We would like to present the results of our investigation on social networks. What are the most popular Russian social networks? Almost everybody knows such social net as “Vkontakte” (VK). If you live in Russia, you have definitely come across with VK once, twice, or even more often. It is the largest Russian social network. It is just an ordinary website and a mobile app with many interesting features and advantages.
It has the following features:
- almost all your Russian friends use it;
- it has a wide range of mini apps, which you can use for ordering food or a taxi, tracking your habits, shopping, etc.;
- you can transfer money, watch clips and send photos, videos, audio files, maps, documents etc.;
- VK hosts various events like a 24-hour Hackathon, Start Fellows (a grant support program for tech projects), VK Cup (a programming championship), VK Music Awards, and VK Fest (a two-day open-air music and entertainment festival) etc.
Another popular Russian social network is Telegram. People began to use it in June 18, 2020. This net is for fun (news, famous people’s channels), for getting information. There are useful bots and channels. You can use it to keep in touch with your classmates (also in a group chats), family and friends.
It has some features like:
1. Telegram is a cloud-based app; so if you buy a new phone, you will not have any problems with your messages magically disappearing like it tends to happen with other messengers. You can also use multiple accounts;
2. you completely customize your messenger;
3. there are some interesting things like telescopes (video messages), bots, channels, secret chats, silent messages, and schedules, etc.
Such astonishing features set Telegram apart from other messaging services.
The results of our investigation.
We used a questionnaire to learn which Russian social network is more popular with young people. We wanted to find out how often our students use social networks. 63 students participated in our questionnaire. There were 51 students from our institute and 12 students were from other universities (Taganrog and Rostov-on-Don).
The questionnaire was in Russian.
Fig. 1. Participants of the questionnaire
41 students prefer to use Vkontakte more often than Telegram.
Fig. 2. Analysis of the most popular social network
Half of respondents use VK a few hours non-stop. Most of respondents use Telegram only a few times a day.
Fig. 3. Frequency of social networks usage
Respondents use this social network for talking with their families or friends, for watching videos or reading entertainment content, news, etc.
Fig. 4. Types of content in VK
In Telegram, they like to read news. There are blogs to get some useful information for their studies.
Fig. 5. Types of content in Telegram
Responders noted that VK’s positive features are clarity, popularity and simplicity (anyone can understand how to use this social network).
Fig. 6. VK's positive features
Negative features are the following: a lot of advertisement and expensive music subscriptions.
Fig. 7. VK's negative features
Responders noted that Telegram’s positive features are safety, privacy settings and funny stickers.
Fig. 8. TG's positive features
For some respondents Telegram’s negative features are connected with difficult interface.
Fig. 9. TG's negative feature
Conclusion
Respondents gave VK ‘4’ (the range was 1.2.3.4.5)
Fig. 10. Results: VK
Also, they gave Telegram ‘4’. VK has “4” either.
Fig. 11. Results: TG
It is not the final result of our investigation. It is interesting and useful to continue our investigation.
References:
- Russia's Most Popular Social Media Platforms. — Текст: электронный // news.itmo.ru: [сайт]. URL:https://news.itmo.ru/en/features/life_in_russia/news/9716/
