Feb 23, 2010
Chatroulette clones
Update 20th April 2010 Well this post has been getting swamped with comments listing more clones than I ever expected so I’ve turned commenting off, the list below is not comprehensive but well, all you need to know is that there is a lot of Chatroulette-like sites out there.
Partly as a result of the Chatroulette Missed Connections site, and partly because it is fascinating to see an Internet phenomenon like Chatroulette unfold, I’m taking an interest in all things related to it. I love how Andrey, the man responsible for Chatroulette, has created this just by doing something he loves.
So a couple weeks ago I saw ads on freelancer sites looking for developers to clone Chatroulette. Looks like these ads found some willing developers as these clones are starting to crop up every day.
Here’s the Chatroulette clone list so far, in no particular order:
- Omegle (hard to say it is a clone, it was first just text before Chatroulette arrived then added video after Chatroulette)
- CamStumble
- ShufflePeople owned by WooMe
- Zupyo
- SpinTheCam
- Facebuzz
- HeyPeople
- FaceRoulette
- HeyReddit for Redditors
- TinyChat Next
- Stickam Shuffle
- StirChat
If you hear of more let me know and I’ll add them to the list. Remember though, if you’re thinking of visiting one of these sites, Chatroulette will always be the original success story for this type of web site, and if you think cloning it is a good idea, may I politely suggest that building an idea that is original and needed might be more rewarding – copy Andrey’s passion, not his idea.
Interesting to see the clones pop up. People are weighing in all over the ‘Net on this phenomenon: http://bit.ly/aF6UeM
Hey Eliot, Also heard some buzz about spinthecam.com. It was up briefly but down again. Add that to the list I guess
Thanks John, added, along with Zupyo – Eliot
cam carousel, really? are they TRYING to attract tweens??
As in Carousel at the fairground? Are tweens into those, think thats a bit of a stretch Veronica.
Do WooMe prefer ShufflePeople as a name?
well shufflepeople was never meant to be a third party site, we launched it to test the functionality for integration into WooMe. I think the name accurately describes the experience, which wold also be integrated if we find the test dictates it worthwhile to do so.
and, I know many tweens, girls ages 9-14, who still get excited about fairground carousels, although, as many articles have recently pointed out, site like Chatroulette might corrupt such innocence.
Perhaps you’re right, maybe 9 is too old in our modern world to be involved in such childish things such as carousels and unicorns.
One more to add to the list http://www.stirchat.com
Found a German project as well. http://www.hey-people.com Looks very high quality. Seems like they want to establish additional features to improve dating opportunities. The traffic is not high, though.
Hi,
The “original” isn´t very original.
It´s fascinating, how chatroulette took of, in such a short time. But it definitely wasn´t the first one to do this kind of things. In fact, peoplezapping.com went online 2008 and did exactly the same thing. Business Angel was MP3 Inventor Karlheinz Brandenburg. While http://www.peoplezapping.com offers random chats during live events, a microsite using the same technology called hey-people.com is reduced to face to face conversation. I´ve been using
People Zapping to stream and videochat, I know
the founders, from the time they started two years ago.
Here are some links, I found on their site:
People Zapping in 2008:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l7ZnPnnol4o&feature=related
People Zapping today:
http://www.peoplezapping.com
Hey-People:
http://www.hey-people.com
Best Regards,
Enrico
Thanks for the tip Jan – added!
Enrico, thanks for the detailed response. From your comments it sounds like peoplezapping.com didn’t do exactly the same thing as chatroulette, correct me if I’m wrong, it sounds like it was centered around live events, which isn’t the same as chatroulette. If it did the exact same thing I’m confused as to why the same company would release HeyPeople? Anyway, HeyPeople is added to the list, but not PeopleZapping.
Hey Elliot,
they started doing the same thing as chatroulette,
and added the live broadcasting feature later, because the pure single chat didn´t take of at that time. Hey People is the original People Zapping, with a new design. I just wanted to tell this, because everybody thinks, and writes, that random chat for video was invented now. But in fact, it´s an old idea, which was happy to take off now.
Thanks for your list, very interesting! Cheers, Enrico
Hello Eliot!
I’ve found a new one: http://FaceRoulette.net
It’s like ChatRoulette but it’s fully integrated with Facebook!
Direct Facebook url:
http://apps.facebook.com/faceroulette/
Thanks Julia, adding it now
Looks like the majority of these are breaking the Adobe Stratus TOS by having advertising.
There is also http://heyreddit.com which has been runnning for around 3 weeks.
Tiny Chat has their own clone as well, “Next,” http://next.tinychat.com/
Also, CamCarousel is no longer a clone, they’ve switched to selling the technology instead.
a guy on the reddit community made one a while ago.
heyreddit.com
another clone
http://stickam.com/shuffle.do
Thanks for the updates everyone, list is now updated.
“copy Andrey’s passion, not his idea.”
@Eliot: I would state it differently:
“give him credit for his passion, not his idea!”
Andrey was the first to make random chats a hype. He was not the first to implement such a service.
omegle is the best for me