Clubhouse

Social Media Expert & Founder of Snack Toronto.  Getty One major thing that happened as a result of the pandemic was that many brands dramatically increased their spending on social media ads. This, paired with a captive audience of users who were forced to stay home all day with nothing but the internet to keep them occupied, allowed new social media networks to successfully break into the mainstream for the first time in over a decade, the last one being Instagram in 2010.  Last year, TikTok caught a massive break and filled in a gap created by uncertainty and fear about the future. It was easy to zone out on TikTok for a few hours or spend time learning a new dance or trend. We also saw the launch of the invitation-only platform Clubhouse. By keeping it exclusive, this audio-based platform generated huge buzz and now has more than 10 million weekly active users.  » Read More

Jonathan Spiers May 13, 2021 1 The parking lot at Monument Avenue and Hamilton Street. Proposed apartments would also replace an existing office building, visible to the right. The Argon Apartments are to the left. (Jonathan Spiers photos) A global missionary group headquartered in Richmond is looking to get in on the city’s apartment boom. International Mission Board, along with an out-of-town developer, is planning a 263-unit apartment complex on land it owns across Hamilton Street from its headquarters at 3806 Monument Ave. The pair of five-story buildings would fill a surface parking lot at 3700 Monument Ave. and replace an existing three-story office building at 1301A N. Hamilton St. Both properties have been under IMB ownership for decades. The three-story office building on Hamilton was built in the early 1980s. IMB is working with Silver Hills Development,  » Read More

White nationalist Nicholas Fuentes and anti-Muslim zealot Laura Loomer made very brief appearances on new app Nick Fuentes and Laura Loomer (Photo illustration by Salon/Getty Images) Select members of the far right, including white nationalist Nicholas Fuentes and anti-Muslim activist Laura Loomer, have been kicked off Clubhouse, a new conversation application that has gained popularity during the coronavirus pandemic, where users can engage with each other in real time about a myriad of topics in different virtual "rooms."  On Saturday, Loomer signed up for the platform and quickly joined a room entitled: "App Store Hate Speech Double Standard: Parler vs. Clubhouse," moderated by right-wing communications flack Kris Ruby. That particular room quickly descended into chaos, with Loomer going on an anti-Muslim tirade, which apparently violates the platform's policies. "As a Jewish woman, who was physically ejected from a moving Uber by a radical Muslim driver, on Rosh Hashanah, I value my safety, I'm pro-life, and you know I don't think I should have to be roadkill because Uber doesn't do background checks on their drivers," the onetime Florida congressional candidate said.   » Read More

2021 is the year of audio. Group chat apps have generated buzz around the world, led by the hype surrounding Clubhouse. Tech giants as well as startups quickly churned out similar instant conversation products to gain a slice of the pie. Facebook said it would soon launch a clone, while Twitter is already testing a similar feature. In China, where Clubhouse is now blocked, a number of homegrown counterparts have emerged. Among them, ByteDance, the parent company of TikTok, is developing a similar product. The fad of Clubhouse may have passed, but audio is here to stay. It is a format that feels more authentic and less invasive. Direct conversations give users more space to build relationships, while privacy is ensured during the exchanges. However, it is never easy to find a tipping point within a market. While it is true that the tech giants have sufficient resources to get ahead in the race, smaller startups have their advantages too. They are more focused, more adaptive when tapping into a market. Sango is one app that is setting a high bar.  » Read More

Abuja, Nigeria (CNN)Nollywood actress and filmmaker Genevieve Nnaji is among the cast of an audio adaptation of Broadway musical 'FELA!' premiering on the Clubhouse app this weekend. The production highlights the struggles of Nigerian music star and Afrobeat pioneer, Fela Anikulapo Kuti who was an outspoken critic of Nigeria's military regimes and was frequently arrested for his troubles.'Fela Ten-Twenty' director and producer, Funa Maduka, told CNN that while the audio adaptation is a nod to the original Broadway musical, 'Ten Twenty' represents the date of the shooting of protesters by security forces at the Lekki Toll Gate in October 2020, in the wake of the nationwide #ENDSars anti-police brutality protests. She added that the adaptation on Clubhouse will frame "the #EndSars movement in the context of Fela Kuti's legacy.""Fela's music... demanded global engagement with African political thought. In the aftermath of the October 2020 #EndSars protests ... his message still achingly resounds. This production is a love letter to those fighting for a better Nigeria," said Maduka.  » Read More

