[HN Gopher] Clubhouse doesn't value privacy, security or accessi...
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       Clubhouse doesn't value privacy, security or accessibility
        
       Author : laurex
       Score  : 86 points
       Date   : 2021-05-02 18:35 UTC (4 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.cigionline.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.cigionline.org)
        
       | mwcampbell wrote:
       | As a partial response to the part about accessibility, Clubhouse
       | is now quite accessible to blind people, and a growing proportion
       | of the online blind community is embracing it. Here's a podcast
       | episode about Clubhouse from a blindness perspective:
       | 
       | https://mosen.org/episode-99-all-you-need-to-know-about-club...
       | 
       | Of course, the fact that it excludes deaf people is still a
       | concern.
        
         | bpodgursky wrote:
         | > Of course, the fact that it excludes deaf people is still a
         | concern.
         | 
         | I don't even understand this. What are you suggesting? That
         | auto-captioning be mandatory for all voice applications? The
         | technology is only barely there, and is crazy expensive to
         | consume unless you've developed the tech in-house (ie, Google).
         | What about Discord or just normal phones -- are those fine?
         | 
         | If you're just saying "have text-only channels" I don't
         | understand the point of using Clubhouse in the first place.
         | There are a ton of great text-only messaging platforms.
        
           | mwcampbell wrote:
           | > If you're just saying "have text-only channels" I don't
           | understand the point of using Clubhouse in the first place.
           | There are a ton of great text-only messaging platforms.
           | 
           | And that's why I'm staying away from Clubhouse as long as I
           | can. I believe that we should prefer text for important
           | discussions, so as not to leave people out. We're still
           | learning how to effectively have online discussions in text,
           | but I think it's too soon to give up on it and retreat to
           | relying on audio.
        
       | jonas21 wrote:
       | I promised myself that I'd stop wasting time getting into
       | internet arguments. And to be honest, I don't even like
       | Clubhouse. But this article is full of so many bad-faith
       | arguments that I just can't. Here are a few examples:
       | 
       | > _It is clear that Clubhouse was not designed with privacy in
       | mind. The app, which initially launched without a privacy
       | policy,_
       | 
       | To support this claim, the author links to a Twitter thread [1]
       | where someone first says there is no privacy policy, then someone
       | else provides a link to it, then the first person shows a video
       | that appears to show a broken Privacy link on the Clubhouse
       | website -- a web site that nobody visits because Clubhouse is an
       | app. As far as I know, the in-app link to the privacy policy and
       | the link on the App Store have always worked -- this is one of
       | the things that Apple consistently checks before approving an
       | app.
       | 
       | So somehow, having a broken link becomes they "launched without a
       | privacy policy". You might say, well, maybe the author didn't
       | read the Twitter thread carefully. But who was the person on
       | Twitter who pointed out that Clubhouse does, in fact, have a
       | Privacy Policy? It was Elizabeth Renieris -- the same Elizabeth
       | Renieris who wrote the article! In other words, she's completely
       | aware that her claim is untrue, yet she makes it anyway.
       | 
       | > _Instead, Clubhouse is yet another example of technology
       | designed by, and largely for, privileged, white, Western and
       | able-bodied men._
       | 
       | First, this ignores the fact only one of the two founders of
       | Clubhouse is white -- the other is a brown immigrant from a non-
       | Western country. I doubt the author is unaware of this, and is
       | simply reclassifying asians as "white" because it supports her
       | narrative.
       | 
       | Secondly, attempting to paint the founders as ablist because they
       | don't yet support captioning is both heartbreaking and absurd.
       | One founder has a daughter who was born with a genetic defect
       | that causes severe disabilities, and he has put a tremendous
       | amount of effort raising awareness and fundraising for this [2].
       | He's literally the last person you'd accuse of holding a
       | prejudice against the disabled.
       | 
       | Finally, at least in my experience, Clubhouse seems to have
       | created a community where minorities and women are welcomed and
       | play a prominent role in leading and moderating discussions. The
       | claim that Clubhouse is designed largely for white men seems...
       | completely unsupported.
       | 
       | [1] https://twitter.com/wbm312/status/1360044616217628677
       | 
       | [2] https://www.lydianaccelerator.org/
        
