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Comment by ryanSrich | Hacker News Reader

I wasn't into early Twitter or Facebook, but were they also full of scammers and hustle type people? Seems like 99% of my Clubhouse feed is Bitcoin, stonks, etc. I mean I just looked and there's a room (whatever they call it) titled "Entrepreneur Millionaire Secrets". Why is this being recommended to me? No idea.

Also, I'm either too out of the loop to get it, or just a bad user because I honestly have no idea how to use Clubhouse. Any room I join I can't talk in. There's no way to contribute to discussion. On top of that, most rooms have 100s or even 1000s of people in them. I don't get what this app is, or how it's supposed to work.

Even the musk interview with the Robhinhood guy wasn't that good. Would have been much better as an actual thought out podcast.

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It just baffles me how a new social media service in 2021 with a heavy base of tech and crypto enthusiasts is using the exactly same centralized, privately controlled and owned model as the status quo I thought we all agreed on was problematic. Really?

As icing on the cake, you need phone number verification to sign up, something that in an increasing number of countries is practically impossible and maybe even prohibited to get without having it tied to your personal name, address and government ID.

I got several invites to it but no way am I going to be part of the growth of what I consider harmful. They could have done something great here, but it seems it's just a VC grab for money, influence, user data and market share.

I hope they either do a hard pivot or that the service dies in a fire.

Twitter started with a heavy base of tech enthusiasts..

>exactly same centralized, privately controlled and owned model as the status quo I thought we all agreed on was problematic. Really?

Artificial scarcity, exclusivity and FOMO are the entire value proposition of clubhouse (and crypto to a large degree). It's a digital nightclub. There is no other reason why in the year 2021 when Elon Musk gives a talk only 5k people can listen in a 'room'.

And yes it is ironic, and deeply depressing that the internet, where we can theoretically send stuff for free at virtually zero-cost, is segmented exactly like the real world. But it makes sense if you look at it like zero-sum spaces where people fight for attention and resources with very little intrinsic value creation.

Have you read this? Gets to your point about Clubhouse being the digital night club - https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2021/01/21/nostalgia-for-network-...

Thank you for posting this article, which led me down to the Breakingsmart post titled "Against Waldenponding"

https://breakingsmart.substack.com/p/against-waldenponding

I highly recommend reading both.

Both Clubhouse and crypto grow by FOMO

Most crypto enthusiasts could give a shit about crypto. They just want to get rich without doing anything.

Just yesterday I saw a tweet from a Bitcoin grifter (he even wrote a book about it) saying Bill Gates is evil because he wants us to reduce dependency on hydrocarbons. Hydrocarbons underpin the centralised grid while renewables introduced the concept of a distributed grid. The cognitive dissonance is telling.

I spend a good chunk of my time at work evaluating pitchdecks, and even in the crypto space it's notable that most people try to build concepts that insert themselves as a rentseeking central hub even when their idea doesn't in any way require it. Clearly a lot of people see that as the best way of securing their ability to monetise.

But at least for some of those ideas it's clear that they'd have a far greater shot at success if they opened up and created something that allowed more benefits to flow to potential partners, and even to potential competitors, because it'd increase their chance of being the new standard in $field. They might end up with a smaller market share, but of a much larger market.

I'm not saying that will work for everyone, because it won't. But it seems people way too rarely consider if that's even a possibility, because they're from the start putting effort into preventing a decentralised model from working. Then, after they've ruled out a decentralised solution, a whole lot of them add "blockchain" to their pitchdeck after having made blockchain totally pointless by introducing a centralised authority... Sometimes I just want to lock some of these founders in a room and ask them "why?" over and over.

I have some friends who've done blockchain consulting work for a few years. I've found myself hanging out with them at a lot of blockchain events. I ask those annoying questions a lot, like "why" and "Isn't this just a badly implemented, unscalable mostly centralized system with weak governance?".

Its usually fun (for me) but I never get any good answers. It feels like arguing about the existence of god with believers. My working theory is that young technologists get into blockchain because it seems cool, and its something bigger than themselves to care about. Before long they have lots of friends who are believers too, and asking hard technical questions feels like a threat to their community. So they don't ask, and instead spend years working on technology thats an obvious dead end. (Which isn't to say everything in the field is useless; but about 90% of it almost certainly is.)

The irony is that quite a few of these systems could potentially be revolutionary if they were willing to give up enough control. Many of them are centralised because they think it's the best way of making money of it, even though it's compromising their original technical vision and making their use of blockchain meaningless. I think quite a few of those will be crushed when someone dare create decentralised versions of their original idea and they can't respond.

