The Internet is changing rapidly even without external influences. And events and phenomena such as the coronavirus pandemic only further speed these changes. In just a year, we’ve seen how much the priorities of Internet users have changed. Platforms that previously did not generate much interest have peaked in popularity. Conversely, once super popular sites began to lose ground.
We’d like to look at the sites and applications that have developed most actively during the pandemic and, unexpectedly for many, have become super popular. It’s going to be an interesting ride!
Platforms for education
Due to the pandemic, millions of schoolchildren and students were forced to switch to a remote learning format. That required the use of specific platforms. Fortunately, by the time they were needed there were plenty:
- Google Classroom
- Moodle
- Unicraft
- Schoology and others
Such sites allow you to create virtual classrooms and courses, organize student registration, share teaching materials with students, monitor student progress, collect homework, and much more.
Of course, for many, the transition to this sort of training format turned out to be quite difficult. Especially for older teachers and educators who find it harder to learn new technologies. But in general, the educational process around the world has not been disrupted and has continued at approximately the same pace.
Video-based social networks
Diverse video content has become an integral part of our lives. These are educational videos, entertainment videos, and much more. There are more and more Internet platforms based on videos. First of all, YouTube has to be mentioned. According to Statista, the site has over 2.3 billion active users worldwide. 79% of Internet users have a YouTube account.
YouTube is one of the pioneers of video social media. But now there are many alternatives which are also worth paying attention to:
- TikTok — a social network with short videos, which is rapidly gaining momentum around the world. According to official statistics, over 33 million people visit TikTok every month.
- Instagram — one of the most popular social networks, on which we are also seeing a gradual transition from photo to video content, including Stories, Reels, IGTV. At the moment, Instagram has over 500 million daily active users.
- Kwai — one of the most popular social platforms in Asia. Here users can create 57-second videos with various special effects, publish stories that become available for 48 hours, and much more. At the moment, Kwai has about 520 million monthly active users. These are mainly adolescents aged 14-18 years.
In this era of the rapid development of mobile Internet technologies and the active introduction of 4G/5G networks around the world, there’s no doubt that the demand for social networks featuring video will only grow.
Video chats
Video chat sites are social platforms through which you can communicate with people via video link. Most commonly, this function is complemented by other features, including text messaging, desktop sharing, file transfer, and so on.
It’s important to add that there are two broad categories of web chat services. The first is chats for people from your contact list. The second is for communication with strangers. Let’s take a closer look at these two formats.
Video chats for communication with people from your contact list
Such video chat sites are ideal for communicating with friends, family, loved ones, work colleagues, and so on. That is, with those people whose contact details you already have. Among the most popular platforms during the pandemic were the following:
- Skype
- Zoom
- Google Hangouts
- Discord
- ooVoo and others
Many of these sites are actively used in the learning process, for solving work issues, and so on. Most of them are either free or partially paid and provide basic functionality to everyone, without exception. In general, these are useful and convenient platforms, but such video chat sites are not suitable for finding new acquaintances at all.
Anonymous video chat for communication with strangers
Online web chat is the best alternative to dating sites and apps. The principle is very simple, and therefore very convenient. You go to a website or launch an application, make a couple of clicks, and a random user appears on the screen in front of you. You can chat with them on almost any topic, get to know them better, make an appointment and just have a nice time with a friendly conversation.
There are really a lot of this sort of video chat site today. Among the most interesting are:
- Chatrandom — a web chat with themed chat rooms, gender and geographic filters.
- Omegle — a video chat site with a search for people by interests, an unmoderated section and a separate section for university students.
- CooMeet — video chat with girls with an excellent gender filter and excellent moderation. Besides that, there are convenient mobile applications for iOS and Android.
There are many more options, but these three video chats are worth looking at first of all. They are quite different, but they will give you a comprehensive understanding of what modern anonymous video chat is, how it works and its advantages. Be sure to try web chat sites as an alternative to dating sites and apps!
Take advantage of the latest developments
Social Internet platforms are very diverse channels that allow you to study, work, communicate with friends and family, make new acquaintances or just have fun. The modern user has almost complete freedom of action and choice, and this should be taken advantage of.
We have listed just some of the popular online sites that aroused the special interest of users during the pandemic. There are many more though, so don’t forget to follow the trends and always look for something new.
