In the ultra-competitive world of the Internet, many websites have come and gone over the years. However, there are some websites have taken hold of the public’s imagination and become more than just websites. They have become a part of our lives, as familiar to all of us as your pet or your best friend. What would even come as a bigger surprise to you is that some of the world’s most popular websites include some names you’ve probably never heard before, while you may have heard of big names like Google, Facebook, Yahoo and Amazon, you probably may not have heard of names such as Baidu, Tencent, VK or Yandex — but those are the most popular websites in places like China, Belarus and Russia and because of the huge population of places like China and India, popular websites in countries like these are also very popular in the global scheme of things. The list of the top ten most visited websites in the world has remained virtually unchanged for quite a while now. This is due in part to the brilliant business plans employed by the executives in charge of these websites. The ability to anticipate future changes in the industry and react to them has been critical in keeping these websites on top.

This social networking and micro-blogging website has literally helped to change the world we live in today. Thousands of protesters participating in the recent uprisings in Egypt and Libya gathered together partly because of Twitter. We have only scratched the surface of this powerful communication tool and the best is yet to come.

A networking tool to find connections to recommended job candidates, industry experts and business partners. Allows registered users to maintain a list of contact details of people they know and trust in business.

This website is based in Mainland China and provides IM service, as well as mail and a search engine. You can also do shopping and there is a dating site as well. Currently, they count their total users at over six hundred million. QQ is a social networking and microblogging service utilising instant messaging, SMS or a web interface. China’s largest and most used Internet service portal owned by Tencent, Inc founded in November, 1998. Presently, Tencent is aiming its operations at the strategic goal of providing users with a “one-stop online life service”. Tencent’s Internet platforms QQ, QQ.com, QQ Games, and PaiPai.com have brought together China’s largest Internet community. Tencent’s communications and information-sharing services include QQ.com, QQ Instant Messenger, QQ Mail, and search engine SOSO. Linked up with heavily used features such as forums, chat rooms, and QQ Groups, Tencent’s Qzone has grown into China’s largest personal Internet space. These services foster group interaction and resource sharing. Virtual products such as QQ Show, QQ Pet, QQ Game, and QQ Music/Radio/Live have been successful in providing entertainment and customization options to users. Mobile phone users can take advantage of a number of value-added wireless services. Tencent’s PaiPai.com is a C2C on-line shopping platform that seamlessly integrates into Tencent’s other community platforms.As of June 30th, 2009, the number of registered QQ Instant Messenger users has reached 990.0 million. Active users numbered at 448.0 million. Peak concurrent users have reached 61.30 million. QQ Games platform counted about 6.2 million users simultaneously on-line. QQ.com has become China’s most visited Internet portal website. PaiPai.com has also become China’s second largest Internet shopping platform

Unlike traditional encyclopaedia, Wikipedia is a collaboratively edited, multilingual, free Internet encyclopedia supported by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation. Wikipedia’s 30 million articles in 287 languages, including over 4.3 million in the English Wikipedia, are written collaboratively by volunteers around the world. It is a free encyclopedia built collaboratively using wiki software. (Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License), it is offered in many different languages. Started in 2001, the site can be rewritten and edited by the users. A user can add content to any entry he wants, or start a new entry.

What could be described as the Google of China, Baidu is a leading Chinese language search engine  that provides “simple and reliable” search experience, strong in Chinese language and multi-media content including MP3 music and movies, the first to offer WAP and PDA-based mobile search in China. Apart from being the most popular Chinese language search engine, the site also provides over 50 other services.

This website stands for Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle. This site provides just about every service you can think of and shows no sign of slowing down, a major internet portal and service provider offering search results, customizable content, chatrooms, free e-mail, clubs, and pager.

This is the most popular site specifically designed for sharing videos. It was purchased by Google for over $1 billion. YouTube is a way to get your videos to the people who matter to you. Upload, tag and share your videos worldwide! YouTube is a video-sharing website created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005 and owned by Google since late 2006.

The popular social networking site was started by Mark Zuckerberg in his college dorm room at Harvard in 2004. Since then, it has grown to serve over one billion users worldwide. The service allows you to send messages, as well as share pictures and videos. Just like Twitter, Facebook has helped to assemble and organize people involved in protests and demonstrations all over the world. There is no limit to the popularity of this site.

This website provides many features, the most famous being its search engine. They also offer Gmail, their popular email service. Google also owns YouTube and Blogger, so they control three of the most popular sites in the world. It enables users to search the world’s information, including webpages, images, and videos. It offers unique features and search technology. Google also provides specialized searches through blogs, catalogs, videos, news items and more. The search engine giant also provides Internet services that let you create blogs, send email, and publish web pages. It also has social networking tools, organization tools, and chat tools, services for mobile devices, and even Google branded merchandise.