BEIJING: Learning from various kinds of online videos and live-streaming platforms have become a rising popular choice among Chinese young people.

Statistics showed that over 18.27 million people, twice the number of participants in the 2018 college entrance examination, have learned by watching videos or live-streaming on Bilibili.com, China’s leading online video platform, since the start of 2019.

The most popular hashtag on Bilibili for live-streaming videos is “study with me,” in which hosts mainly live stream study sessions or study alone.

In 2018, a total of 1.46 million hours of live-streaming depicting study scenes, and more than 1 million times of study related live-streaming footage were broadcast on Bilibili.

Xiaoming has been studying machine learning via Bilibili for half a year. “Bilibili has become one of the hottest places to learn machine learning,” she said.

Shorter videos teaching courses such as linear algebra, or exchanging learning experiences and tips, are also quite popular.

Sun Jiashan, an associate researcher with the Chinese National Academy of Arts, said learning via mobile networks has become a common choice and habit for many Chinese. Videos and live-streaming, no longer just for entertainment, have been endowed with more essential functions like learning, Sun added.

“Such platforms will become daily used internet tools in the mainstream society and will be deeply integrated into every aspect of the socialization of production,” Sun said.

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