Alexander Shatov/Unsplash Facebook is starting the first test of its Live Audio Rooms product with public figures and creators in Taiwan, part of an expansion of the company’s audio services that will over time include podcast hosting and creation tools. The social media giant announced a sweeping set of updates to its audio services in April, with Live Audio Rooms being the Clubhouse-like centrepiece, allowing users to participate in group voice conversations. It intends to expand the trial’s availability over time and the service will eventually be accessible in the Facebook and Messenger apps. Taiwan is one of Menlo Park, California-based Facebook’s most vibrant markets, where celebrities and politicians constantly debate important issues and freely interact with their audiences. For the initial roll-out, Facebook is limiting the test to what it says is a handful of public figures while planning to bring Live Audio Rooms to Facebook Groups as well. The company is integrating its Stars feature into the audio chat product, letting fans buy tokens to support their favourites,  » Read More

TipRanks3 Monster Growth Stocks That Are Still UndervaluedA lackluster jobs report didn’t derail the markets last week. New jobs in April totaled only 266,000, far below the 978K expected, and the official unemployment rate, which had been predicted to come in at 5.8% actually ticked up slightly to 6.1%. Even so, the tech-weighted NASDAQ gained 0.88% in Friday’s session, the broader S&P 500 was up 0.75% at the end of the day. These gains brought the S&P to a new record level, with a year-to-date gain of 13%. The market’s growth so far this year has been broad-based, based as it is on a general economic reopening as the corona panic shrinks in the rear-view mirror. Broad-based market gains create a positive environment for growth stocks. Using the TipRanks database, we’ve pulled up three stocks that fit a profile: a Buy rating from Wall Street, recent share appreciation that strongly outperforms the overall markets, and considerable upside potential, indicating that they may still be undervalued. Here are the details. Crocs (CROX) We’ll start in footwear,  » Read More

In Silicon Valley, what passes for innovation often means copying the hot new thing, and right now that new thing is Clubhouse: an app that provides audio chat rooms for people to discuss whatever they want. Facebook, Twitter, and other major social networks are all racing to introduce their own audio chat products as fast as they can cobble them together. Their moment may have already come and gone: According to recent reports, downloads of the Clubhouse app have dropped precipitously over the past month. But Clubhouse is surging in popularity in the Middle East—with more than a million downloads this year—where it’s being hailed as an important new space for discussing politics, sex, abortion, alcohol, and other verboten subjects. Clubhouse users are “practicing democracy in real time,” Mohammad Ali Abtahi, a former Iranian vice president, recently told The New York Times. The Times’ story struck a somewhat hopeful tone, presenting Clubhouse as a refreshing agora of free speech in “repressive countries,” while burying the reasons for concern.  » Read More

Reddit is one of the most famous social media forum in the world as it is the network of communities based on the likings of the people, the users can find the community according to their interests and they can become part of it. There are almost 430 million monthly active users on Reddit and the social media platform is expected to grow even further up to double its current size. After punching under its weight for many years the company is building new tech and is testing with charging users around the world. This social media giant has even more users than Twitter and one of the top twenty sites in the world and it is the perfect aim to increase the size when the site has a strong following around the globe.As a business, its assessment is a fraction of its contemporaries, and so too its revenue, as a cultural trend, it’s side-lined as a geeky chase. But now, the company has decided to turn that over, the operating officer of Reddit Jen Wong said it.  » Read More

"We are here to help you relax, unwind and get into the lulla-vibes," said the soothing voice of the young man who serenades thousands of people to sleep every night. "Please make sure your mic is muted." For two hours every night, a group of music and voice performers called the Lullaby Club gather on Clubhouse, the buzzy audio chat app, to help listeners wind down and fall asleep with a calming, whisper-only experience. What started as a kind of social experiment has become one of the most popular channels on Clubhouse, with some 32,000 followers. The Lullaby Club got a big boost on Feb. 1, when its founder, Axel Mansoor, became the face that appears on the app's icon. "The thing about the Lullaby Club is that it proves that in this loud freaking world, you don't have to be loud to get noticed," said Mansoor, 28, a singer-songwriter from Los Angeles, who makes soulful, self-love pop. Prior to Clubhouse, he was probably best known as a finalist on NBC's talent reality show,  » Read More