世論 What Japan Thinks

I feel the biggest home-grown problem that will have a major effect on the Japan of the future is the combination of the ageing population and the drop in the birth rate, as some time soon Japan will seriously have to consider how they approach the lack of workers and the explosion in elderly people looking for government care. This recent survey from MyVoice looked in particular at the decrease in the birth rate aspect of the problem.

Demographics

Over the first five days of September 2008 15,495 members of the MyVoice internet community completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 54% of the sample were female, 1% in their teens, 15% in their twenties, 36% in their thirties, 29% in their forties, and 19% in their fifties. I’ve just noticed that in the free comment column they have people up to the age of 73 answering, so from now on I’ll tag the top bracket of all MyVoice panels as fifty or older, not just as fifties.
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This survey from MyVoice is their third home use air conditioner survey. I thought I had translated their second air conditioner survey last year, but it turns out it was from DIMSDRIVE Research instead. And it was more interesting…

Demographics

Over the first five days of September 2008 15,465 members of the MyVoice internet community successfully completed a private online survey. 54% of the sample were female, 1% in their teeens, 15% in their twenties, 36% in their thirties, 29% in their forties, and 19% in their fifties.

I looked at the previous survey and I discovered I said just about everything I know about Japanese air conditioners! I do get people searching occasionally for Japanese air conditioner manuals – the functionality is often rather complex and if you can’t read Japanese it’s difficult to know what to do. Now, there’s an idea for a Web 2.0 site – www.rimoconmaster.com (rimocon being the Japanese abbreviation for REMOte CONtroller), upload a photo of your remote (and rice cooker, microwave, etc) with the buttons labeled, or without them labeled and get other users to fill in the functions.
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Perhaps it’s partially because the rules on advertising beer in the UK and the US, etc are very strict about not promoting enjoying beer, but humour is often key theme in their advertisements. Without such shackles in Japan, television spots for beer focus on noisy gulping down of said alcoholic beverages. This subject, beer and advertisements, was the topic for a recent survey from MyVoice.

Demographics

Over the first five days of September 2008 15,367 members of the MyVoice internet community successfully completed a private online questionnaire. 54% of the sample were female, 15% in their twenties, 37% in their thirties, 29% in their forties, and 19% in their fifties.

Just to give you an idea on how these beers get advertised, in Q2 I’ve embedded YouTube videos for each of the brands. Yes, that’s a very young Helena Bonham-Carter selling Suntory Malts! As a bonus, here’s an extra advert that I can’t embed…
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Another recent survey from MyVoice looked this time at the sense of taste.

Demographics

Over the first five days of September 2008 15,245 members of the MyVoice internet community completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 54% of the sample were female, 1% in their teens, 15% in their twenties, 36% in their thirties, 29% in their forties, and 19% in their fifties.

Many Japanese seem to make a fuss over the inability of foreigners to eat anko, a sweet bean paste usually made from adzuki beans, which I have never had a problem with. Certain kinds of seaweed have never been a problem, but natto defeats me every time. I used to hate Brie and other soft French cheeses until I went to Normandie and had it fresh there, so perhaps I need to find a similarly-fresh kind of natto, not the cheap supermarket plastic packs.

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If you’ve lived in Japan for any amount of time you might suspect that just about the only times that get resold are books, music and software, at places like the entertainingly-named Book Off, but to find out what other transactions take place, MyVoice looked at the buying and selling of used goods.

Demographics

Over the first five days of September 2008 15,250 members of the MyVoice internet community completed a private online questionnaire. 54% of the sample were female, 1% in their teens, 15% in their twenties, 36% in their thirties, 29% in their forties, and 19% in their fifties.

I did once buy a Gameboy Advance new then some second-hand software, but I left the device on a flight to Amsterdam! I’ve bought and sold through Book Off, although it’s a bit scary to visit their shop and see mile upon mile of books to browse through! I also once sold a digital camera back to a shop, but that was a highly unsatisfactory experience. I have my old dead computer to dispose of, but I don’t think I could get any money for that, so I’ll drop it off with a recycler somewhere.
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MyVoice recently published their second survey into pet life, a rather too direct translation of the Japanese title of the survey. I also translated the results of their first look at pet life almost three years ago, for reference.

Demographics

Over the first five days of September 2008 15,293 members of the MyVoice internet community successfully completed a private online survey. 54% of the sample were female, 1% in their teens, 15% in their twenties, 36% in their thirties, 29% in their forties, and 19% in their fifties.