       | HenryBemis wrote:
       | > It also demonstrates a growing chasm between attitudes in the
       | United States and Europe about data governance
       | 
       | Yes, in Europe we got GDPR. In the USA you got a bunch of jokes
       | and jokers trading your data for peanutes.
       | 
       | The disregards towards 'anything' is BAU.. "move fast, break
       | things". I feel that in the USA many companies are in a money-
       | grab. "We will fix it later", and the later becomes never.
       | Because once you created 100 problems, you only 'invest' to fix
       | the 'top 5' and only because an auditor/CISO told you so.
        
       | blfr wrote:
       | If _public opinion and attitudes about privacy and security have_
       | really _evolved significantly since Mark Zuckerberg launched the
       | Ivy League-only TheFacebook.com_ , they would be moving to Signal
       | in droves. They aren't. Most people don't care.
       | 
       | I convince friends occasionally but the privacy argument does
       | next to nothing. The gif search, reactions, and MMS handling are
       | all better selling points.
        
         | x0x0 wrote:
         | The article is just shockingly poor. to wit
         | 
         | > _or provide any way for users to exercise their data
         | protection rights_
         | 
         | the privacy policy, in fact, does. Per it's update date of 5
         | April -- before the publication of this article on 28 April --
         | the privacy policy says
         | 
         | > _Please log in to your account or contact us (at
         | support@alphaexplorationco.com) if you need to change or
         | correct your Personal Data, or if you wish to delete your
         | account._
         | 
         | Not to mention the persistent use of single companies and their
         | actions used to malign every startup. See, eg, the article
         | about clearview. (If the author weren't lazy, they probably
         | would have realized clearview is not actually a silicon valley
         | company: it's in ny, and the primary investors are Kirenaga
         | partners, an east coast vc firm. So really only tenuous
         | connections to sillicon valley)
        
       | 88840-8855 wrote:
       | I have used that app for 3 minutes and lost interest. What is
       | your impression, is the app growing, useage-wise & feature-wise?
        
         | ilrwbwrkhv wrote:
         | i would actually love a video app where people can discuss and
         | debate on a livestream with a reddit like categorization.
        
           | lotsofpulp wrote:
           | Why? Audio and video are so low bandwidth in terms of
           | information, especially for a debate. With text and forums, I
           | can go through links, numerous counter arguments, skip past
           | trolls within seconds.
        
       | da_big_ghey wrote:
       | is not a captioning hard for machine to make correct still? i am
       | not too aware of how developing are in this space.
        
         | Rebelgecko wrote:
         | The various online video conferencing apps do a pretty good job
         | at it
        
           | jfk13 wrote:
           | I suppose it depends on the speaker, but I wouldn't generally
           | describe the examples I've seen as "a pretty good job". Seems
           | to me there's a _long_ way to go...
        
         | x0x0 wrote:
         | Yes.
         | 
         | it's... something how this article links to folks that just
         | assume it's easy to do, and do well. Let alone in real time.
        
       | transitivebs wrote:
       | Here's a visualization of 2.7M Clubhouse users data and their
       | connections: https://clubhousesocialgraph.com
       | 
       | Note: this is much larger than the data leak mentioned in this
       | and other recent articles.
        
       | superasn wrote:
       | The only lesson learned by most founders is it's better to ask
       | for forgiveness than permission.
       | 
       | Be it airbnb or reddit almost all companies have employed one
       | shady tactic or another to grow and maybe once the site is pretty
       | popular they maybe take some steps to fix these issues on surface
       | and hopefully people will forget about such things soon (1)
       | 
       | (1) https://davegooden.com/2011/05/how-airbnb-became-a-
       | billion-d...
        
       | xbar wrote:
       | The model is working as intended.
        