I think we will see some fantastic uses of blockchain eventually, but I worry a very substantial proportion of the people pitching blockchain based ideas today don't even understand that they're missing the point themselves or know they've compromised everything but don't dare pitch the uncompromising decentralised vision.

They are enthusiasts like Bernie madoff is an investor

Maybe this will come off as uncharitable but Clubhouse feels like a weird VC version of a pump and dump scheme to me.

Clubhouse doesn’t do anything all that innovative (what can it do that Discord can’t?) and the pitch isn’t even that unique. The key to success was that they got the right VCs. Those VCs use it, get their friends to use it, pull some strings to get celebrities to pop in. It becomes successful but in this really weird way where once you scratch beneath the surface there’s not actually anything there. I think that’s why there’s so much weird grifty content on there.

But hey, it’ll do more than well enough I’m sure. Probably not well enough to go public but it’ll get bought out by [insert name of FAANG here] and everyone will walk away with a tidy profit.

(Purely anecodotal of course, but none of my "normie" friends have mentioned Clubhouse to me once. During the pandemic a lot of the having been using Houseparty. It's a lot of fun. But I rarely see it mentioned on HN. I suspect part of the reason is that it was already sold in 2019 to Epic Games, so no-one is trying to aggressively hype it up any more)

See I’ve heard the opposite. Just yesterday[1], Ben Thompson posted about how clubhouse is reaching those normie users. I disagree, but often these things have a way of being self fulfilling prophecies. I don’t think Clubhouse is for sure a pump and dump just yet. If they get bought by Facebook or Twitter for billions then that’ll confirm it for me. However, it is very strange how infatuated a16z seems to be with Clubhouse. I see rooms posted on the app all the time with a16z VCs and sometimes the founders of Clubhouse. I’ve joined a few. It’s just naval gazing about what the “vision” for clubhouse is. This isn’t necessarily bad. It’s just radically boring content. Subjective of course, but there’s no substance to these conversations.

Anyway, I honestly don’t hate clubhouse the app. I hate a lot of the bullshit content it shows me, but hey, maybe they’ll figure it out.

I will say, there is something artificial about the user base of CH. it doesn’t feel organic. I think this gets to your point about getting the right people with the right network on the app. There aren’t any actually _new_ interesting people. It’s people you already know about. People you’ve been reading about (if you’re in startup culture) for years.

1. https://stratechery.com/2021/clubhouses-inevitability/

> It’s just naval gazing about what the “vision” for clubhouse is.

Did you mean navel-gazing or are you referring to Naval Ravikant? This is a sincere question, since I gather he's pretty active on CH.

Ha...I guess it works both ways

> If they get bought by Facebook or Twitter for billions then that’ll confirm it for me.

Facebook is apparently building a ClubHouse competitor

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/10/technology/facebook-build...

Twitter is already testing one.

https://www.theverge.com/2020/12/17/22187490/twitter-spaces-...

Agreed it seems faddish and I don't see how it can have staying power. How will they monetize or put ads in what is essentially audio-only conference calls?

That said, social media doesn't have to be innovative to be a good business, it just has to be slightly different, attract a core base who in turn attract their network who build loyalty. Like snapchat > instagram stories > tiktok

> Clubhouse doesn’t do anything all that innovative (what can it do that Discord can’t?) and the pitch isn’t even that unique. The key to success was that they got the right VCs. Those VCs use it, get their friends to use it, pull some strings to get celebrities to pop in. It becomes successful but in this really weird way where once you scratch beneath the surface there’s not actually anything there. I think that’s why there’s so much weird grifty content on there.

I used to feel this way about Twitter, Instagram, etc: basically every post-Facebook social network that fundamentally implemented a subset of Facebook functionality.

I eventually came around to the notion that the initial conditions of a social network are incredibly important for establishing the community and its norms, which is where most of the value resides. The norms[1] governing what one posts about, the type of people you expect to find, even the Overton Window of what's expressible on a network without getting downvoted/harassed/suspended all depend on these conditions. "This functionality already exists in product Y" becomes more or less irrelevant to the future success of a social media service, and more importantly, only narrowly relevant to its utility.

[1] these may differ from subculture to subculture but exist at least locally

I totally agree. People don't really care about the technology; we care about the community that technology connects us to. Its not about the features. Its about who you find when you open the app.

Us technologists tend to think the best product is the one which everyone uses. Thats wrong. The best product is the one which connects you to a tribe. (Which is never 'everyone' by definition.) And then makes you feel seen for who you are. (Which will almost never happen in crowded room of strangers.)

