The public was a bit less satisfied with Microsoft"s software products in 2011. Computerworld.com reports that a new survey from the American Customer Satisfaction Index gives Microsoft"s software 75 points in 2011, down from 78 points in 2010; ASCI has been conducting these surveys since 2006.
David VanAmburg, director of ACSI, said that the downturn wasn"t due to a particular event but rather to the overall rise of mobile software apps. He states, "It"s somewhat of a relativity game, where the mobile environment is recasting how people think of traditional software." He added, "For 99 cents you buy an app that does some kind of very cool thing, and by comparison, traditional software looks cumbersome."
Even with the drop in the current survey, Microsoft"s numbers are still better than most of the previous years of ASCI"s reports. In 2008, the survey rated satisfaction with Microsoft"s software at just 69 points. Of course, that was during the time period when the company was dealing with Windows Vista.
It"s not just Microsoft that had a slight decline in ASCI"s survey results. Other PC software vendors such as Adobe and Symantec saw their survey scores go down in 2011 to 77, a decline of two points compared to 2010.