survey

Own a Lumia 900 and have a spare 15 minutes? Why not fill out a Nielsen web survey for Lumia 900 Windows Phone customers, which could pocket you a $200 Amazon gift card. The 4G Windows Phone has been taking the states by storm, surpassing all expectations and selling faster than Nokia could produce which led to a number of delays, not just within the U.S. but around the world too.

Have you been happy with your Nokia Windows Phone, or have all the problems taken their toll? Be sure to check the survey out, but note that Facebook connectivity is required.

Source: Nielsen (Lumia 900 survey), via: @TheRomit; thanks @aharpaz for the heads up!

We've had isolated but frequent reports of certain bug and issues with the popular Nokia Lumia 900. We summarized them in our previous post as they include things like purple-grays on the display, camera shutter button that stops working and issues with the device volume keys not working.

Check it out for more details and once you have pop back here and vote on whether you are having any of those problems. Note: You can vote for multiple items

Did we miss something? Have a theory on what's causing some of them? Want to just pontificate? Lets us know in comments.

Windows Phone Folders concept

As we reported a few days ago, Nokia was asking for feedback on the AT&T Nokia Lumia 900 via a user survey. Those who participated even qualified for a $50 Amazon gift-card for their trouble.

While user surveys are nothing new (and AT&T has done them in the past) one interesting question was noticed by reader Jonathan W regarding folders: "I would like to be able to arrange apps into folders on the apps screen" was asked with a rating system ranging from "Disagree strongly" to "Agree strongly".

That's an interesting item to raise in a survey only because Windows Phone does not have a folder system at all for apps on the Start screen. There is, however, a homebrew folder solution which works very well by Windows Phone Hacker and we know users in the past have asked for such a system (especially with all the apps we now have).

Is Nokia watching the homebrew community? They would be silly to ignore it. Are folders on the table for a Windows Phone OS update? Possibly. We know that Nokia can modify the Start screen and aspects of the UI much deeper than other OEMs.

So far, Nokia have not exercised that option but with the proof-of-concept homebrew folders working out, they could easily (and more elegantly) instantiate such a concept in the OS, should they choose to do so. Alternatively, they could also lean on Microsoft for such a feature for everyone including competing OEMs, much like the 4G LTE experience.

We'll certainly be watching Nokia closely to see what they do with this survey information. Oh and Nokia, yes, folders are a very good option and we'd like to see native support for such a feature in Windows Phone..

Thanks, Jonathan, for the image; Windows Phone Folder concept by WPCentral member Sebastien "ArtSooby" Bruneau

Nokia is looking for feedback on the Lumia 900 Windows Phone and the first 500 eligible participants will receive a $50 Amazon.com Gift Card as a thank you.

If you've purchased a Lumia 900 over the past few days, just follow this link and sign up for the survey. A confirmation email will then be sent your way with links on how to register.

You'll need your Lumia 900's IMEI number (on the box label) and agree to the terms. You'll also agree to respond to a minimum of three web surveys about your Lumia 900. Once you fill in all the blanks and check all the boxes, you will then receive another email confirming your registration and let you know the survey links will be emailed out in a few days.

It's really nice that Nokia is reaching out to customers to see what works with the Lumia 900 and what could stand a little improvement (camera..cough..camera).

Thanks, Arun3, for the tip!

Some mixed news coming out today from a survey of 2, 173 developers taken in late January by IDC and app tools maker Appcelerator. Developer interest in making apps for Windows Phone is at 37% which is just a 1% less than the previous report back in November--in other words, statistically it's the same.

That's good and bad. The good news is that RIM is continuing to plunge from 20% to less than 16% leaving Windows Phone to be the clear "number three" in the mobile OS space (when factoring out tablets). The bad news is even with the Lumia 800, developers are still not jumping on the Windows Phone bandwagon as expected (or needed). Despite this, Appcelerator says "interest remains high" for the freshman OS even in the face of unimpressive device sales to date.

The survey was conducted just days after the AT&T Nokia Lumia 900 was announced, so developer interest in that device had barely had anytime to register for this survey (not to mention it has not gone on sale yet). Only 18% of those surveyed were interested in developing for the Lumia devices, meaning Nokia still has some word to do to sway devs that Windows Phone is worth it.

Interest in Android, however, did slip from previous quarters which lead the researchers to conclude that there's a “small but steady erosion” in developing for that platform, perhaps a result of fragmentation and issues with getting devices on par with ICS. Meanwhile, iOS is holding steady from previous quarters.

