Five out of six people in the US report that they feel lonely. A good amount of the youth portion of this statistic uses social media. Social media and feelings of loneliness can be correlated, and one can be the cause of the other or vice versa.

The only social gatherings available are now limited, no thanks to the coronavirus pandemic. The loneliness pandemic now not only affects younger individuals – it casts a wider net over the general populace. The need for interpersonal connectedness now becomes a need and not just leisure. The amount of useful information also becomes more limited as the internet becomes inundated with the same information. The speed of people’s ability to sort useful information from trash also becomes proportional to the amount of time they spend reading online.

A lot of the information on the internet is text-based and allows for searchability. But what if an expert wants to share trade secrets with people who are willing to listen? Enter the Clubhouse app.

What Is Clubhouse App?

Clubhouse is a space for casual, drop-in audio conversations with friends and other interesting people around the world. . Currently, it’s invite-only and is limited to iOS. It already passed the 600 thousand user count despite being released in 2020.

How Is Clubhouse App Different?

Social media apps rely heavily on text and images, like Twitter and Instagram. The advantage to this is that there is recorded information that can be stored and shared among peers. As with any other recorded material, text and images can be retrieved. Text and images also have the advantage of being shared multiple times across multiple platforms, allowing everyone to have access to it, provided it’s published and the rights to ownership aren’t exclusive.

This kind of information found in social media is very useful when it comes to research or artistic license. By allowing the public access to it, they can draw inspiration and utilize it to generate composite information. Non-oral methods of passing information also have the advantage of consistency even across long periods of time. It’s also less prone to modification which is a common scenario in oral methods, like what happens to stories or rumors.

Information passed verbally and are non-recorded has the main advantage of being secured and exclusive. Information passed this way makes sure no external factors change it. Verbal information also has the advantage of an interpersonal aspect. The way it is transmitted also has an effect on its value. If the same information were delivered by a politician and scientist, people are likely to believe the former as the choice of words they use affects how it is perceived.

Clubhouse was conceived with the intention of letting speakers have a platform to freely voice their opinions or share information with a select audience. It’s loaded with features useful for individuals interested in listening to speakers that they consider worthy of an audience, or simply because they trust information from direct and reputable sources. 

Speeches provided by respective experts of different fields have the advantage of additional insights into the conception of the ideas, the rationale behind the processes, and other tidbits of information that may selectively be excluded from written formats, out of fear of criticism or general dislike by the public.

Clubhouse’s unique invite-only feature means that trolls will less likely invade forums. ClubHouse values privacy like how Apple does for its users. There’s no release for Android platforms yet and it’s highly unlikely they will be releasing the app to the competitor OS. 

Clubhouse also doesn’t store recorded information which means information exchanged in Club Rooms (the ClubHouse equivalent of public live chat rooms) are only available to people attending the podcast-slash-live audio feed. It’s also time-sensitive: people who just have arrived in a club room can either ask for the information from other users or ask it from the speakers themselves.

Despite Clubhouse exclusivity, it’s still in its early stages and it’s hard to tell what direction the company will be going in with the app.

How Does the Clubhouse App Work?

Clubhouse is a relatively simple and easy-to-use application. There is preregistration involved since the app currently has a waitlist. People are flocking to the preregistration phase in hopes of getting in due to its exclusive nature. The Clubhouse app is available in the Apple App Store for download. 

While an individual is waiting for their turn to be included in this very exclusive app, they can reserve usernames. Once in the app, they can only get one chance at changing it so they have to think about what username to assign themselves. 

• There’s also an indirect way to get into Clubhouse. If a first-time user downloads the apps and by chance are in another user’s phone contacts, the other users can invite them in without spending the allotted single invite the app offers to all users. 
• Invites can also be earned by using the app frequently. Word of caution to people trying to get into Clubhouse: don’t risk purchasing invites from Reddit as these may be scams.
• Once registered, users can also link their Twitter and Instagram profiles. These can be good for speakers who need to extend their influence outside the Clubhouse app and are looking to solidify their credibility as people who deliver relevant information. 
• The Clubhouse app’s main page is called the Hallway, which is similar to Facebook’s News Feed. Here, members can see the respective icons for a search function, invites to Club Rooms, notifications, and the profile section.
• Users in the Clubhouse app can be divided into three types: speakers who will show up on the Stage section of a Club room, Followed by Speakers, and Others in the room. Basically, there are speakers, their followers, and non-followers. The only way to know if another user is following the same speaker as someone else is if they click their profile to check which Club Rooms they belong to and who they follow.  

There are a ton more features and this article covers only the introductory portions. At this point, it’s only useful to know the basics of the app and who it’s really for. For pre-registration, visit the Apple store.