Despite Maps Debacle, Demand for New iPhone Appears Strong

Apple's new maps for iPhone and iPad was met with such derision that the company's chief executive even apologized for the feature. Still, the flawed maps are not turning people off from wanting the phone. A new survey published Friday estimates that as many as one-third of American shoppers are interested in getting the smartphone in the future.

ChangeWave Research, a firm that regularly conducts surveys to study consumer spending, said that demand for the iPhone 5 was unprecedented. It surveyed 4,270 American consumers and asked how likely they were to buy an iPhone 5 in the future - 19 percent said they were very likely and 13 percent said somewhat likely. ChangeWave said the percentage who said “very likely” was double what it was for the previous iPhone, the popular iPhone 4S.

And despite early concerns about the company's new maps software, which replaces Google's maps with its own, a large majority of iPhone 5 owners and iOS 6 users polled by the com pany did not seem to be bothered by its shortcomings. Ninety percent of respondents said it was not a problem, and only 3 percent said it was a big problem.

Another new feature in the iPhone 5 that could annoy some is the new Lightning connector, which renders obsolete the spare charging cables and iPhone accessories that people have collected over the year. Most survey respondents weren't fazed by this either: 31 percent said it was somewhat of a problem, another 31 percent said it was not much of a problem, and 26 percent said it was no problem at all. The remaining 6 percent said it was a very big problem.

“Despite the media attention surrounding both the Apple Maps issue and the Apple Lightning port issue, neither has had an impact on the massive numbers of buyers queuing up to buy the iPhone 5,” said Dr. Paul Carton, ChangeWave's vice president of research, in a statement. “Rather, the survey results show both issues hardly rank as bumps in the road.†

Early demand for the iPhone has already been strong. The company sold five million new iPhones in the first weekend the phone went on sale, beating the iPhone 4S by about one million. The company is expected to report its sales on Oct. 25.