Let's Talk@Clubhouse: Exploring Voice-Centered Social Media Platform and its Opportunities, Challenges, and Design Guidelines

Abstract

© 2022 ACM.Due to the pandemic, social media has become an essential route to satisfy socializing needs. Expanding from dominant services like Facebook and Instagram, a new wave caused a stir-Clubhouse as a voice-centered social media platform. Despite its worldwide popularity after its launch in 2020, general properties of Clubhouse have not been actively discussed. Accordingly, this study explores Clubhouse's opportunities and challenges as a voice-centered social media through its user experiences. We conducted interviews with regular Clubhouse users (N=26) to gain insight into their motivation, social networking, and conversations. Findings highlight that voice is effective for establishing social relationships via interactivity and intimacy, mutual respect, and convenience from ephemerality. Conversely, users reported patterns of the privacy paradox and the oligopoly of communication. Design guidelines for future voice-centric social media are proposed. Our initial study of Clubhouse will encourage more dialogues on voice-centered social media and its potential as a major platform.