Clubhouse is the big stinker that nobody wants to talk about • Hacker News Board

Re: Clubhouse is the big stinker that nobody wants to talk about

#81

Post by derefr » Sun, Jul 25, 2021, 3:40 PM UTC

nift wrote: post #71

dcow wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So how does clubhouse change the game? We already have youtube and podcasts. You can listen to Joe Rogan over bluetooth in your car. You can even ask Siri to play it. What is clubhouse doing that makes it easier to access or produce high word count content in audio form? How is clubhouse helping creators monetize their content? Why would I go to clubhouse instead of patreon for the type of content you describe? Not a…

Not a clubhouse expert but it seems clubhouse is better for “spontaneous” conversations/talks, as in I don’t have to upload it as a podcast perhaps do post-processing etc to get my content out. It also allows you to promote your audience to speakers so it’s more of an interactive podcasts, so you can actually ask questions to a panel or the speaker. Again, haven’t used it much but this is what I understand Clubhouse…

> as in I don’t have to upload it as a podcast perhaps do post-processing etc to get my content out

That sounds like shirking the responsibility of not wasting the listener's time, i.e. lowering the barrier to production at the cost of raising the friction of consumption. For the app to be popular to use — rather than just popular to publish on — wouldn't you want the opposite?

Or, to put that another way: wouldn't "an edited recording of a talk recorded on Clubhouse, posted to YouTube" become a more popular way to consume Clubhouse content, than actually going on Clubhouse? And would this not kill any hope Clubhouse would have of ever monetizing, since there would be no users on the app itself to ever show ads to?

(I think this is truly the thing that really did "kill" Vine, in the end: there was no reason for most people — who are not, themselves, performers — to engage with Vines on Vine, when they could just engage with Vine compilations on YouTube. The creators saw the writing on the wall and sold it. TikTok came up with a better model, "democratizing" Vine's professionally-produced-funny-6-second-clip model into the much more widely-engaged-with "clip of a pretty person being silly with platform-licensed music in the background" model.)

Re: Clubhouse is the big stinker that nobody wants to talk about

#82

Post by Infinitesimus » Sun, Jul 25, 2021, 3:49 PM UTC

prestigious wrote: post #64

They didn’t iterate fast enough. Nothing to do while listening, at least now you can dm but it needed chat a long time ago.

> Nothing to do while listening

I've never used it but I know folks who liked Clubhouse because they could listen in while getting other stuff done in their loves. Like radio but a bit specialized? Idk.

Re: Clubhouse is the big stinker that nobody wants to talk about

#83

Post by pierre_clubdeck » Sun, Jul 25, 2021, 3:53 PM UTC

thomasfromcdnjs wrote: post #70

I've been having fun with Clubhouse, spent the last 3 weeks integrating it with GPT-3 and Google Speech. https://github.com/thomasdavis/omega Writing a blog post at the moment to post on HN this week. Draft: https://lordajax.com/post/Omega-Clubhouse-GPT-3-bot/

Clubdeck dev here - pretty cool idea :)

Re: Clubhouse is the big stinker that nobody wants to talk about

#84

Post by thomasfromcdnjs » Sun, Jul 25, 2021, 3:55 PM UTC

pierre_clubdeck wrote: post #83

thomasfromcdnjs wrote: post #70

I've been having fun with Clubhouse, spent the last 3 weeks integrating it with GPT-3 and Google Speech. https://github.com/thomasdavis/omega Writing a blog post at the moment to post on HN this week. Draft: https://lordajax.com/post/Omega-Clubhouse-GPT-3-bot/

Clubdeck dev here - pretty cool idea :)

Awesome! Do you guys have a discord? I'd love to chat about Clubdeck and API's. Not looking for features, just love talking dev. Can do a demo for your team too. (finishing a video demonstration atm)

Re: Clubhouse is the big stinker that nobody wants to talk about

#85

Post by Superblazer » Sun, Jul 25, 2021, 3:55 PM UTC

The clubhouse front page is filled with trash tiktok title like names. It made me cringe everytime I opened it, what's the point of asking me my interests if it is never respected. I uninstalled clubhouse a few days ago

Re: Clubhouse is the big stinker that nobody wants to talk about

#86

Post by pierre_clubdeck » Sun, Jul 25, 2021, 3:55 PM UTC

thomasfromcdnjs wrote: post #84

pierre_clubdeck wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Clubdeck dev here - pretty cool idea :)

Awesome! Do you guys have a discord? I'd love to chat about Clubdeck and API's. Not looking for features, just love talking dev. Can do a demo for your team too. (finishing a video demonstration atm)

No we don’t. You can find us on Twitter (see contacts on our website)

