A Web Script-Based Method to Evaluate User Satisfaction of Mobile Services in the Field

Providing mobile services that ensure user satisfaction is one of the most crucial issues for telecommunication carriers and service providers. Traditionally, user satisfaction with the service, i.e., the Quality of Experience (QoE), has been assessed in a laboratory. However, a reliable QoE for a target mobile service in the context of actual use cannot be obtained by laboratory experiment. This paper proposes a novel Web script-based method that evaluates user satisfaction for waiting time of mobile services in the field. The proposed method has the following practical advantages. Since experimental conditions, especially communication conditions, can be simulated with a Web script, such as FlashLite, a subjective assessment can be conducted anywhere using the mobile terminal of the participant. Thus, QoE for a target mobile service in the field can easily be obtained. The main contribution of this paper is that we clarified that a subjective assessment system that implements the proposed Web script-based method is suitable for evaluating user satisfaction regarding waiting time where this time ranges from a few hundred milliseconds to a few seconds.