I got attacked yesterday in my Clubhouse room.
She was well-meaning, wanting to use Clubhouse to grow her personal brand– to speak as often as possible in front of as many people as possible.
After a few minutes of monologuing, we realized she didn’t have a question and just wanted to speak. She still kept on going– while others patiently waited to ask their question and get help from our panelists.
For those who are not on Clubhouse, it’s a platform that has been taken over by people talking about how to become a millionaire and similar folks who really want to be public speakers.
The other 99% of the million people on Clubhouse use it like a radio call-in show- to be entertained and educated, mainly to listen and sometimes to ask a question.
There are many “rooms” in the Clubhouse, which you can think of as temporary channels to discuss a particular topic.
Mark Wagner and I chose “How to hire digital marketers” and invited a couple of other moderators who have hired hundreds of digital marketers to be on the panel.
This lady– I’ll not mention her name to protect the guilty– after being able to sneak in a monologue, somehow managed to sneak in to speak again– this time with a lengthy tirade about women’s rights and how Clubhouse is male-dominated chauvinism.
I’m sad.
Fortunately, Kristen Ruby jumped in to defend me– plus some other ladies who told her that she was holding the whole room hostage.
Eventually, we were able to get to her leave the stage by choice, instead of having to kick her out, as she mentioned had happened to her on other stages she came to speak.
She was like the Trump supporters who stormed the Capitol– no doubt wanting to be visible and speak her mind.
I thought it was interesting that her rationalization for holding us hostage was that she had to “stand up for herself”.
The seed that grew social media is also the seed of destruction– that it’s a platform where everyone has a right to speak, but not a right to be heard.
Bill Gates talked about this in his book “The Road Ahead”, where the internet is like an auditorium where everyone is quietly talking. Most people have their volume knobs set at 1 to 2 on a 100-point scale.
But some people will crank up their speaker to 100, drowning out everyone else.
The larger the room, the greater the possible damage from these well-meaning folks who are forcing themselves upon us.
Maybe as an “influencer”, they feel it’s their duty to fight the man and right the very real discrimination out there.
But could you imagine having dinner with friends at a restaurant and then a crazy-eyed stranger comes up to take over your conversation?
I predict that Clubhouse will devolve from an amazing place to make connections into attention-seeking maniacs storming the Capitol to speak their minds.
Certainly, you can choose who you follow (which drives the “newsfeed” of the rooms you see).
Remember how the popular internet forums of years ago died because the conversations would descend into name-calling?
The next phase of the internet is going to be characterized by this new wave of a vigilante who feels wronged and needs an outlet to express their struggle.
I don’t see this as a Facebook, Twitter, or Clubhouse thing– but a culture shift for the planet, led by the United States.
