世論 What Japan Thinks

japan.internet.com recently reported on an interesting survey from Trend Micro into Android smartphone usage. Actually, no survey title was given in the article, but that is probably close enough to the theme.

Demographics

Towards the end of 2012 316 people between the ages of 18 and 59 who had changed from a feature phone to Android in 2012 completed a web-based questionnaire, although it is not clear how they were selected or if the survey was private or not.

Note that Galapagos in the title comes from a frequently-used term for Japanese feature phone which have evolved in isolation to devices uniquely suited for their environment, but unable to establish a foothold anywhere else in the world.
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A recent survey from MMD Laboratory entitled 2012 smartphone user insight survey confirmed a trend I have seen with my own eyes; SNS usage, in particular LINE, has really taken off.

Demographics

Few demographics were presented; just that over the 18th and 19th of December 2012 670 smartphone using members of the MMD monitor panel completed a private internet-based questionnaire. The sample was aged between 20 and 59 years old.

When I initially read this survey, I was surprised to see email not featured anywhere, but finally I noticed that it was considered a built-in function. What I would really like to learn, though, is what people use for their main email provider; is it their carrier’s functionality or do they choose GMail or other third-party providers?
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japan.internet.com recently reported on a survey conducted by Neo Marketing into smartphones.

Demographics

Over the 26th and 27th of September 2012 500 smartphone users between the ages of 20 and 59 chosen by some unstated method completed an internet-based questionnaire. No further demographics were given.

I spent some time today with my wife looking for an upgrade from her dumb phone to a smartphone. She seemed quite taken by the LG Optimus G, which does has impressive stats, and I wonder if she was actually unconciously influenced by the advert that’s running on the TV, as she says the guy 11 seconds in has a lovely smile, but she didn’t realise that was advertising the same phone as the one she was eyeing up.
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goo Research recently carried out asurvey into the interesting topic of smartphone privacy, although japan.internet.com only reported on the security lock results.

Demographics

Between the 5th and 9th of October 2012 1,080 members of the goo Research online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 52.7% of the sample were male, 15.6% in their teens, 17.8% in their twenties, 21.3% in their thirties, 16.2% in their forties, 16.3% in their fifties, and 12.8% aged sixty or older.

I don’t use any lock on my smartphone, myself. I’d like to see some sort of voice-based password that combined both voice and phrase recognition.
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With the iPhone 5 out today, this survey from the female-targeted marketing research firm Her Story, reported on by japan.internet.com, into smartphones makes me curious to find out how many Madagala girls picked one up.

Demographics

According to the report published by Her Story on the 20th of September 2012, between the 9th and 14th of September 2012 500 mobile phone-owning women belonging to the Her Story monitor group aged between 20 and 49 completed an internet-based survey.

Madagala comes from the Japanese word mada, meaning still, and the portmandeau word Gala-kei, from Galapagos and keitai, which is the generic term for feature phones for the Japanese market, so Madagala girls are women who are still using feature phones. This appears to be a term Her Story invented for this survey, so in the same vein I have come up with Sudesuma girls which as you might guess means (well, I claim it means) women who have already moved up to smartphones.
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goo Research recently conducted a survey into smartphones, the results of which were reported on by japan.internet.com.

Demographics

Between the 4th and 6th of September 2012 1,088 members of the goo Research online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 52.7% of the sample were male, 16.5% in their teens, 18.0% in their twenties, 21.7% in their thirties, 16.3% in their forties, 15.6% in their fifties, and 11.9% aged sixty or older.

You’ll notice that the top five features in Q2 are all areas where the iPhone would score highly. On the other hand, the choice of answers does not seem to contain any specific feature-related replies, such as NFC smartcard, TV or radio reception, etc.

One of my colleagues who currently uses a feature phone on docomo (I think it is) was going to take a day off to queue for the iPhone 5, but it now appears that they have ordered it online instead!
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MMD (Mobile Marketing Data) Laboratory recently conducted a survey into smartphone usage and purchasing awareness amongst seniors.

Demographics

Over the 8th and 9th of August 2012 884 people completed an internet-based questionnaire, although there was no details on how the sample was selected. 37.4% were aged between 60 and 64, 37.4% between 65 and 69, and 25.1% aged 70 or older. No sex information was given.

A lot of the answers here indicate more awareness of technical features than I expected, but perhaps either don’t knows were eliminated (some of the numbers in Q2, for instance, didn’t agree with the printed bars) or there was detailed explanations about each of the features.
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goo Ranking recently looked at when a smartphone would be handy overseas.

Demographics

Between the 8th and 8th of February 2012 just over 1,000 members of the goo Research online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. Unfortunately, the link to the demographics is broken, so I cannot report the numbers in any detail.

Fortunately open wifi is far more common overseas than in Japan, so a smartphone can be used without worrying about roaming charges. Having just come back from overseas, the most convenient features were being able to check my docomo email via wifi and posting photos to Google+.
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I’m sure everyone’s had their moments when they wished to smash their smartphone into a thousand pieces, so this survey from goo Ranking looked at exactly that, what makes people annoyed with their smartphones.

Demographics

Between the 17th and 18th of January 2012 1,048 members of the goo Research online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 61.6% of the sample were female, 12.3% in their teens, 15.6% in their twenties, 27.9% in their thirties, 25.8% in their forties, 9.5% in their fifties, and 8.9% in their sixties. Note that the score in the results refers to the relative number of votes for each option, not a percentage of the total sample.

Number 3 is my pet hate with mine. My mail program gets slow and fails to respond switching between screens, so I end up getting a bunch of taps queued up and it pops in and out of edit mode. Number 7 is also annoying, as trying to view mail while walking (hmm, perhaps it’s a safety feature instead?) often results in the screen bouncing around. What are your pet hates?
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This recent survey from Media Interactive looked at upgrading to a smartphone, specifically from current Japanese feature phones, often called Galapagos mobiles in both English and Japanese due to their unique evolution to fit the needs of the Japanese market.

Demographics

Between the 9th and 11th of December 2011 300 feature phone-using members of the iResearch monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. No further demographic information was provided.

There definitely is a problem regarding viruses, worms and other malware on Android in particular, but it is debatable how likely the average user is to encounter them; I would guess that not often enough to make buying a virus scanner a good investment. Do any of my readers use smartphone virus scanners, and if so, why and how?

Looking at the list of negative reasons from Q1, if one thinks about the iPhone on SoftBank, lack of electronic cash, infrared and One Seg (terrestrial digital television), a need to change email addresses (I believe), poor reception, lack of design choice and no waterproofing all count against it. For Android phones from Japanese manufacturers on Docomo, virus worries and perhaps a lack of apps (or at least a perception of a lack) count against it. That gives a total of 62.3 points against the iPhone, versus 29.7 against Android, about twice as few negative votes for Android. Curiously enough, just about twice as many people want an Android versus an iPhone4S according to Q3 and Q4.
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