       | areoform wrote:
       | I have tried to provide an alternative take on ClubHouse, but it
       | seems that people are hyper-polarized when it comes to the
       | application. Which is strange as it has provided me with the most
       | authentic experiences I've ever had on the internet.
       | 
       | This is a bit shameless, but here's an excerpt from my exegesis -
       | https://areoform.wordpress.com/2021/04/18/on-clubhouse/,
       | 
       | > Which brings me to the role of ClubHouse as a generator of
       | profound experiences. Some nights ago, an ex-TLA (Three Letter
       | Agency) officer walked into the room, sparking a conversation
       | about strategic elicitation (brought up by me) and empathy for
       | difficult people (brought up by him). Our conversation was
       | interrupted by an admittedly troubled person angry about the
       | "plandemic," spoiling for a fight. In text, we would have ignored
       | him - he had been banned from most social media platforms. Or,
       | given in and argued with him, but it was clear that he was deeply
       | upset. And so we talked.
       | 
       | > He was a struggling musician. Who had lost his living when the
       | pandemic hit and the symphonies shut down. The world was a harsh
       | place for him. He was also one of the few people in the world who
       | had mastered a very particular instrument brought into prominence
       | by Beethoven. And so we begged him to play. To share his gift
       | with us. He obliged by playing a beautifully complex piece of
       | music that demonstrated his mastery over the instrument. We
       | thanked him. Said our goodbyes, and went to sleep.
       | 
       | > A charged situation was transmuted into the magical.
       | 
       | Yes, it's flawed, but I'm glad that it exists.
       | 
       | There's a unique energy in the air, when it comes to ClubHouse.
       | There's something magical about it. I'm worried that it too will
       | get lost to entropy and the casual cruelty of crowds. (it's
       | harder to be cruel when people know each other)
        
         | loceng wrote:
         | It may not even have been that you would have ignored him if
         | via text, but that they may not have been as engaged or been
         | able to read your genuine concern or attention - reading your
         | response in whatever projected tone he believed
         | someone/everyone would treat him.
         | 
         | These tools can be used or wielded either as weapons or for
         | healing-learning. I think we're just beginning to organize to
         | understand after the clusterfuck of the experience of Facebook
         | and the current mainstream status quo "social media." Likewise
         | decoupling someone's reach by providing video services -
         | whether live or recorded - and not being dependant on
         | mainstream media to determine who's messages get out, and how
         | long they can be, along with rehumanizing it, faces and voice
         | being more engaging than simply test, is what we needed; where
         | an individual like Joe Rogan acts a curator to expose
         | interesting guests to share their story for 2-4 hours -
         | essentially creating/expanding nodes of leadership - whether
         | entertaining, educational, or role modelling.
         | 
         | I think whatever experience people have on Clubhouse will fully
         | depend on the context, the curators, and so ultimately how
         | Clubhouse or such platforms are governed; along with how access
         | to the information is managed, if all the most popular people
         | start putting their content behind walled gardens then that's
         | arguably a problem - or then we allow privacy if anyone is
         | trying to extract too much, whatever is considered
         | unreasonable.
        
       | comodore_ wrote:
       | this piece starts very low by quoting Kevin Rose the chief
       | censorist anti free speech activist from the nyt and continues in
       | that vein, very underwhelming.
        
       | throw7 wrote:
       | Are you in da club? Alpha Exploration is born and it's where ya
       | wanna be. It ain't where you go for delusion, it's reality. Gonna
       | get reason, you'll find me in da club, bottle full of cause, it's
       | got what you need, if you ain't into makin' love. So come give it
       | a chance, if you into verity.
        
