Survey: iPhone Owners Generally “Not Affected” By Maps Issue

Hyperbole is the stock in trade of many tech bloggers and journalists. Yet beyond simply trying to grab eyeballs with exaggerated headlines, people in the tech press often get very worked up about issues that have little impact on “ordinary people.” That may be the case with the so-called “Apple Maps debacle.”

Mike Blumenthal used the Google Consumer Survey tool last week to ask iPhone owners whether they’ve been affected by the documented problems with Apple Maps. The survey received 168 responses.

Just over 50 percent said it’s had no impact on them. A second group (23 percent) agreed with the statement that the new Apple Maps were “good enough for me.”

Just over 17 percent of these people said that the problems with Apple Maps were “annoying” but “not a deal breaker.” Finally, just under 9 percent had a negative reaction and indicated it might or would affect future buying decisions.

Source: Mike Blumenthal (n=168 US Adults) 10/12

Mike looks a bit deeper at the demographic and geographic segments and finds that older people and rural residents are more likely to be dissatisfied than urban dwellers and those under 55 years old.

As Mike himself points out this is a small sample and needs to be followed up with additional research. However I suspect these results are generally representative of what’s going on in the real world: some people are “annoyed” but most are simply not impacted to any significant degree.

Apple is reportedly stepping up efforts to fix the documented problems and improve the data. Accordingly users who have had limited interaction with Apple Maps or otherwise not been affected to date may never discover what all the fuss was about.