Clubhouse, the “vocal” social network: this is how it works

For some days we have only been talking about Clubhouse, a “vocal” social network that could become the star of the year. Already loved by many users, the platform allows the sharing of content only via audio , without images or texts. The goal of the social network is to create an open space for expression and sharing, allowing a real dialogue between users. Clubhouse is therefore very different from Facebook , Twitter and Instagram, as the only contents present are podcasts. Launched in April 2020, the social network could revolutionize the connections between users.

Clubhouse: how the voice social network works

An invitation is required to use Clubhouse : it is not possible to register independently, and the minimum age of 18 is required to use it. The operation of the voice social network is very simple: a user creates a room for which, from that moment, he will be the moderator. The club name comes from the fact that, in addition to the normal rooms, there are real groups dedicated to the comparison on a specific topic . The rooms can be public or private: in the first case, anyone can enter and participate in the conversation; in the second case, only those who are invited can participate. The moderator takes care of the discussion, guiding the topic and managing the interventions of the speakers .

Speakers are the users in the room who have the right to speak. Not everyone, in fact, could be enabled to participate in the discussion: the moderator can choose to allow only some users to speak. Generally, the first speakers enabled to speak are only the moderator and the first user invited by him. Everyone who joins the conversation is called listeners . Listeners can "raise their hand", requesting to be able to intervene in the conversation , and it will be up to the moderator to enable or disable the user who requested to speak.

Users can add each other and become followers , so as to speed up the creation of conversations between frequently contacted speakers. At any time you can remove users from the list of followers or block them. If there is a user blocked by many of their contacts it will be marked with a "!" next to the name. The notification is only visible privately, and is used by the user to identify a potential dangerous speaker. In the event that a user is a moderator it will be easier for him to decide whether to let that speaker speak or leave it muted.

Clubhouse: privacy and app status

The creators of Clubhouse argue that their social network has far fewer privacy concerns as the shared material is "vocal" only . There are no posts or images to keep in the archive, and the audios are not stored. Communication uses end-to-end encryption and is not logged . The only case in which conversations are stored is when you report a behavior that goes against the rules of the platform: in this case the staff can enter the discussions and record the audio as a support to verify the report. In the event that the report is made after a discussion has taken place, the staff does not have any type of access to the conversations.

The idea of ​​making it by invitation is not out of the desire to keep the platform exclusive, but to better manage the growth of the community and the functionalities. Currently the app is in beta and is also available in Italy, only for iPhone . The company has announced that they are developing the Android version which in the near future will also be available on the Play Store. Behind Clubhouse are Paul Davison and Rohan Seth, former Pinterest and Google employees, who designed it in the middle of the pandemic. The platform is currently worth $ 1 billion and has reached 2 million users .

Clubhouse's intention is to allow the monetization of conversations for content creators . The modalities could include room access tickets, subscriptions to the user's personal channel or a tipping system. This would bring the app closer to platforms like Twitch, in which, however, communication would continue to take place via "real-time podcasts".

The articleClubhouse, the “vocal” social network: this is how it works comes from Tech CuE .