When I wrote about cat pee and poo recently one question that came up there too was about shedding hair. One of my readers, sasutan, was kind enough to highlight the FURminator as an effective means of reducing shedding. However, some investigation on the internet priced it at around 10,000 yen (US$100), but further investigation showed that an alternative, the ShedBuster is widely available in Japan at under a third of the price, and apparently even uses the identical metal brush head supplier as the FURminator. One especially nice bonus of these undercoat brushes is that unlike ordinary brushes they don’t cause huge clouds of hair, but instead almost all the hair clumps in the tines, so there’s fewer problems for those with cat allergies, and of course less dead hair also means less dandruff, the cause of most cat allegies, so it’s a win-win device.
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I left the UK just as alcopops, fizzy drink-like youth-targeted cheap and relatively high in alcohol drinks started to become a serious problem due to their appeal to under-age drinkers. In Japan there is chuhai, and this is what MyVoice looked at in their sixth canned chuhai survey.

Demographics

Over the first five days in September 2008 15,054 members of the MyVoice internet community completed a private online questionnaire. 54% of the sample were female, 15% in their twetnies, 36% in their thirties, 29% in their forties, and 20% in their fifties.

According to the dictionary, chuhai is an abbreviation of shochu highball, Japanese spirits with tonic water, although the canned form often bears little resemblence to its humble origin. Alcohol content varies from 4% to 7%, and due to low tax rates one can of supermarket own-brand costs 88 yen (84 US cents or 45 UK pennies) for 330 millitres, close to half the price of branded beer, or about a third less than happoshu, and even cheaper when you consider the price per unit of alcohol.

By the way, yes, Suntory Calorie. actually does have a full stop after Calorie, it’s not a misprint!
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With most phones now crammed full with the latest features, most manufacturers are putting more effort into the design aspect of their phones as the differentiating feature. To see how consumers perceive the look of their mobiles, MyVoice conducted a survey into mobile phone design.

Demographics

Over the first five days of September 2008 15,502 members of the MyVoice internet community completed a private online questionnaire. 54% of the sample were female, 1% in their teens,l 15% in their twenties, 36% in their thirties, 29% in their forties, and 19% in their fifties.

The first phone that I felt was stunning in design terms was the Sharp Aquos with the rotating screen that could change from portrait for standard email use to landscape for One Seg television watching. That phone first came out on SoftBank, but it’s now offered by all three major carriers. To my overseas readers – have Sharp licenced that technology to any foreign manufacturers? I seem to remember hearing that Panasonic’s push-button opening for clamshells has been licenced overseas, but Panasonic seem to keep that feature to themselves as a differentiating factor for the domestic market.

In the graph, I kept Sony-Ericsson separate as some of their hardware is worldwide, some domestic only.
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Universal design, a term coined by Ron Mace, a fellow of the American Institute of Architects, has been embraced by many Japanese companies. To see how awareness of it is spreading throughout Japan, this survey from MyVoice investigated what people thought of Universal Design, or UD as it is often abbreviated to.

Demographics

Over the first five days of August 2008 15,045 members of the MyVoice internet community successfully completed a members-only online questionnaire. 54% of the sample were female, 1% in their teens, 15% in their twenties, 37% in their thirties, 29% in their forties, and 18% in their fifties.

In Q4, the lack of awareness of UD when selecting products is not necessarily a bad thing, as good UD should ideally be invisible. On many Panasonic products, for instance, the on button is a large yellow one with a black legend, a colour scheme which has been shown to be the most visible to people with cataracts or other vision problems, and the largeness makes it easier to find and push. Without knowledge of UD, the average able-bodied user perhaps just thinks it’s clearly marked, without considering the accessibility issues.
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With other surveys showing that car manufacturers are among the most green companies, let’s look at one effort they make to show their green credentials, hybrid cars, in a survey conducted by MyVoice.

Demographics

Over the first five days of August 2008 14,782 members of the MyVoice internet community successfully completed an internet-based private questionnaire. 54% of the sample were female, 1% were in their teens, 15% in their twenties, 37% in their thirties, 29% in their forties, and 18% in their fifties.

The Prius is a lovely car which I always try to rent when I need a car in Japan. I always use Toyota Rent-A-Car. If you pay using a (Japanese only?) credit card you get a 5% discount. The cars are fully-equipped with a CD player, good satellite navigation system (Japanese only!) and ETC automatic toll payment machine, if you have a card for that. I’m picking up one the weekend after next, and it works out at about 8,000 yen per day.

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