A national survey of 1,200 consumers conducted by Solutions Research Group found that 3 out of 4 surveyed Americans wanted a new gadget this holiday season. The rankings went a little something like this:
- HDTV (35%)
- Windows-based notebook (20%)
- Digital camera (17%)
- Windows-based desktop computer
- GPS car navigation
- Cellphone
- Digital video camera
- Nintendo Wii
- Sony PS3
- HD DVD or Blu-ray player
So where's Apple, the big bad daddy of consumer electronics? Well, their best showing was the MacBook with an 11 ranking followed by the iPhone at number 15. Pretty good when you consider the level of brand awareness this represents in a field of otherwise unspecified laptops and cellphones. In fact, 1-in-6 consumers are hoping for some type of Apple gear under the Chanukazaa tree this season.
posted Oct 10th 2007 9:42AM
Thats kind of a stupid thing to say. People who prefer macs have no choice but to buy Apple or am I wrong and Apple now lets other companies manufacture Macs ?
As for the iPhone being up there it's only just been released so of course a lot of people are aware of it. Even more so given the hype that Apple and certain "blogs" gave it.
Maybe they should do the same survey in Europe and see the difference. That and 1,200 is hardly a decent sized sample.
point being maybe also that if the iphone is a seperate option, people are going to choose it.
a better way to survey would have been to ask if you want a cellphone, and then ask if you want a nokia,samsung,motorola or apple.. not if you want a cellphone or an iphone.
N=1200 gives you a margin of error of less than 3%. It's called statistics, AND IT WORKS. Look it up.
Questioning 1,200 people (assuming they were questioned and not just given a list of things to choose from) will hardly give you an accurate picture of what a population of billions is thinking now will it. Might of well just gone down the nearest bar and asked the people in there.
- Anyway 98.8% of statistics are made up.
No, seriously, look it up. Google "sample size". Even if you don't understand the math, it still works.
Yes stand outside an Apple shop and ask everybody who comes out what they would like. Yup that would be an accurate picture of the countries opinions. As others have stated polls like this don't mean jack.
I hate people that have no idea of statistics come out an immediately claim a poll is inaccurate because they don't agree with it. Statistics is fairly well proven, and if done correctly will result in fairly accurate results.
Wording of the question can have a much larger impact than sample size. This question is poor, because Apple products are given their own category while other products are not. As said above, they should ask people if they want a cell phone, and then ask people the brand.
Besides, a margin of error of less than 3% just means that, if you were to ask every human living in the U.S. that question, their answers would be within 3% of the poll's result. It doesn't mean people are actually going to go out of buy those items.
there's not enough information in the article about the survey conducted to conclude either way if the survey produces robust results. thus, debate on the topic of the quality of the survey results is pointless.
having said that, i think the survey does point to some strong evidence that AT LEAST 411.6 people [1200 x 35% x (1-2%)] have no clue about why they're getting an HDTV besides. (The number assumes that the HD set top box question was specifically asked to the HDTV respondents, which from the text is a questionable assumption.)
sorry for the sentence fragment. i meant:
"...have no clue about why they're getting an HDTV besides the feeling that they have to get one because it's big and everyone else is getting one."
Wow, I can almost say I have everything on the top 10 list that I wanted. didn't care for the PS3. Maybe I'll get a new camera for this Year.
The XBOX 360 got pwned!!! HAHAHA...
It didn't even rank.
How can you say they got pawned? is it possible that maybe everyone who wanted an Xbox already has one? so its not big on the want list? ;)
Yeah, normally I would find a comment like that to be ignorant, but it holds a lot of water considering it did come out wayyy before the other consoles.
Personally I want a new graphics card, hopefully the GeForce 9s are out by Christmas :D
They don't want them for Christmas because they already bought them to play Halo 3. As if you'd wait till Christmas.
Frank,
Except for the fact that more Wii's have been sold than 360's - and it's still on the list..
Spin that story, you spin it good.
I'm sure Apple have mailed your pay slips for October.
No fricken joke!! HOW MUCH ARE THEY PAYING YOU!? I thought you guys were starting to figure this out...this is laughable
ENGADGET = APPLE BIAS FANBOYISM ENGADGET = APPLE BIAS FANBOYISM ENGADGET = APPLE BIAS FANBOYISM ENGADGET = APPLE BIAS FANBOYISM ENGADGET = APPLE BIAS FANBOYISM ENGADGET = APPLE BIAS FANBOYISM ENGADGET = APPLE BIAS FANBOYISM ENGADGET = APPLE BIAS FANBOYISM ENGADGET = APPLE BIAS FANBOYISM ENGADGET = APPLE BIAS FANBOYISM ENGADGET = APPLE BIAS FANBOYISM ENGADGET = APPLE BIAS FANBOYISM ENGADGET = APPLE BIAS FANBOYISM ENGADGET = APPLE BIAS FANBOYISM ENGADGET = APPLE BIAS FANBOYISM ENGADGET = APPLE BIAS FANBOYISM ENGADGET = APPLE BIAS FANBOYISM ENGADGET = APPLE BIAS FANBOYISM
Its just crazy....
Enapple
Applegadget
Something to that effect....
You guys are seriously pathetic
Stop being biased already to your sugar daddy apple
Yeah... I also found it humourous that Engadget decided to put a positive spin on 83.33% of the sample not wanting an iPhone...
maybe able isnt in top10 because there is more than 110 million ipod sold so there is a lot less ppl that want apple product because:
a: they already have an ipod
b: they now know apple isnt that great, itunes really suck, its not user friendly
c: its cost a lot and you dont get much more
am surprised that blu-ray/hd dvd player is so high
apple*
Funny how even though not a single Apple product was in the top ten they twisted it to mention them. Ahwell I don't want to start one of these bloody fanboy wars. Although number 11 spot is prety good since they are the sole sellers of that product, plus they will sell truck loads of iPods at Christmas. Good work Apple.
