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There were local, volunteering missions to help healthcare workers, the homeless, etc all done by some "non-profit" in europe. Those missions had state-sponsore

by jokoon 7y ago

There were local, volunteering missions to help healthcare workers, the homeless, etc all done by some "non-profit" in europe. Those missions had state-sponsored ads, and I volunteered online. As soon as they required me to use zoom, I told them I would not use zoom. I just go on their whatsapp thing, so of course I get less info, etc. I really fail to understand how Zoom became so popular, and I was recently wondering the same thing about TikTok, which by the way, was just a clone of Vine. Essentially, with apps like that, advertising and adoption is critical, the tech doesn't really matter that much. I would really be interested in understanding what are the strategies in place to make people use those things. Of course the virus played a huge role, but I'm certain there are specialists about how to gain users rapidly.

baumy 7y ago
Can't help you with TikTok or Vine since I don't understand those either (I believe the target market for them is mostly people around age 21 or younger, so if you're outside that group that's not surprising). For Zoom though, I feel it's quite trivial to see how it became popular. Of all the various video chat/conferencing software that exists, Zoom is the easiest for the layperson to setup and use while also tending to be the best performing in terms of audio/video quality, latency, large numbers of users on a single call, etc. My girlfriend was able join a Zoom call with her parents a few days ago without even telling them how to do it; yesterday I overheard a 30 minute phone conversation while she tried to explain to her mother how to edit a facebook post (unsuccessfully, despite valiant efforts). Outside of this niche community, basically nobody knows or cares about Zoom's various security gaffes. They just want something that works and gets out of the way. And I say all this as somebody who has watched others use Zoom a few times and read about it, but never used it myself nor felt the inclination to. I'm sure you're right about specialists and strategies to try to spark mass adoption being things that happen, but the technology matters as well.

by jokoon 7y ago

baumy 7y ago

Can't help you with TikTok or Vine since I don't understand those either (I believe the target market for them is mostly people around age 21 or younger, so if you're outside that group that's not surprising). For Zoom though, I feel it's quite trivial to see how it became popular. Of all the various video chat/conferencing software that exists, Zoom is the easiest for the layperson to setup and use while also tending to be the best performing in terms of audio/video quality, latency, large numbers of users on a single call, etc. My girlfriend was able join a Zoom call with her parents a few days ago without even telling them how to do it; yesterday I overheard a 30 minute phone conversation while she tried to explain to her mother how to edit a facebook post (unsuccessfully, despite valiant efforts). Outside of this niche community, basically nobody knows or cares about Zoom's various security gaffes. They just want something that works and gets out of the way. And I say all this as somebody who has watched others use Zoom a few times and read about it, but never used it myself nor felt the inclination to. I'm sure you're right about specialists and strategies to try to spark mass adoption being things that happen, but the technology matters as well.