In the end, this latest survey reinforces what we already know: iOS is number one and steady, Android is a strong number two but slowly eroding and Windows Phone is in a steady-state with under 40% of developer interest. What is needed is a game-changer and at this stage, Windows Phone 7 may not be it. But to quote Yoda, "there is another"...it's Windows Phone 8.

Source: Appcelerator; via: GigaOm, ZDNet, Reuters

Two weeks back Mobile Nations ran a survey asking all of you to tell us a few things about your computing and mobile device ownership and buying plans.  I’ve been digging into the data which is especially pertinent given today's iPad announcement.

Admittedly, those of us who fill out these surveys in the first 48 hours are often the most enthusiastic tech people of the bunch.  So we can’t go too crazy drawing conclusions.  But still, the data is interesting.

We had just over 1100 Windows Phone users fill out the survey.  The percentage of those people who use a Mac versus a PC is quite small, at only 5.1%

Across the entire survey population (over 7500 results), Mac has 17.7% market share. Without doing the math, this sure looks like a statistically significant result to me.

This may not be too shocking of a result to many of you, but I think we can safely say that Windows Phone users dislike Macs more than the average person.  A lot more.

For better or worse, AT&T was and still is the "premier partner" for Microsoft and Windows Phone. As a result, they seem to be interested in how the experience is going for those of us who fork over money to them. We've been seeing reports of this survey going around starting tonight (even Jeff Wilcox got one) and we just finished ours up a few minutes ago.

The survey took about 15 minutes and was surprisingly detailed and lengthy. Based off of the phone you bought, it asked for feedback on why you bought that phone, your favorite features, order of importance on design, complaints, etc. It also inquired about your knowledge of other Windows Phones e.g. for my Titan survey it asked if I knew about the Focus S and Focus Flash and asked why I did not get that phone instead (hah! If they only knew).

Overall the survey should give AT&T some useful feedback on these devices and hopefully steer them towards more important features in the future. There is a chance to win a $100 electronic "gift card" which is not exactly enticing, but what the heck.

ChangeWave Research has just published some interesting data that affirms our previous coverage (where WP7 was only at 44%) about the high rate of satisfaction users have with Windows Phone 7 when compared against RIM, Android and iOS. According to the chart above, Windows OS ranks just above RIM at 27%. I know what you're thinking, "you just stated that this is supposed to prove WP7 is a satisfying OS?".

Don't be fooled by the chart above folks, the percentage of Windows Phone 7 users that are "very satisfied" is actually at 57%, but Windows Mobile is only at 14%, so the Windows OS is taking into account both values. We argue that this sort of publication does the OS no justice at all since majority of readers are interested in presented data as opposed to the text underneath the chart:

"Both industry leaders are far ahead of the overall Very Satisfied ratings for the other major operating systems – Windows OS (27%) and RIM OS (26%).

But in an encouraging sign for Microsoft, we continue to see a big difference between the high Very Satisfied rating for Windows Phone 7 (57%) vs. the much lower rating for Windows Mobile OS (14%). Even so, the higher Windows Phone 7 rating has yet to produce a sustained momentum boost for Microsoft in term of buyer preferences."

We decided to create our own chart to reflect the differentiation between Microsoft's older and newer platforms. Looks much smarter, right?

All in all, positive stuff for Microsoft. While we're still behind Apple (no surprise), it's great to see a relatively high percentage, contradicting what carrier sales staff preach. Please note that the data sample shown in this report is 89% US and 11% outside the US so we would see different results in other countries. UK being a strong example with RIM still proving to be a heavy player.

Source: ChangeWave Research 

A lot of talk has been present about Microsoft being in third place overall (market share, apps, developers etc. combined), attempting to catch Apple and Google. A recent survey released by IDC shows a trend for the mobile OS group with developer interest throughout 2010/11 - Microsoft is yet again third.

Although we are ahead of RIM at the last point, we should put away the celebration packs of goodies due to the interest percentage for WP7 falling below what the platform had this time last year. Blackberry suffered a heavier fall and thus WP7 comes out tops, notably due to the Nokia partnership (which will hopefully boost developer interest once they bring handsets to the table).

Also included in the report is a fragmentation chart displaying what developers are most concerned with. Android is a known pray to OS and hardware fragmentation, something which WP7 hasn't had (yet, I've touched wood). The most concern is reportedly skill fragmentation, however. 

So overall, WP7 is still playing the slow catchup and I doubt anything will alter until Nokia devices come into the spotlight, or a good number of contracts end soon and customers wish to go to WP7.

via: WPSauce, CNET