Interesting that you didn't find the time to actually follow the Informationweek.com link and RTFA. Engadget was merely quoting the source, contrary to all the fanboi bashing that's going on.
If you want to get pissy about someone trotting Apple out on a pedestal, at least focus your hate towards the right source (It was linked above but I'll go ahead and add it for good measure):
http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml;jsessionid=F1VWJXSZUZ4WMQSNDLRSKH0CJUNN2JVN?articleID=202400758
I agree. And Information Week was just stating that it was very high for one particular product from a particular brand, as opposed to "Windows-based Notebook" Just as Sony and Nintendo made it on to the list. They were stating the number 3 (Bronze). They do, do that at events regarding placement. So Engadget and Information Week were stating who took home the bronze medal.
Before you start bashing Engadget take the time to actually READ THE STORY. (and yes i know where the caps lock key is)
It would be really interesting to know how much and in what currency (iPhones?) engadget gets paid for this type of informative and unbiased stories... anyone knows where to find out?
Why do you always have to mention Apple, even when they have nothing to do with the story? Why don't you give kudos to Sony and Nintendo for having better brand awareness than Apple?
@Jonathan Bergeron,
Did you even read the story we linked to? There's an entire paragraph dedicated to a discussion of just Apple products.
Thomas
@ Thomas Ricker:
You make it sound as if the primary focus of the survey was to discover Apple's ranking in the consumer wish list. In reality, the small paragraph which was primarily about apple was just another 'mention it in passing' descriptor of popular market products. It was no more embellished than the rest of the information including the 'paragraph' about the Wii...
-The Truth Beacon
why tag this apple while they aren't on the Top-10 ?
ridiculous....
Oh, my god. The article had a pointless Apple slant, JUST LIKE YOU! You guys should hook up.
Sorry, Thomas...
But Truth Beacon just handed you your ass on a silver platter.
What happened to reporting on Gadgets? Yea, I know you lifted the Apple part from info week, but really, if anything this should show that 5 out of 6 don't want ANY apple product, and even more don't want an iPhone, even if it's free.
What should that tell you? Well, very, very, very few people in the world care about the next rumor of a potential hack for the iPhone. So, can we start reporting real Gadget news again? Or maybe you can start an "www.gadgetapple.com" site, instead of forcing us to try and find that slow "apple-free" link.
WILL EVERYBODY WHO DOESNT LIKE APPLE IN THE NEWS STOP COMMENTING ON EVERY SINGLE APPLE ARTICLE!!! really, if you dont like apple then stop wasting yours and everybody else's time by making useless comments and whining about how engadget reports on technology news. too bad for you if apple has been releasing products and making ranking lists! Sheesh just scroll on by and stop wasting the time and the page space of those of us who are mature enough to recognize technological news and to be able to read something that has a companies name on it. Maybe Engadget should have a restriction for those who can't handle the name of any company and blocks you from seeing the articles with actual corporation names on them. Guess what you'll get then ?? almost no articles at all. So stay quiet and stop wasting the people, who can handle articles that recognize companies for making good products and be highly ranked on consumer lists, time!
Go cry somewhere else and stop making a mockery of Engadget.
You act as if the no one is aware of the Ipod name. Christ, it's become the generic name for mp3 players, might as well be Kleenex. Yet it doesn't appear on the top 10 list. THAT is your headline and you missed it.
crapple.
mmmm apples.....
It's hard to enjoy an apple, if you are missing your two front teeth.
I can't believe two front teeth got edged out this year.
Probably because Engadget is a tool of the American Dental Association.
ADA FANBOIS! ADA FANBOIS!
Agree, very biased article. Apple is doing well NEWS, apple isnt doing well NEWS, if you are reporting about the survey I found more interesting to see HDDVD and bluray there, also im curious, does Xbox360 apear, and Ps2?
is that you code?
My wishlist... a new Microsoft Vista PC and the Zune 80 just recently announced.
If you guys don't want to read a post about Apple, don't read it. Quit whining.
@shamowfski
That's point, this ISN'T a post about Apple!
@something
It's tagged Apple, and has apple in the headline, seems to be about apple to me.
Anytime Engadget posts anything about apple all of you apple haters come in and bitch about how much engadget loves apple. Go to a different site then. There are more than 1 gadget sites on the web. Posted from an XPS btw.
Ok, the Engadget post was about Apple but the STORY was not... or did you skip reading the source and instead instantly go to "fanboy mode"?
Accourding to your logic, they could post a story about a soldier dying in Irag, title it "Soldier dies not wearing an ipod", tag it "Apple", and link it to a story that doesn't mention anything Apple related and it would be an "Apple Post".
The point is that they make all articles about Apple even if they have to twist around backwards to do it.
@Something
"Soldier dies not wearing iPod"
I'm LAWLING my ass off right now.
Rule #1: Never trust the information or service from a company that's name uses the word "Solutions".
Rule #2: All surveys are biased or skewed. Period.
Rule #3: Rules #1 & 2 are correct. Always.
:)
Oh, and where is any reference to Xbox console (Wii I can understand, but no mention of Xbox?). And I know more people (not Apple-fanboys) that want an iPod or MacBookPro than those that want a PC laptop. (those that want a windows notebook, do not want Vista on it).