In an article on Webuser, research by Virgin claims that a PC crashing is more stressful than trying to give up smoking. Apparently we have become so reliant on our PCs/laptops, iPods and so on, that if they crash and burn we find it raises our blood pressure to dangerous levels.
As part of Virgin's launch of Digital Help, the group conducted their own research into what gives consumers digital stress. Having questioned over 2000 consumers, it's clear that we have a love-hate with our digital buddies.
- 78% of respondents claim they shouted at their technology
- 21% said they had actually thrown their technology at the nearest wall
- 14% had resorted to punching their gadget
A PC breaking down at home was considered the worst event that could occur, coming second was attempting to get different components to work together. Setting up wireless networks was also a hit with consumers and a quarter of respondents cited printer issues as being another common offender. But you can't say we're not diligent - a staggering 78% said they would spend 2 hours trying to fix the problem themselves rather than spend 20 minutes talking to a customer service helpdesk. This is hardly surprising given our aversion to irritating telephone automated systems (of those questioned for the Virgin survey, 57% thought that being kept on hold was more stressful than being stuck in a traffic jam).
Virgin has used this data to come up with Virgin Digital Help giving consumers a free toolkit that you can download to enable you to give your PC a bit of a kick up the bottom, access self-help guides and access to experts via a telephone or digital link up service.
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