       | carlosdp wrote:
       | A lot of these criticisms are trying to attribute mal-intent to
       | what in reality is almost certainly that the founders aren't
       | super-humans who got everything technically right out of the
       | gate...
       | 
       | Also
       | 
       | > The app has since been banned in China after hosting
       | conversations about alleged Uighur internment camps and other
       | politically controversial subjects, which could clearly have put
       | activists and dissidents at risk.
       | 
       | I see this argument sometimes for apps, and I feel like it should
       | be made more clear that it's the _Chinese government_ putting
       | these people at risk of harm, not the apps.
       | 
       | Asking for security from a super-power state actor as a baseline
       | for creating a social media app means only Facebook, Google, and
       | Twitter get to ever make social media apps.
       | 
       | > The data referred to is all public profile information from our
       | app, which anyone can access via the app or our API." Davidson
       | was essentially defending "scraping" -- the practice of
       | extracting publicly available, non-copyrighted data from the Web.
       | Whether technically a breach or not, the incident has breached
       | the trust of many of its users, who did not reasonably expect
       | their information to be used in this way.
       | 
       | You can do the same thing with every Instagram account or
       | Facebook or <insert basically every social media platform>. The
       | platform is designed for people to be visible and share. You know
       | that whatever you put in your bio can be seen by anyone on
       | Clubhouse in a room you are in, or in search.
       | 
       | I don't see how this can be made private without defeating the
       | whole purpose of the product. And I also don't see how this
       | violates privacy when no such privacy was offered.
       | 
       | > Scraping is the same technique that controversial start-up
       | Clearview AI, popular with law enforcement, has used to amass its
       | facial recognition database.
       | 
       | It's also the same method used by Google to give you search
       | results, like what the hell are we talking about here? Also
       | _Clubhouse_ didn 't do any scraping. That's being lost here in
       | this weird comparison.
       | 
       | > The audio app, only available to iPhone users, was designed and
       | deployed with virtually no accommodations for individuals who are
       | deaf, hard of hearing, visually impaired or who have certain
       | other disabilities. Competitors such as Twitter Spaces, while not
       | perfect, at least allow users to turn on captions and share
       | transcripts, among other features, demonstrating that
       | accessibility in audio apps is possible
       | 
       | Yea, because Twitter is a multi-billion dollar public company
       | with an established and experienced engineering organization with
       | top experts in AI. Clubhouse was started a year ago and only just
       | started reaching hyper growth in January.
       | 
       | The contention here is you need to get this all correct out of
       | the gate, which realistically only one of the big tech companies
       | could actually pull off.
       | 
       | > And while it is one thing to ask people to go without their
       | Facebook or Google products and services, now that these
       | platforms have become so embedded in their daily life, it is
       | another to ask them to abstain from Clubhouse. In this moment,
       | before users have a compelling need to be on these platforms
       | (because everyone else is there), and before Clubhouse becomes
       | too big to fail, we still have a choice.
       | 
       | I'm confused, so we don't like that Facebook and Google own all
       | of our digital interactions, but you also need to have Facebook
       | and Google-level resources before it's ok for you to try
       | launching a social media product?
       | 
       | Clubhouse reportedly turned down a $4b buyout from Twitter
       | potentially, doing _exactly_ what people have been saying they
       | wish happened with Instagram or WhatsApp, but still they 're
       | doing it wrong.
       | 
       | Damned if you do, damned if you don't, I suppose.
        
       | mrkramer wrote:
       | Privacy is the thing that everybody talks about but nobody has
       | it.
       | 
       | Move on.
       | 
       | Btw Clubhouse being worth $4bn?! New Studio 54?
        
       | azinman2 wrote:
       | Clearly this author has never tried to create a social network.
       | It's crazy hard, the network effect chicken and egg is really
       | really really hard to crack. Unless you use basic tactics to
       | reduce friction as much as possible, how else are you going to
       | grow from nothing?
       | 
       | It's also very strange to talk about SV and backers as if they're
       | some homogenous group. A diversity of skill sets, ethos, and
       | methods exist. Many founders are going at it for the first time.
       | And financial backers aren't usually technically literate to warn
       | about incrementing ids in SQL. They want to know how fast you're
       | growing and the business prospects.
       | 
       | If we start creating laws around these things, then it'll only be
       | even tougher for up-comers to challenge the existing big players.
       | It would be great if the mobile platforms could proxy contacts to
       | at least solve that privacy problem while also being reasonable
       | in their usage, but all new companies have to find some way into
       | people's hearts and minds that easily will forget about a new app
       | within 10m of existing their first usage.
        