Re: Clubhouse is the big stinker that nobody wants to talk about

#87

Post by jasode » Sun, Jul 25, 2021, 3:59 PM UTC

dcow wrote: post #59

jasode wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Unfortunately, listening has much higher friction than reading. Sure, for a minority of consumers like yourself. However, for most people that make up the mass audience... they do not like to read long-form text whether it is articles in Vanity Fair, The Atlantic or books. Yes, people would rather read the text of a temperature and weather forecast on their smartphone -- instead of listen to a long-winded presentati…

So how does clubhouse change the game? We already have youtube and podcasts. You can listen to Joe Rogan over bluetooth in your car. You can even ask Siri to play it. What is clubhouse doing that makes it easier to access or produce high word count content in audio form? How is clubhouse helping creators monetize their content? Why would I go to clubhouse instead of patreon for the type of content you describe? Not a…

>What is clubhouse doing that makes it easier to access or produce high word count content in audio form? How is clubhouse helping creators

I'm not sure there's an exact parallel of "creator" in the Clubhouse paradigm. I'm not a Clubhouse user so my info is 2nd-hand based on how others describe it but this is my understanding of its original differentiation from podcast platforms and Youtube.

Consider the scenario of:

- Interesting Person A is not a podcast host or content producer. Person A also does not write text articles and opinion pieces in magazines or newspapers.

- Interesting Person B is also not a podcast producer.

- Person A and Person B can talk to each other in a public performance setting on an adhoc basis with audience interaction. Yes, Youtube livestream can also have multiple talking heads but that's video. With Clubhouse being audio, it lowers the barrier for participants who are ok with speaking but don't want to be seen.

- this means "interesting" people who are not podcasters like CEO Tesla Elon Musk can talk to CEO Robinhood Vladimir Tenev in a public forum which attracts an audience. Neither are of them are the "host" or the "guest" in a traditional sense. Neither have to set up a podcast or "upload" their conversation.

That was the original hype with it. The exclusive "invite-only" of famous people created buzz. Maybe the COVID lockdown and bored consumers looking for new entertainment helped boost its initial audience count. However, that doesn't mean the idea of scaling that up by "letting everybody in" ... a.k.a. "The Eternal September" makes Clubhouse more valuable. It seems to have the opposite effect.

Re: Clubhouse is the big stinker that nobody wants to talk about

#88

Post by thomasfromcdnjs » Sun, Jul 25, 2021, 4:04 PM UTC

pierre_clubdeck wrote: post #86

thomasfromcdnjs wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Awesome! Do you guys have a discord? I'd love to chat about Clubdeck and API's. Not looking for features, just love talking dev. Can do a demo for your team too. (finishing a video demonstration atm)

No we don’t. You can find us on Twitter (see contacts on our website)

No worries, been following you on Twitter for a while now, keep up the good work!

Re: Clubhouse is the big stinker that nobody wants to talk about

#89

Post by dcow » Sun, Jul 25, 2021, 4:07 PM UTC

libertine wrote: post #76

dcow wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One might argue this was their “viral” marketing strategy and hence may deserve some blame for ruining things. Large VC shops are basically marketing engines for their portfolio companies.

But wasn't that the end game of the app? Or that app should have remained exclusive to some users? What users? Who would be the judge of that? Just multi millionaires? Just founders? Or tech people? I don't even know what "tech people" means. Even so, if it was supposed to be like that: what would be the appeal for those users if they didn't had access large audiences listening to them? If they want exclusive talks t…

I’ve heard it called viral marketing before. I don't disagree with your points. Probably just a semantic difference.

Re: Clubhouse is the big stinker that nobody wants to talk about

#90

Post by tomhoward » Sun, Jul 25, 2021, 4:10 PM UTC

Firebrand wrote: post #53

tomhoward wrote: post #9

I joined CH in January, and I initially felt the same sense of excitement I felt when I first joined Twitter in early 2008 and started connecting with new, likeminded people. But that excitement died off within about two weeks, once I realised how little really interesting discussion there was. There were some highlights, and I still dip in now and again when a compelling name pops up, but it's mostly pretty uninspir…

Maybe it’s just me, but I find the concept of hiding behind my profile picture while I speak to potentially hundreds of people in my pajamas to be not nearly as frightening as uploading a video of myself for hordes of 12-year-olds to roast in the comments. There seems to be enough everyday people comfortable enough to do that on TikTok to make it work, though. Clubhouse’s demise seems to come from entering such a mat…

I wasn't comparing the creator threshold with TikTok; that's a much bigger leap for me too (though it probably wouldn't have been when I was a teenager, if I was sharing stuff with people my own age).

I was comparing it to Twitter, Facebook and (original) Instagram, etc, in which a much greater proportion of users are posting content rather than just consuming.

It's the having time to think about what you're writing/posting that makes people more comfortable posting on those platforms. And of course you can hide behind an avatar on those platforms too.