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Have you ever heard of a Motorola FanBoy? Me neither!
So, it would seem that it is fair to accept the 791 score.
Note - that score is only ONE TENTH OF ONE PERCENT below Apple's 800 - a figure that (as the author implies) maybe somewhat artificially high.
Conclusion, survey is meaningless as it's own findings provide the basis for Motorola to be be ahead - possibly by quite a bit in reality!

Something huge to note about smartphone satisfaction surveys is that it's perhaps the ONLY smartphone respondents ever owned and have little or nothing to compare it to.

This is one of the biggest things which make this survey difficult to interpret, so the results need to be handled with extreme care.

As someone who is an expert in information, I find almost all of your interpretation of what the results might mean to be very flawed, kinda like pulling stuff out of thin air.

Take the iPhone's antenna issue as a case in point. Notice how EVERYONE used to just blindly blame the carrier when a phone call was dropped, but then when they have something tangible to touch on their phone they switched to blaming the phone? But there's a third factor, the electromagnetic field we all move around in that's interfered with by buildings and other electronic devices which no one can see, touch, and thus blame appropriately.

The point is that "users" are the last people who know what they're talking about. You can measure their satisfaction, but how can you then responsibly interpret EMOTIONAL responses in a comparative way when the respondents cannot compare? Also, battery life might sound deterministic, but compared to what, their previous phone from the same manufacturer?

Personally I think that Apple knows how to press people's emotional buttons better than the other manufacturers. For example, Apple users LOVE the Apple Store, but compared to what? The Apple Store in San Diego is manned by 40 - 70 employees at any one time. How can an AT&T or Verizon store experience be compared to that? People's emotional responses are being manipulated by Apple's marketing, and product design. That's the reason they may be more satisfied, but is that what's being reported on?

Lastly, when a satisfaction number goes down, it does not necessarily mean less satisfaction. I could be at the same level as before but the number of competitors has increased relatively speaking. Competition can increase even when the number of manufactures is the same. That's statistical analysis 101. And some of the changes reported above are razor thin and there's a margin of error.

Information, and polling, can be a bad thing when poorly obtained, then reported without caveats, and then interpreted irresponsibly. And then you've got the fact that much of the source of that information is bad information to begin with.

It's a mess!

Mark Hernandez (no relation)
The Information Workshop

thewazak, on 24 September 2010 - 07:20 PM, said:

Maths fail. 800/1000=80%. 791/1000=79.1%, so 0.9% difference.

As for comments about "maybe somewhat artificially high": on what basis? Straw-clutching's the only one I can see. Is a fanboy not allowed to like the product they bought? That clearly rules you out.

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Since mllions of iPhone users clearly continue to be unperturbed by the supposedly "faulty" antenna, at what point will you start to wonder whether "faulty" might be an inappropriate adjective?

crosswordbob, on 25 September 2010 - 07:38 PM, said:

Or perhaps it's just user apathy? They simply redial when a call drops? And think nothing of it? Maybe they don't report it either? Could also be they are in a strong coverage zone? But from an engineering standpoint, it is a catastrophe. Could that be why the iPhone5 release has been accelerated according to rumors? I bet you the antenna design will differ than from the iPhone4.

http://lmgtfy.com/?q...+5+release+date

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Shhh! All this 'secrecy!' surrounding Apple, like if it was that important... It's only a disposable phone after all.

~~~~~~~~~~~~
There is no such thing as bad publicity except your own obituary.
~ Brendan Behan, Irish author & dramatist (1923 - 1964)

WinTard, on 25 September 2010 - 09:05 PM, said:

User apathy I could see might have people being OK with their phone, but consistently reporting highest satisfaction levels is not consistent with apathy. And no, I'm not satisfied that it is a catastrophe from an engineering standpoint. I think a whole lot of people who don't really understand antenna physics but think it all works according to "common sense" have said that it is, and cling onto that in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Common sense is the least valuable asset in a bleeding-edge antenna engineer; physics and common sense parted ways about 95 years ago.

WonTard said:

And how many previous rumours of an impending 'fixed' version have proved to be nonsense? The authors of that quote even point out how little actual insight is needed to start a rumour. The media have decided it must be faulty (which I dispute, based on available evidence) so jump on all these rumours to save face. "Apple are releasing a new design; we were right about the flaw all along!" But Apple conspicuously hasn't changed the design. Isn't it just possible that when they say it's been overblown, coupled with strong customer satisfaction and a complete absence of data indicating significant levels of call dropping that they may just be right? It certainly looks like the most likely option to me (and fits with my entirely positive experience with mine, in all locations I've used it).

If the iPhone's design is so badly crippled; its performance while held so as to "bridge the gap" so much poorer than its rivals, wouldn't we have seen Nokia, Motorola, Samsung publish results of their own tests? They certainly have testing facilities that put any of the half-arsed tests by Consumer Reports and the like to shame. Time passes, and the longer nobody proves there is a significant user-affecting issue with the phone (and nobody can claim no-one's been looking), the less likely it seems to me that there is one.

Edit: The above "95 years" should probably read "105 years". Same dude, different result.

This post has been edited by crosswordbob: 25 September 2010 - 10:36 PM