         | 3np wrote:
         | > If we start creating laws around these things, then it'll
         | only be even tougher for up-comers to challenge the existing
         | big players.
         | 
         | For interoperability etc I disagree. Leverage on existing
         | protocols where possible and you get most of it for free. E.g.
         | use xmpp/matrix if you need IM-like functionality.
        
         | tpxl wrote:
         | > If we start creating laws around these things, then it'll
         | only be even tougher for up-comers to challenge the existing
         | big players
         | 
         | This is such an unimaginative take. Laws could easily demand
         | easy export of _all your_ data and interoperability of chat
         | systems.
        
           | leesalminen wrote:
           | How do you foresee that working? Would the government publish
           | a standard API for all chat systems? Would chat system makers
           | have to build a bridge for every single messenger ever made,
           | even if it only has 1k users? I just don't see how the law
           | can make apps interoperable without huge barriers of entry
           | that would benefit the incumbents.
        
             | 3np wrote:
             | Laws shouldn't name names but properties, such as: Fully
             | documented and available APIs where first-party clients or
             | front-ends can not rely on undisclosed endpoints.
             | 
             | For a chat app, that would just mean using en existing
             | solution like XMPP or Matrix and provide API documentation
             | for any added deltas.
             | 
             | The less you touch user data, the less you have to think
             | about this.
        
             | creata wrote:
             | Why not just set an arbitrary threshold on how big you need
             | to be before interoperability law applies to you? After
             | all, people are only forced to interoperate with you when
             | you're sufficiently big.
             | 
             | > I just don't see how the law can make apps interoperable
             | without huge barriers of entry that would benefit the
             | incumbents.
             | 
             | I don't see how making such a huge dent in network effects
             | will be anything but a detriment to the incumbents.
        
           | kodah wrote:
           | Unimaginative is the wrong word, imo. GP is calling out that
           | over-regulation introduces market hurdles for smaller
           | businesses. This is a known and non-controversial fact.
           | Typically it gets addressed by instituting different
           | requirements for various key metrics like company or user
           | base size.
           | 
           | Article 30 of the GDPR states that companies with fewer than
           | 250 employees do not need to keep processing records unless
           | "the processing it carries out is likely to result in a risk
           | to the rights and freedoms of data subjects, the processing
           | is not occasional, or the processing includes special
           | categories of data...or personal data relating to criminal
           | convictions and offences."
           | 
           | Your point about an authoritarian government siphoning user
           | data from companies which siphoned that data is also possible
           | and valid.
        
         | justapassenger wrote:
         | > If we start creating laws around these things, then it'll
         | only be even tougher for up-comers to challenge the existing
         | big players.
         | 
         | That's very "entrepreneurial" view. From big networks we've
         | learnt what issues are there, but we should exclude small
         | players from the rules, because it makes it hard to create a
         | product?
         | 
         | I do get a sentiment, but some products are just super hard to
         | build and require huge capital and time investments. Does that
         | give advantage to big established players? Yes. But why should
         | we allow small players to act knowingly in a way that's bad?
        
