A visit to Clubhouse these days feels like a visit to ghost town. Very few interesting conversations and importantly, none of the celebrities are to be seen there.
Rewind to 4 weeks and we had Elon Musk, Zuck, Naval et al organizing these lavish parties and we all stood up outside the gate to join those thousands of listeners.
And much of this is attributed to the star power which A16Z gang brought to Clubhouse – pretty much the entire Silicon Valley!
They are gone. And so is everybody. No parties. No fun. No real talks.
Clubhouse was also competing with conferences. It almost took inspiration from these high-profile conferences, where people attend to listen to big celebrities, network with people who are just like them, ahev their wine and go back.
Just that, unlike these conferences, there is very little post-event networking and friendships.
I am not referring to just the Indian market, but also the global conversations – there are very few great clubs happening now.
What gives?
Well, I am no expert in human psychology, but I believe the celebrity power of Clubhouse GTM has brought in more consumers than producers. I am talking about the intent of usage, which pretty much defines how you will use the product in the long run.
Most now see Clubhouse as a place to listen to celebrities and not a place to talk to people who are like you.
Your community. Your friends. People who are at max 2-3 years senior in the career/startup / life ladder and the ones with whom you wanted to network – you don’t talk to them on Clubhouse.
You don’t talk because they don’t talk. They don’t talk because they are all waiting for Naval and Sriram to talk or bring celebrity guests.
Question : How many of you have ever tried creating your own room at Clubhouse?
The default behavior is to join a celebrity talk show, listen and that’s it.
Almost feels like a rock band that is not gonna play because the lead guitarist and singer are missing.
The audience does not know that they can have fun either ways also. They can sing their own song, play their own music.
The club offers them guitars, drums and all sorts of instrument.
But they are waiting…waiting for the show to begin.
Will the Android app launch bring back the zing? Well, my guess is as good as yours. Wait..let’s talk about it @Clubhouse 🙂
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