Young people think facebook is for old people, because their parents are on the site. You could probably take facebook, change nothing about the site except for the theme and name (so its not associated with old people anymore). Start with a new, empty database of users and with the right marketing a new generation would fall in love with it again. Once the features are good enough, culture and image is everything.

The decade also makes a difference. When Fb and Twitter was launched, "blogging" was still a side passion thing, and the notion of an "influencer" hasn't really been invented yet, Reality TV was just beginning and people actually believed the reality tv show were not scripted. The major voices and grifters on CH are people who cynically play the social media game in the past decade, many of whom won in different domains such as IG and Youtube. They bring with them all the growth-hacking tools that made other platforms less interesting over time, except on CH it's happening from day one (or month 7).

What made early CH felt like the early internet is that none of the early users did that, they had IRL jobs and other platforms to voice their value.

There were even "influencers" on MySpace, e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tila_Tequila and JumpCut https://www.flickr.com/photos/taoofthe777/463603221/ (iJustine, who is still pretty famous).

> I wasn't into early Twitter or Facebook, but were they also full of scammers and hustle type people?

I wasn't in super-early Twitter, but early Twitter was not at all like that. What I saw was that relationships and followings made on blogs translated to Twitter, and most of the movement was organic. I don't think at that point people thought of becoming an "influencer" like the ones we have now, so Twitter didn't attract those types too much. It was also far, far easier to participate, it was way more welcoming than it is now.

It was also less open, in the sense that Twitter didn't recommend you what was popular to keep engagement up like they do now. Back then you wouldn't see too much content outside of your network, retweets were manual and likes (favorites then) didn't show up in your timeline. So you only saw what the people you followed actively wanted you to see. That meant that these accounts made just to sell you things and scam you couldn't reach too far, as people didn't actively share their content. So content that gets attention now in Clubhouse wouldn't be popular in early Twitter.

Recommendation algorithms and engagement metrics have just completely ruined social media...

That was the era though of the inorganic suggested follow list that pumped up early folks to completely ridiculous follow counts.

I was on Twitter early, and my experience is no, it was very different. It's possible that stuff existed in some circles I wasn't running in, but I didn't see any of it. Facebook was so different (pretty locked down to just your friends) that it's not comparable.

There are some charlatans on Clubhouse for sure. I was listening to this guy M.L. Billion https://www.instagram.com/ml.billion and he is just full of shit. All flash and no substance. The guy probably changed his last name to Billion to make it sound like he was wealthy. Some people don't have a BS detector and eat this shit up.

All I see on CH is people like this. That and a very strange phenomenon...

I’ve noticed a trend on Clubhouse. I think it’s a new marketing gimmick. I’ve noticed these types of rooms that have celebrities in them. The celebrities never say anything, they’re just there, but it gets 1000s of people to join the room. One I noticed was talking about “climate change” that has Brad Pitt in the room...but it’s literally a YC company pitching to investors, everyone aside from Brad Pitt is either at this YC company, or an investor, Brad doesn’t say a word.

So the scam is this. Find a celebrity. Get them in a room. Pay them some fee to just stay on the line. This in turn funnels 1000s of people into the room because they see a room with “major celebrity” and then the scammers shill their scam to 1000+ people.

If the celebrity does not talk, what evidence is there that they're indeed that celebrity instead of just a fake profile?

Obtaining a second Clubhouse invite to use for your fake celebrity would surely be cheaper than paying the real one.

Once you have a ring of fake celebrity profiles you can even resell the service to others.

And this thing supposedly landed $100M in funding. What a world.

Yeah from what I can tell CH does not yet verify users like Twitter or Instagram. I'm sure that's coming, but I haven't seen it yet. I guess you could run a whole scam on CH right now and fly under the radar. I suspect this is what a lot of people are doing. Most of the rooms feel like getting stuck at the local motel 6 listening to a time share pitch.

I get the feeling that right now is not actually still "early" Clubhouse, if that makes sense. I can't remember where I saw it but someone created a timeline of how Clubhouse grew with different key events.

I've been on it since early December and I've seen it become gradually more and more focused on marketing, cryptocurrency, and how to become a millionaire.

Maybe it's also a result of different communities coming to the platform as invites spread.

Anyways, how I've seen it change just in the last few months is that it seems that people are using it in a less exploratory and more promotional way, a less flexible and more focused way.

But that's clearly just what I've seen, I'm curious how other people have seen it evolve since last April or so.

yeah its not, its just still invite only lol

I got on last summer and it worked better in the smaller "club house" style

its just a fireside chat app, or "live podcasting" or whatever

some utility for some

but even back last summer, people had these cringy "I'm a millionaire like everyone else" bio, that didn't make any sense then and doesn't make any sense now

I’ve used “call-in, talk radio” when referring to CH - tune into an AM channel during your morning commute, and see if there’s any parallel, ha!