       | gkoberger wrote:
       | This article makes me wonder if we'll ever see another social
       | network ever again. Our opinions on privacy and security have
       | shifted dramatically (for the better, in my opinion), however
       | imagine an author writing about Facebook a year in under a 2021
       | lens.
       | 
       | Facebook (and others) grew because a lack of privacy and security
       | was the goal. Images were public and tagged, conversations were
       | viewable by anyone, the minifeed made it easy to see every change
       | people made, etc. It was exclusive (college only) but also very
       | public. The high amount of content and low amount of friction
       | made it spread virally. Now it's much more locked down, but
       | that's okay... it already hit a critical mass.
       | 
       | The current consensus about privacy and security seem to be at
       | odds with what's necessary to make a social network work. The
       | ability to connect with anyone at any time with no friction is
       | what makes social networks thrive, but also what enables
       | harassment and abuse.
       | 
       | I think it's likely we've already seen the last great social
       | network.
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | Barrin92 wrote:
       | It's no surprise that Clubhouse values none of the things
       | presented in the title because it's completely orthogonal to what
       | makes Clubhouse 'valuable'. It's like saying "Elsevier is a
       | billion dollar business despite being unfriendly to readers,
       | researchers, and limiting access to human knowledge". No that's
       | the reason, why in the logic of our economic system _they have
       | any price attached to them_.
       | 
       | Clubhouse's entire value proposition is artificial scarcity. It's
       | the NFT of social networks. Take something that is abundant and
       | cheap in the world of software (communication, space, room size)
       | etc, and artificially bog it down to create a zero-sum game of
       | status.
       | 
       | It's basically 'un-innovation' for a lack of a better term.
       | Technically there's nothing in Clubhouse that if it doesn't
       | already exist anywhere else cannot be copied in five minutes. All
       | the things clubhouse places limits on already are abundant, which
       | is why their market value is, ironically enough, 0.
        
         | areoform wrote:
         | Except that's not true, having experienced it, I would say that
         | ClubHouse produces intimacy as a service. I've had magical
         | conversations on the application that I've never had anywhere
         | else.
         | 
         | Saying that it's just another product and that it can be copied
         | in 5 minutes is missing the point. The choices that they've
         | made, their decision to eschew everything except for voice,
         | help create a medium that is intimate, thoughtful, and kind.
         | And otherwise busy people are addicted to it.
         | 
         | Someone I know said that talking on ClubHouse felt like being
         | back at Stanford. Just the electrifying conversations. The
         | sense of possibility. There's something special here.
         | 
         | Recently, I decided that I'd like to interview a cosmonaut who
         | has never been interviewed by the west before. To tell his
         | story before a broader audience. And I started a ClubHouse room
         | to do it, and people from around the world came together to
         | help me. Including people who knew him! I'm just a stranger,
         | but they heard me explain why I wanted to preserve this man's
         | legacy and that was enough. People were happy to chip in and
         | help.
         | 
         | That's magical. And I haven't experienced anything like that
         | before. There's this profound sense of intimacy that this
         | platform produces that's missing elsewhere.
         | 
         | I keep repeating myself, but _there is something here_. It 's a
         | mistake to discount it.
        
           | exogeny wrote:
           | It's hard for me to think of anything less niche than "like
           | being at Stanford" given the extreme, tech-focused, affluent,
           | bourgeois-as-fuck description that implies.
           | 
           | The average person doesn't want to spend hours listening to
           | thought leaders who are in love with their own voice
           | pontificating randomly on topics that don't affect or address
           | their lives in any way. To believe that they will to such an
           | extent that A16Z is willing to give them a $4B given zero
           | revenue, declining traction, and no clear business shows that
           | all you need to do to gain ever-increasing valuations in the
           | tech world is to serve up the exact kind of frou-frou,
           | nebulous bullshit that you wrote and that VCs eat up.
        
             | areoform wrote:
             | > given the extreme, tech-focused, affluent, bourgeois-as-
             | fuck description that implies
             | 
             | While I understand where you're coming from, this is the
             | kind of conversation that has turned me off from most of
             | the internet.
             | 
             | On the months I've been on ClubHouse, I've never had an
             | exchange like this. But elsewhere on the web? It's fairly
             | common.
             | 
             | Text is a hard medium to discuss complicated ideas in. It's
             | too easy to be snarky. You get kudos for it. But that's
             | harder to do in voice. Because you'd have to hear my
             | reaction, and the reactions of others. You'd have to hear
             | how off-putting it is.
             | 
             | I prefer ClubHouse now, because the rest of the web is so
             | snarky. And do you blame me? Given how you've reacted to
             | me?
        
               | stale2002 wrote:
               | > I prefer ClubHouse now
               | 
               | The problem is not that you prefer clubhouse. Instead, it
               | is that you have ascribed some magical property to it,
               | and are treating it like it is some revolution.
               | 
               | That is great that you have found something that you
               | prefer. But there is no need to talk in such grandious
               | terms, when talking about a simple voice chat app.
        
