WhatsApp crushes the competition in South Africa

[Kevin Lancaster]

WhatsApp crushes the competition in South Africa

The latest statistics from Vodacom show that WhatsApp is by far the largest instant messaging platform in the country.

 

[Baxteen]

Telegram


also first

 

[Grep]

Funny how they have these stats since they aren't allowed to intercept traffic.

 

[Idiosyncratic]

Telegram


also first

I wish

 

[Hamish McPanji]

Funny how they have these stats since they aren't allowed to intercept traffic.

You can get stats without intercepting the traffic. You are just filtering data throughputs using specific sets of rules. All ISP's do it, and a lot of companies too

 

[ginggs]

Things are going to get interesting when whatsapp stops working on all these blackberries sometime this year:
http://mybroadband.co.za/news/smart...most-popular-smartphones-in-south-africa.html
http://mybroadband.co.za/news/cellular/156807-whatsapp-ending-blackberry-and-nokia-support.html

 

[hawker]

Telegram


also first

Nobody uses that. Whatsapp is ubiquitous.

 

[ginggs]

Whatsapp is ubiquitous.

In South Africa, maybe.

 

[Grep]

You can get stats without intercepting the traffic. You are just filtering data throughputs using specific sets of rules. All ISP's do it, and a lot of companies too

Agree 100% that all ISP's do it but please show me which device can do exactly that without a proxy of sorts. I am well aware they all use a defined type of cache engine but that is intercepting to a degree.

 

[ginggs]

Agree 100% that all ISP's do it but please show me which device can do exactly that without a proxy of sorts. I am well aware they all use a defined type of cache engine but that is intercepting to a degree.

A router can log traffic, not a switch though.

 

[HavocXphere]

In South Africa, maybe.

Yeah overseas its not really popular. Also starting to annoy me how its tied to a specific phone number & gets confused easily if you switch numbers. Plus people carry multiple phones & then don't read the damn thing for hours if you send it to the wrong one.

FB messenger, text and snapchat seem to be the primary means of communication overseas.

 

[Grep]

A router can log traffic, not a switch though.

It's still intercepting traffic, logging is intercepting.

 

[FiestaST]

A real captain obvious here....

 

[hawker]

In South Africa, maybe.

Also Germany.

 

[Dave]

There's over a billion users, it's big in most countries.

 

[FiestaST]

Yup pretty much most except US of A

 

[Dave]

Yup pretty much most except US of A

I think that's down to the fact they have had unlimited text for many years on their plans and data allowances have been small and expensive. Coupled with the fact so many Americans are insular and make little use of international text and calls and the demand for whatsapp is lower.

I don't think it's that popular in China either, but that's more to do with the state control and the popularity of local apps.

 

[Chris.Geerdts]

When I was tracking these services myself, Wechat was low already actually declining, Whatsapp was rising and FB Messenger was less popular, but growing quickly

 

[HavocXphere]

There's over a billion users, it's big in most countries.

Yup pretty much most except US of A

South Africans tend to overestimate how popular it is...guess why:


Its got lots of users, but its got a predominantly 3rd world country userbase.

 

[Dave]

When I was tracking these services myself, Wechat was low already actually declining, Whatsapp was rising and FB Messenger was less popular, but growing quickly

WeChat has been increasing for the last year or more, December 2014, 500million, August 2015, 549 million and January 2016, 650 million.

Though WeChat is more than just a messaging app for the Chinese.

The (almost) current state of subscribers:

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