How do you weigh this against audio books, podcasts and music? I've struggled with just those three. Adding a 4th option is just too much.

I do suspect for people that enjoy talk-radio style podcasts might enjoy CH more since it's live. If CH can land a big name podcaster, maybe not a Rogan level, but someone big enough, they could start to chip away at podcasts.

For me, what I like about CH compared to those three is yes, that it's live. I'm tired of overly produced/edited/scripted content, which I find many of those three you mentioned to be more and more every day. Even TV starts to annoy me because many live shows are still scripted, people typically reading off teleprompters or memorized lines.

CH also let's you do something these other platforms don't: see who is listening with you. I was in a room last night with Chris Voss on stage talking about negotiation skills and saw Eric Stonestreet, one of the actors from Modern Family, in the audience. Also just connecting with other people in the audience, adding them on Twitter and sometimes even starting conversations about the conversation we heard.

The thing is, people do audio books, podcasts and music on Clubhouse too.

There are some people that use it as a discord server while they are playing games - I mean what discord's original differentiating quality was: external team chat.

People are drawn to its discovery and interactivity system. Even if ultimately both of those buckle under a crowd so as to be useless, in their current forms.

I am trying very hard to use Clubhouse, but unfortunately I am having the same experience.

I have followed people who I find interesting and groups that align to my interests - but the loudest figurative voices are still the ones who pop my notifications most often. Frustrating, but I’m going to keep at it through February at least.

I’ve also had to rebrand it in my mind, it’s not social media. It’s more like community talkback radio and has found a niche in my listening habits where I’ve given up a few hours a week in podcasts to listen in on some wacky chats.

Yeah I did the same thing. Followed interesting people, but they never get recommended to me. Either because they aren't starting rooms or discussions or whatever its called, or because Clubhouse's feed algo thinks I want to see other things. I still have it on my phone, and will use it if the content changes, but it seems like it's very limited at this point (which is fine, it's not even a year old yet).

I just opened the app again and scrolled for maybe 45 seconds. Not a single thing of interest to me.

It seems to me that the biotech people I follow on twitter are now doing Biotech Clubhouses? I think it's more like a talk show and you are in the audience and you can raise your hand to ask a question?

Clubhouse was notably started by people from Coinlist and a lot of their engineers are from Coinbase.

I don't use Clubhouse, but I'm curious - is there a way for you to flag "Millionaire Secrets" as a poor recommendation? Something like a thumbs up/down?

If so, maybe it's just a matter of time before those recommendations are eliminated for you.

If not, well, I think that's the problem. It's probably too soon (not enough data) for CH to make good recommendations without active input from users.

There isn’t. I looked for this as well. I’m happy to help train an algo if it means better content for me, but that’s not an option.

It seems like if you’ve ever even opened a room that is tagged “investing” you’re now in the vicious cycle of having scam millionaire content spammed to your feed. It doesn’t help that Clubhouse only shows like 3 rooms before you have to click a button to see more. Compared to YouTube where on almost any page there are 20+ videos that are recommended to me at any time. Clubhouse has very low information density.

The concept of clubhouse is interesting. Live podcasting is a neat idea that could work. But it’s hard to see how CH is achieving this right now.

There’s an option to hide - swipe left. Not sure if the algo picks it up though. I get the same crap

I think the hype works though. I don’t have a clubhouse account and I can sort of imagine the plethora of hustlers and the time I would waste if I did have an account. But like the early invite only days of gmail, it’s still a social indicator if you’re “in”

Clubhouse is definitely full of this stuff, but so is a lot of superficial social networking. It also feels like the VC lovefest a lot of times, but there are also some moments that can be pretty cool. For example, I listened in on a discussion of the Chinese government’s treatment of Uighurs, and when that ended, I listened in on deadmau5 geeking out about cabling runs at live shows and livestream dvr tech. Obviously I didn’t contribute to either of these discussions, but it was still nice to listen in on them. As for contributing, this is where clubhouse is a bit odd. If I want to take part in discussion, I need to start my own talk, join talks with my friends, or be connected enough to be on someone else’s talk. I don’t think it’s likely that you will just drop into a popular talk and start chatting on it, as most of them are “panel-like” discussions.

Column is an attempt to fix this:

https://joincolumn.com

Concurred. Just opened and saw 「Clubhouse Elites How to grow your network」 Looks more like poopey Garbo to me.

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