.2% in their forties, and 27.9% aged fifty or older.

Note that the questions below were concerned with credit-card sized cards, not mobile phones, so the actual percentage of owners of electronic cash-capable devices would actually be higher, although of course usage is another matter.

I carry an ICOCA rail pass, but I never put any money in it, so I don’t know if that would count or not in this survey! Otherwise, I am quite happy carrying a pocketful of dross around with me all the time.
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Japanese weddings are another of these things you should experience as both a guest and as a bride or groom, and perhaps even as a minister. To find out what Japanese want to see more of and less of at these events, first what people wanted to do, for both men and women, and what people wish they’d stop doing at weddings, again also for both men and women.

Demographics

Between the 22nd and 24th of April 2008 1,048 members of the goo Research online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 51.7% of the sample was female, 7.1% in their teens, 14.7% in their twenties, 29.0% in their thirties, 27.4% in their forties, 11.6% in their fifties, and 10.2% aged sixty or older. Note that the score in the results refers to the relative number of votes for each option, not a percentage of the total sample.

Having been married in a kilt, the groom tossing was perhaps the most dodgy event for me! I wish they’d quit just about everything on the list in Q2, as the Japanese weddings I’ve been to have been universally formulaic and rather dull on the whole.

The trumpet shower mentioned in Q2 is trumpets that spit out metallic tape; the giant cracker is a similar effect, but with a huge launcher. The candle-lighting involves going round every table in the pitch dark with a big sword-like fire lighter and lighting a candle in the middle of each table.
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The only convenience store close by my house closes about 10 pm, and anyway I’m too broke and too married these days to get up to much at the midnight hour. However, this recent survey from MyVoice into late night and 24 hour businesses shows that there’s a lot of people active in the small hours.

Demographics

Over the first five days of May 2008 14,350 members of the MyVoice Internet Community successfully completed a private online survey. 54% of the sample was female, 2% in their teens, 15% in their twenties, 38% in their thirties, 29% in their forties, and 16% in their fifties.

Conspicuous by their absence in the list of late night operators are trains and buses. Most lines have their last train depart by midnight, with one reason being safety, to allow the operators four hours per night for essential maintenance. The other more cynical reason is that it keeps taxi drivers in business. It’s quite an amazing sight the first time you see taxis twenty deep outside the railway station after the last train departs!

Image from wukong on Flickr.
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Despite the recent survey showing a distinct lack of interest in podcasting, this survey reported on by japan.internet.com and conducted by JR Tokai Express Research Inc into portable digital audio players shows about 55% of Japanese own suitable players.

Demographics

On the 25th of May 2008 330 members of the JR Tokai Express Research monitor group employed in the private sector completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 72.1% of the sample were male, 13.0% were in their twenties, 40.0% in their thirties, 33.0% in their forties, 11.8% in their fifties, and 2.1% in their sixties.

I’ve got in the mood for using a portable player again, although my memories of the Sony hard disk Walkman that managed to lose track of most of my content twice is still fresh in my memory. However, I can’t be bothered with the hassle of it all, and I do remember that it made the train ride to work less fulfilling and more stressful. This could probably be accounted for by the player transporting me into my own private world, but due to train noises and other leakage of sound into my ears, I could never quite reach there. Despite someone standing over me right now waving a fan just at the edge of my vision with his incessant fap-fap-fap and occassional brushing of the fan against his suit, and another guy slurping from a smelly cardboard pack of one-cup sake, and a third with ciggie breath, I can cope better by facing it rather than trying to hide behind a wall of sound.
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Sorry for the rather boring headline, but since Nakamura ate my dog last week, I thought I’d better stay clear of any suggestive remarks regarding cat-owning young Japanese women and photographs of their… well, I hope you get the picture, so when you do, please forward it to me. Anyway, back at the survey, BlogCh and CLUB BBQ investigated pets.

Demographics

Between the 14th and 6th of May 2008 582 users of the free email forwarding service CLUB BBQ completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 51.9% of the sample was male, 15.5% in their twentes, 42.7% in their thirties, 31.9% in their forties, and 9.9% of other ages.

Pictured above is my lovely American Shorthair who is also my mobile phone wallpaper.

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Food safety is a big topic here in Japan, with the memory of poison gyoza fresh in many people’s mind, and raw vegetables from China in particular shunned by many consumers. To see what exactly is happening, Nippon Research Center recently conducted a survey into food safety issues.

Demographics

Between the 2nd and 14th of April 2008 1,200 people were randomly chosen based on the population distribution from the 2005 census data. 200 sample points were chosen and from each point 6 people agreed to face-to-face interviews. 50.4% of the sample were female, 6.2% in their teens, 15.1% in their twenties, 17.9% in their thirties, 15.3% in their forties, 18.4% in their fifties, 15.9% in their sixties, and 11.2% in their seventies.

I’d like to say a quick hello to any readers who might have joined me from Slashfood, who have been kind enough to cover a couple of articles from me in the last few weeks. This one is just to show I do serious food topics too!

Not surprisingly, China’s image is horrendous, but there is one particular Chinese export that people do not seem to mind, or at least don’t think about it when purchasing. That product is Oolong and other teas, and one new tea in particular, Suntory’s Black Oolong Tea, advertised as one product that canhelp in the fight against metabolic syndrome, has in the two years since launch sold round about 75 billion yen’s worth (around 750 million US dollars) of tea according to a television programme I saw at the weekend, representing close to half a billion 350 ml bottles! Its adverts unashamedly features subtitled Chinese actors eating Chinese food. Click through to view the television commercials.

Perhaps it’s just the types of web sites I frequent (Slashdot and digg, for instance), or perhaps it’s just that people are reluctant to admit to filesharing even semi-anonymously, but this recent survey conducted by goo Research and reported on by japan.internet.com into movie watching showed P2P the second least-popular way for obtaining movies.

Demographics

Between the 14th and 16th of May 2008 1,087 members of the goo Research online monitor pool completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 52.4% of the sample was male, 12.1% were in their teens, 22.1% in their twenties, 21.6% in their thirties, 16.2% in their forties, and 28.0% aged fifty or older.

“Better than free” is the basic strategy pursued by many paid services that compete with pirated content. Apple’s iTunes, in particular, mostly achieves this goal, but other systems I have used, especially from large Japanese corporates, are nowhere near realising this. I’ve not personally used any of these mail-order DVD rental systems, as most of my film needs are met by either the cinema or stuff recorded off cable.

I’m not sure why video tape-only people were eliminated from Q2, and finding out the patterns of usage of tape and DVD (and hard disk, for that matter) would have been interesting. Perhaps if one pays to obtain the full results one can learn these details. I’m also a little surprised that Video On Demand and acTVila were not distinct answers for Q2.
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