             | guscost wrote:
             | > thought leaders who are in love with their own voice
             | pontificating randomly on topics that don't affect or
             | address their lives in any way
             | 
             | Yes, those conversations are dreadful. And there are a lot
             | of them. But you're doing just another version of "Reddit
             | is a website filled with silly cat pictures" here.
        
           | dancemethis wrote:
           | There's no intimacy, thoughtfulness or kindness in a
           | proprietary software where a corporation can get the
           | conversation and use it for its own means.
           | 
           | On the opposite, by being predators of user privacy they are
           | hostile.
        
           | opheliate wrote:
           | > Someone I know said that talking on ClubHouse felt like
           | being back at Stanford.
           | 
           | I think this quote reveals a lot more than the person you
           | know necessarily intended.
           | 
           | > Recently, I decided that I'd like to interview a cosmonaut
           | who has never been interviewed by the west before.
           | 
           | I would have loved to listen to this conversation, but
           | unfortunately, I come from a working-class background in the
           | UK, and as such, I don't know anyone who would have a
           | Clubhouse invite to give me. I'm not trying to make any
           | assumptions about your background here, and I'm sure there
           | are many people on Clubhouse who come from un-privileged
           | backfrounds, but perhaps the intimacy of the environment
           | comes from being surrounded by people who come from a similar
           | place (i.e: Ivy League colleges, Silicon Valley companies)
           | due to the exclusivity Clubhouse has imposed.
        
             | areoform wrote:
             | I am a high school dropout.
             | 
             | I'm happy to send you an invite. Message me on twitter.
        
         | gkoberger wrote:
         | If you only talk about the tech behind it, then you're correct.
         | However there is a scarcity of time and attention, which is
         | what Clubhouse aims to capture. People want to be where things
         | are happening. That's why land is abundant, yet I pay $2600 for
         | a one-bedroom apartment in a city.
         | 
         | I've been using Clubhouse for a year, and seen various
         | iterations. Earlier, there was so much human connection. I
         | talked to amazing people almost 1:1, and it was like being part
         | of a small club. As it grew, it became more like a 24/7
         | conference where you could drop in to hear any topic you want.
         | Less my thing, but still fascinating.
        
           | areoform wrote:
           | Have you heard of Prelon and Small Steps, Giant Leaps?
           | 
           | https://prelon.org/
        
       | Invictus0 wrote:
       | The calculus on privacy is simple. Would you rather be a $4B
       | company that used shady methods to get users, and pay a small
       | fine; or, be a $0 company that followed all the rules right into
       | the graveyard? All the old hypergrowth network companies used
       | these shady tactics to get their users; now they want to solidify
       | their moat by banning the same tactics for other companies.
       | 
       | I'm not saying that a company can never succeed by following all
       | the rules--just that it's a lot less likely.
       | 
       | Have we learned nothing from 2008? The only thing that is going
       | to deter white collar crimes is jail time--everything else is
       | just the cost of doing business.
        
         | sthnblllII wrote:
         | Thats not going to happen as long as people keep electing
         | politicians whose largest donors are Facebook co-founders.
         | 
         | https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2020/10/22/elec-o22.html
        
         | pyrale wrote:
         | > a $4B company
         | 
         | Small correction: a company that acquired capital at a $4bn
         | valuation. As VCs are well known to shore up countless failures
         | with few overwhelming successes, That valuation is essentially
         | useless.
         | 
         | If you want a correct valuation, you'll have to wait and see
         | what employees get for their shares.
        
           | ohgodplsno wrote:
           | Founders don't give a single damn about the employees.
           | They'll be doing lines of cokes on company budget, and walk
           | away with a fat load of cash even if it fails. VC has never
           | been for the employees, and never will be.
        
       | incadenza wrote:
       | I think they've correctly learned that these concerns aren't
       | sufficient to prevent users from flocking to the next new app
       | that their friends are using.
        
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