Why Should Online Education Use Danmaku?
At the end of July, Xingshua Education's premium open courses and recorded courses surprisingly introduced danmaku functionality. According to reliable sources, this feature sparked significant controversy within Xingshua Education from planning to development, and nearly became a shelved project. The feature itself is controversial, let alone combining danmaku with online education.
In today's internet era, it's often said that winning over the youth wins the world. But now, it needs a revision: winning over the post-90s wins the world! If you have no connection with the younger generation, tomorrow will have no place for you. The same applies to online education. The age structure of the audience is the entry point, and their interest orientation is the cohesion point. These are the directions guiding each product innovation.
Cinema Meets Danmaku
Not long ago, as people heatedly discussed China's first danmaku film (likely the world's first), the general public was largely pessimistic about it. What was the effect? Those involved said it was incredibly fun, while many others found it extremely annoying. You vomit, you have fun, but what about others? Danmaku films are more of a marketing tactic than a revolutionary innovation in cinema. Of course, the industry's confusion did not stop the popularity of this quirky feature on A/B stations. This at least demonstrates two propositions: some people love it, and some people hate it. Danmaku precisely satisfies a small group's intense demands in certain scenarios: to complain, interact, and assert their presence. This is a peak demand, highly provocative and contagious.
Why Should Online Education Use Danmaku?
At the end of July, Xingshua Education's premium open courses and recorded courses surprisingly introduced danmaku functionality (Xingshua Education received a 15 million RMB Series A funding from YY in July 2013, and a $30 million Series B funding from Junlian Capital and Northern Light Venture Capital in August 2014). According to reliable sources, this feature sparked significant controversy within Xingshua Education from planning to development, and nearly became a shelved project. The feature itself is controversial, let alone combining danmaku with online education. Danmaku represents a generational divide. Post-80s may see it as a burden, while post-90s find joy in it. It's like fans of Han Han feeling that "Tiny Times" is a "The Continent" experience. On one side is a generation of rigor, logic, rationality, and steadiness. On the other is a generation of sensibility, freedom, breaking conventions, and pursuing individuality. How can this conflict be reconciled?
Does Danmaku Lead to a Loss of Credibility?
What is credibility? Making students sit upright? Instilling a sense of authority? Or having teachers on a pedestal? In today's internet era, word-of-mouth is credibility, and user experience is credibility. Teaching and learning are no longer a hierarchical relationship. On the internet, teaching and learning are equal interactions. Here, everyone has their own choice, teaching resources are no longer monopolized, and users achieve true equality.
However, equality is a double-edged sword. Satisfying some people's complaints at the expense of others' peace is inherently unfair. Of course, danmaku functionality can be freely toggled on or off.
What Happens After Adding Danmaku to Educational Videos?
Compared to live videos, recorded courses lack interaction. Of course, the emergence of danmaku changes this feeling. On A/B stations, what's popular might be unrestrained complaints. But in online education, danmaku can be used for complaining about teachers or, more importantly, discussing learning content. At difficult or key points, there may be resonant pain points. At a certain point in the video, if the teacher explains brilliantly, it will receive corresponding affirmation. Of course, achieving this ideal effect requires positive guidance and responsible management and operation of danmaku. If left to develop freely, within a few days, you might see nothing but danmaku beyond the danmaku itself.
In recorded courses, the use of danmaku can break the linear time process. Every user who experiences it can generate their own content on it. The educational video will continuously accumulate different highlights. In terms of user experience, it can increase student activity and boost learning motivation. At the same time, different comments can create resonance, enhancing students' sense of presence. Of course, on the flip side, it could be a flood of abuse or unrestrained spamming. How operators efficiently filter out the noise and extract classic, resonant, and witty comments is a big question!
Danmaku May Just Be the Beginning
The predecessors plant the cause, and the successors reap the results. Faced with new things, will the rigorous and steady generation shrink back? Without imagination, it may be hard to understand the emergence of something like danmaku. Its existence implies some form of rationality. Using danmaku technology is a fierce collision of ideas. A sense of participation and presence is what the new generation of users with pure internet genes needs. Although danmaku technology has already become popular on various "elementary school student websites," the author believes this is just the beginning. Deep interaction on the video side, including real-time editing of video content, adding personalized interactions, comments, emojis, images, etc., will be the future direction. Interaction means letting users participate in your product. It is this change in participation mode that will trigger a new wave. It is believed that deep video interaction will spark unique sparks with internet education!
POLYV recently launched a powerful video danmaku feature. Through real-time online interaction among students, it not only enhances the classroom atmosphere but also effectively compensates for the lack of interactivity in online classrooms. At the same time, it provides a platform for students to express themselves.
