Live data from Hacker News

Clubhouse Payments

joinclubhouse.com

81–90 of 241 posts

Re: Clubhouse Payments

#81

Hmm, I see that they use Stripe. Can someone explain how does this not count as In-App-Purchases? I would expect Apple to be all over this and apply it's Mafia cut?

Apple guidelines, section 3.1.1, regarding in-app purchases: >Apps may use in-app purchase currencies to enable customers to “tip” the developer or digital content providers in the app. Section 3.1.2(d), regarding permissible use of other payment methods: >3.1.3(d) Person-to-Person Services: If your app enables the purchase of realtime person-to-person services between two individuals (for example tutoring students,…

It's not fuzzy - 3.1.3 says that may not use "purchase methods other than in-app purchase" (since it's not one-to-one person-to-person service but tipping for one-to-many content) and must use in-app purchase.

Re: Clubhouse Payments

#84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pushing the processing cost to the user doesn't imply it's zero-cost for Clubhouse; they're still on the hook for disputes/refunds.

Are they? Presumably if there is a dispute they will just remove the money from the creator.

If they pay out money to creators in a reasonable time, then a fraudulent "creator" (accounts created with fake/stolen identities and tipped with stolen cards) will withdraw anything ASAP and there won't be anything to remove/recover; and if they want to protect from that, then they have to do invasive verification and/or freeze any income for a quite long time.

Re: Clubhouse Payments

#85
post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You would think they need to grow user count as quickly as possible (like all other VC funded startups), but the fact that they don't have a web app, don't have an Android app and don't have open signups on iOS leaves me very confused about their entire strategy. Is Clubhouse just being pushed by VCs and other tech celebrities as their personal soapbox, or does it have potential to be something beyond that?

The "closed beta" is the marketing strat – people getting FOMO because they can't listen to a convo on CH. "Anyone have a CH invite?" was something I was seeing a lot of on Twitter over the past yearish. FOMO is one helluva drug.

Sure, if done well that works great to generate buzz up to a certain point. Right now though I doubt there's anyone left who really wants a Clubhouse invite but can't get one (so the "exclusivity" thing isn't really driving anyone anymore), and the casual passers-by aren't going to bother jumping through hoops and will just move on.

Re: Clubhouse Payments

#86
post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can create an account even without an invite. If you give it access to your contacts, your friends will get a notification to invite you, if they have an invite to give. Once you get an invite, your account will be activated, and you can use Clubhouse. This is how I got in, through a friend I hadn't talked to in a while.

That’s an interesting way to scrape people’s connections and phone numbers.

It's been done before. I consider it a passive dark pattern.

Re: Clubhouse Payments

#87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yet, with no Android app and an increasing amount of competitors copying the hell out of Clubhouse, I can only see this going in the way of Meerkat, Yik Yak and Periscope. (By being shut down) We'll of course have to wait and see, but I don't imagine that Clubhouse will be entirely displaced. What's unique about Clubhouse is not the concept of a Clubhouse room itself, which is essentially a Discord channel with bas…

The (possible) irony is that ClubHouse uses Agora behind the scenes to power its real-time audio. that’s a Chinese company based in Mainland China. I’d be careful if I was them. The double irony is that I believe Agora is blocked behind TGF.

Excellent point. There are apparently already Clubhouse bots as well, and it would be trivial to record audio using one (although you'd need a bot per room you want to record). It's probably very difficult to recognize Clubhouse bots as well, since you probably don't need that many of them, at least with Clubhouse's current scale, to record all the interesting big political discussions.

Re: Clubhouse Payments

#89
post #24
post #22

> 100% of the payment will go to the creator ... Clubhouse will take nothing. Well imagine if they had an Android app in the first place or earlier right before all the big players started copying them, then it would have been attractive to the users. Right now, what is the point if the invite system is still there. Another platform can just announce the same thing and they are back to square zero. > We are excited t…

How do apps like this survive and grow? Giants can clone the entire product with a small team. I'm worried about this exact problem. Edit: First thought that comes to mind is filing a few patents and then throwing 50% of funding into a lawsuit against the first giant to clone you. This is traditionally not the way , but with the incumbents so nimble and readily able to pick off good ideas, it seems like it might be t…

>Giants can clone the entire product with a small team

Giants are more likely to buy the entire project with a small amount of shares

Neither option is likely to turn out well, but at least the founders could be rewarded

Re: Clubhouse Payments

#90
post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you read the linked announcement: > 100% of the payment will go to the creator. The person sending the money will also be charged a small card processing fee, which will go directly to our payment processing partner, Stripe. Clubhouse will take nothing.

It's still a risky business model, since in certain fraud cases it will be left holding the bag for chargebacks if it has released the money to a fraudster but they don't have a revenue stream proportional to the payment amount to cover whatever percentage of the transactions are fraudulent.

Not sure why you're down voted. People that steal credit cards find ways to fund money from those cards to themselves. Fake apps are one way this can happen. When a company sets up a model where anyone could easily become a receiver of money and anyone could easily pay, they get into the AML world.
Post reply on HN