世論 What Japan Thinks

In this recent survey from goo Research, reported on by japan.internet.com, into the PC Recycle Law, the vast majority who knew it well reckoned it worked to at least some degree.

Demographics

On the 6th of September 2010 1,084 members of the goo Research online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 52.6% of the sample were male, 16.0% in their teens, 17.5% in their twenties, 21.2% in their thirties, 16.5% in their forties, 16.3% in their fifties, and 12.5% aged sixty or older.

I never got any explanation about the law, nor did I see anything in the manual, when I bought my computer nor my LCD monitor, which should also be covered.

I know somone who was too stingy to pay the 4,000 yen or so to throw out an ancient LCD monitor, so instead he dismantled it and chucked it out (in the correct recycle bins, I he must add) bit by bit.
Read the rest of this entry »

This short report on a survey from Marsh Inc by japan.internet.com into home computer environment, but in particular on computer problems, found over two-thirds tried to fix problems themselves first.

Demographics

Between the 14th and 16 of April 2010 300 members of the Marsh monitor panel completed a private internet-based questionnaire. The sample was exactly 50:50 male and female, 1.3% in their teens, 18.7% 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 have Windows Update set to download automatically, as I usually want to check to see what’s getting updated, and I can delay the update until I finish a session, to prevent the reboot reminder getting in the way. At work we are supposed to switch it off; I’d like to say it’s because it gives the IT department a chance to test out stuff, but I suspect it’s more for a dubious reason like preventing overload of the local network.
Read the rest of this entry »

A recent survey from Marsh Inc, reported on by japan.internet.com, looked at one’s home computer environment and found relatively few left their home PC running 24/7.

Demographics

Between the 7th and 11th of April 2010 300 members of the Marsh online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 50.0% of the sample were male, 2.0% in their teens, 18.0% 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 have two computers at home, a desktop and my netbook, which I use when my wife is on the desktop for her evening email check. Both machines are only ever on during active use; we hit the Sleep button if we’re going to be away from the computer for less than thirty minutes, but otherwise it’s a complete power down. It might have been interesting to see if those who switch off mean unplugging, sleeping, hibernating, or letting them automatically enter sleep or hibernate mode.
Read the rest of this entry »

As a sort-of follow-up on a recent survey into internet performance, this time we look with Marsh Inc and japan.internet.com at computer dissatisfaction.

Demographics

Between the 13th and 17th of January 2010 300 members of the Marsh monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 50.0% of the sample were female, 2.3% in their teens, 17.7% 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’m mostly satisfied with my setup at home – it’s no speed demon, but it wasn’t bought as one, although it could do with a little bit of extra memory as it gets a bit slow when memory fills up, and the mouse is rather wonky.

Interestingly, in this survey everyone had a home computer, although usually there’s always one or two who do their surveys from the office or an internet cafe – I presume they pre-screened the sample.
Read the rest of this entry »

A recent survey from Marsh Inc and reported on by japan.internet.com looked at people’s home computer environment. This is a topic I previously covered almost two years ago.

Demographics

Between the 10th and 14th of September 2009 300 members of the Marsh monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. The sample was exactly 50:50 male and female, 1.0% were in their teens, 19.0% 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.

Q2 is a bit vague in the wording, as especially for a portable machine, the room in which it is placed, which implies when not in use, and the room in which it is used may differ. I know when I take my work note PC home it sits in the study/spare room when I’m not using it, but I bring it through to the kitchen table when I want to use it. However my main desktop sits permanently at a computer desk in the study.

Which reminds me, I really should organise the area around my computer desk to be a proper homeworking setup…
Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s an interesting little survey from Marsh Inc and reported on by japan.internet.com into computer maintenance, looking in particular at cleaning one’s PC and accessories.

Demographics

Between the 2nd and 5th of July 2009 300 members of the Marsh monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. The sample was exactly 50:50 male and female, 1.3% were in their teens, 18.7% 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 think the survey is looking at home computers, although there is no clear statement in the article to say that it is.

I must admit to only cleaning my PC once a year, although about once a month I do clean the fluff off the bottom of the mouse.
Read the rest of this entry »

The “Japanese” in the title refers to the people answering the questionnaire, not the make of the computers as a few foreign names found their way into this survey from MyVoice into computer maker brand image.

Demographics

Over the first five days of May 2009 14,915 members of the MyVoice internet community successfully completed a private online questionnaire. 54% of the sample were male, 1% in their teens, 14% in their twenties, 35% in their thirties, 30% in their forties, and 30% aged fifty or older.

It’s no surprise to me in Q5 that Apple came top, as a previous survey into design found Apple was way out in the lead.

For Q7, another survey earlier found that UMPC was actually better-known than Netbook, but here we see an almost four to one ratio of Netbook to UMPC (Ultra-Mobile PC).
Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s an interesting survey from goo Research and reported on by japan.internet.com looking at computer usage of mobile phone users, the fourth in the series of regular surveys.

Demographics

Between the 16th and 19th of February 2008 1,067 members of the goo Research mobile monitor group completed a mobile phone internet-based questionnaire. 57.5% of the sample were female, 3.9% in their teens, 29.2% in their twenties, 40.2% in their thirties, 21.4% in their forties, and 5.2% aged fifty or older. Note that one way that they recruit their mobile monitors is by getting them to enter their mobile phone email address when they apply to be a PC monitor, so bear that in mind while reading the results.

My mobile web use is limited to the occassional dictionary lookup and downloading of animated email icons, for reasons of it being too expensive, too slow, and too restrictive.

Read the rest of this entry »

As quite often happens, this report published by japan.internet.com regarding a survey conducted by iBridge Research Plus into women and home computers was interesting yet frustrating in the incompleteness of the data.

Demographics

On the 23rd of February 2009 300 female members of the iBridge Research Plus monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 23.3% of the sample were in their twenties, 34.7% in their thirties, 29.3% in their forties, 9.6% in their fifties, and 3.0% in their sixties.

The first frustration is that there is no domestic status described, as it would be interesting to see how they share computers with their husbands, children, parents or flatmates.

A second frustration is no information regarding whether wives get hand-me-downs from their husbands, or if their own PC was bought new, and if so, how much input did they themselves have in the decision.

We have a shared PC at home, running Vista with my wife’s account set to Japanese, mine to English, which does work rather well. We’ve no money for a computer each, but if we did I’d probably get a nice wee Netbook for myself.
Read the rest of this entry »

[part 1] [part 2] [part 3]

This extremely detailed survey from goo Research in conjunction with the NTT DATA Institute of Management Consulting, Inc looked at old people and computer and internet usage, and comparing these habits with that of younger people.

Demographics

Between the 12th and 16th of September 2008 1,064 members of the goo Research monitor panel completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 67.5% of the sample were male, 0.9% in their teens, 7.0% in their twenties, 17.4% in their thirties, 12.5% in their forties, 6.0% in their fifties, and 56.1% aged sixty or older. Note that everyone in the sample had access to a computer and has signed up to goo Research as a monitor, so please be aware of that before extrapolating the behaviour observed here to the general population of Japan.

In Q13, I hope the tiny percentage applying security patches excludes those getting pushed Windows updates automatically, and similarly I hope there are a lot of people unaware that their Windows firewall is on. I also wonder what the overlap between those with local anti-virus and those with their service provider’s virus scanning is. Most providers offer the scanning only as a premium service, even though solutions like AVG anti-virus will do everything for free.

In Q16 it is entertaining to see that the only things old folk do on line more than their juniors is share trading, dating, and Second Life!
Read the rest of this entry »