ok lol so many of my friends on my tl are like CLUBHOUSE SOUNDS TERRIFYING so here’s basically what it is / how it works and no i am going to force you to join i literally do not care but i can at least explain why people *like it* rofl

thread!

clubhouse is basically just a casual chatting app. there's no pre-made content; you can’t pre-record, can't record the convos. there's no cameras, ever, and if you don't want to talk you can just...sit and listen. the app functions on “rooms” it recommends you can pop in & out of

you get recommended rooms one of two ways — by joining “clubs” (those are the circles at the bottom of my profile, so i’m in some bookclubs, queer spaces, climate changes spaces, etc) & then by filling out your interests on the app so it can recommend groups & convos to pop into

you can also start your own rooms! they can be public, for anyone to join, “social” so only mutuals can join, or you can make them within that club so other members see it

you can also “ping” people to join — so if i was like hey @ktzhaoauthor come talk i’d click her

i didn't understand how the pinging worked, which is how on friday i ended up creating a room that had like 20 people from twitter in it, lol, but it ended up being a blast? like i got to talk to ppl who i've known On Here for yrs but have never! heard their voice!

so here's what i like about it; one, it just feels...incredibly genuine. the other day @andeehannah and i ended up in the same room of a gardening club and just listened to some lady troubleshoot some person's watermelon crop with him for 10 min, lol. it's just all...v casual

and i like that usually, i don't have to talk! if i want to, i have to "request" to talk when i join a room, which the speaker can grant -- but if i'm in a room that has like, 400 people and they've got someone on there talking about cybersecurity, chances are i'm just listening

where i think this would be good for book twt, in particular, is we often have convos that don't translate well on twitter. people are always racing to be First. when you're in a space where there's no incentive to be the funniest or the sharpest or the loudest, people are...calm

and there's also just...something to be said about getting to hear someone's tone of voice when they're talking about, say, how publishing payments are screwed up. it feels like sitting in a room in a coffee shop vs engaging w someone performing on a stage.

there is a big accessibility concern; there's no chat feature, which on one hand, is /really/ nice, bc that means it's really hard to troll -- to speak you have to be granted access and the speaker can immediately boot you. but that means it's currently inaccessible to deaf folks

the app is also currently iphone only, & it's invite only /or/ you have to join the waitlist to reserve your username and hope that someone that has you in their contacts is on there, because then they can be like oh yeah i know this person, and approve your acct

but on a whole i...am having a blast. last night i literally hopped from a 6 person room about succulents to a room with 500+ people where a doctor was explaining the science behind sugar causing inflammation in the brain. i think it has a lot of potential for something in beta

and i think, for me, as a person who is Fiercely Online, it's just a lovely feeling to be in a space where content isn't really...a thing. the app is so small that even "big" accounts don't have more than 2k followers. it's not really possible to clout chase or dunk on people.

& for someone who can be kind of anxious and shy, esp on bad mental health days, it's nice that i can pop into rooms of folks talking about their cats or climate change or w/e and just listen, if i want to, as i'm stuck at home but still craving like, some scrap of human contact

oh, also! clubs have to be approved by support. so someone can't just log on and be like "HERE IS MY GROUP ABOUT SETTING OLD LADIES ON FIRE" lol. i recently applied to make a group for publishing folks! so there's some level of like...Actual Moderating, which we don't see on here

another thing i like is that while you can’t really...pre-make or recycle content, you can schedule events or talks ahead of time! so the app will let you know, hey at 11am today there’s a meditation, or next week we’re discussing your favorite book, etc etc.

it's also worth noting that at least, at the moment, the app has a *huge* population of queer and/or BIPOC folks, in particular Black americans. so the platform lends itself to conversations and giving space for voices who are often drowned out on bigger platforms (ie...here)

there's also so many rooms and such a wide breadth of topics that you regularly pop into rooms where folks are chatting in another language or discussing what it's like to be disabled in your twenties or trying to date when you have immigrant parents and it's just...nice? LOL

and again, bc there's no pre-made stuff, and no content to push after, no one can see your face, you can't send pictures or links or /whatever/, there are no likes or rts or sponsored posts, it all feels very...organic and casual and /gentle/ in a way social often doesn't.

anyways! that's it. the app is still very new, and i hope they do find a way to make it accessible. i hope they DON'T find a way to monetize it, lol, bc right now there's no incentives for corporations to be on there and it's lovely. but it's incredibly lowkey, & i like it a lot.

and no i don't have any invites yet bc i am still new but i will do my best to get my mutuals on there once i have them lol

the end

a lot of people are responding to this saying aaaaa does anyone have an invite so; what i would do is sign up and join the “waitlist” bc there’s a good chance someone that knows you is on there, & if they are they can just approve your account. that’s how i got on!

it's all audio! there's no other way to communicate on there. you can't even dm people lol. and if you want to share a picture, you have to change your profile picture and ask people to click it, bc it won't change in the room after you've joined https://twitter.com/SallySultzman/status/1358802433149919233?s=20

if you guys have other questions, just lmk!

& now @joinClubhouse u can approve my writers / publishing folks club bc i just did a bunch of good pr for y’all

the moderation one is huge, tbh. no text boxes + approved speakers make it *very hard* to bomb a chat. moderators can mute & kick people at lightspeed — i’ve seen it happen. so panels i’ve listened to do a good job of protecting their panelists https://twitter.com/julietasthesea/status/1358803290436341762