The Exchanges

Q Always worth a try. Um, okay, so we, we discussed COVID there. The other one that I actually spoke to Mike Mignogno about, which is obviously the founder of Anchor, um, years ago, he said the thing I learned is live does not work, Harry. Um, people want on demand, uh, people want to listen in their own time. Why do you think that's wrong?

A Yeah. I, I think that that's generally right for content, right? Mike's great. And I think his, um, his background, he usually works more in content and, and Mike, Mike and our friends, he's great. Um, but I think he's generally right for content, right? News is an exception where you want to talk about what's breaking, what's happening right now. I think sports is an exception where, where you need to know who the winner is. Another exception is interactive. Content. Like if you think about a zoom concert, wouldn't be really fun because the experience of being there is such a part of it. It's a sensory experience. Being able to look at other people in the audience and see that they also know all the lyrics and they're just as excited as you are. That, that matters. And there's some online experiences where you're in the chat, talking with other people, you might interact with the speakers. So, so interactive can be an exception. And I do think there's something qualitatively different about live that we don't, we don't really understand. Like if I'm sure you've had the experience in the past where you're in the car and a song comes on the radio that you like, and you're like, oh my gosh, we've got to listen to this, but you wouldn't open up Spotify and listen to it in the moment, even though you could, there's something about live that feels special, but generally I think Mike…

AI assessment note: “Clubhouse is not about content. Clubhouse is about talking.”

Q Honestly, I mean, wait for you to answer this one first. Uh, web three, like what would it take for a breakthrough? Is it here for the longterm? Is it sustainable or is this just another fad?

A I'm, I'm very long on crypto. I'm a strong believer. I think it's the right way for the internet to evolve. Right now we're, we're building an economy into clubhouse. We're in the early stages of it, but hoping to have something out there in the not too distant future. And what I'd like to do, what we'd like to do is do it all on top of web three rails, but have it be completely under the hood. And I think with web three, with, with crypto, like the, the challenge Has been that the UX is just not there yet. But a lot of the core components that you need to do things like fiat on ramp and custody and, and, um, you know, everything else, I think those will be coming online in the next six to nine months. And I feel that for products in general, the inflection point often comes when, when services get built on top of them without end users even realizing it, right? It's, it's when people build on top of it because it just allows them to do new things for the user. And the user doesn't even have to know what's happening under the hood. Like an example that I often think about is Wikipedia. When Wikipedia came along, no one cared that it was built on the LAMP stack or, or even that it was a web-based encyclopedia. They cared that it was free instead of the 900 dollar volume, you know, volumes of Encyclopedia Britannica on their bookshelf. They cared that it was free, that it was acc…

AI assessment note: “I'm, I'm very long on crypto. I'm a strong believer.”

Q So you mentioned that, you know, two of you when you raised the Series A, and actually it was then that you realized that something was working. What were the signs that you knew that it was working and that actually product market fit, tick, and it was time to ramp?

A Yeah, you know, um, we look at the stuff that you would expect us to look at, like retention numbers, um, that, that's really the big thing that we always come back to is retention and engagement. But if you think about it from a, from a more zoomed out view, When we launched Clubhouse, it was quite simple. It was a single room. The whole app was a single room. There was no audience. Everyone was a speaker. There was no follow up. Everyone followed everyone and you couldn't change that. And so you come in. And you, you got invited into this thing. You'd come in and you'd see your friends that are hanging out and you didn't even realize that your friends were there hanging out without you. And you'd see friends of friends and people that were here in your extended network. And you talk with them and you laugh and you'd hang out and you would spend hours doing that. It, and, uh, you know, it, it really mimics that real world behavior of, of hanging out with friends. It just takes it online. And I think that that core experience works. I think people love it. People stay for hours. They come back all the time. They spend dozen hours, dozens of hours a week on it, and they tell their friends about it, and those friends want to join. And I think word of mouth is the best way for a product to grow, right? And, and my fundamental belief is that the best communication products, they do…

AI assessment note: “that's really the big thing that we always come back to is retention and engagement”

Q Um, there is this unbelievable ability for us today to build up these heroes in technology, and the desire to do that is so we can then smash them. As bluntly, many media people have liked to do with Clubhouse, they've liked to do with Hopin, many other companies. Um, how does it feel?

A I think you have to have a thick skin if you're going to do startups. You know, I, um, I think, I think that's something that I've kind of developed over the years, because I think in the earlier days when I was doing Highlight, I would take it, I would take it really personally, right? Like I remember someone wrote us an email one time, uh, when it was just two of us at Highlight and they, they're like F you for not having an Android app. And we're like, geez, it's just two of us and we're trying hard. Um, And, and I think that, uh, I think you just have to have a thick skin or else you're just going to crumble, right? I feel personally, I feel that I really admire entrepreneurs. I really admire people who take a swing and it's, it's so easy to, to, you know, try to dunk on people and shit on people and say why something can't be done. But I get personally really inspired by the people that, that, that are out there trying, right? Like I read this book on the Wright brothers a while back and it, you know, it was like a hundred years ago. It wasn't that long ago, but they're, they're, you know, sitting there on the ground Looking up at the sky going, I'm going to figure out how to make man fly. And, and everyone who was trying to just died. Like so many people just died. It was so dangerous. And everyone was just like laughing and saying it couldn't be done. But I think the peo…

AI assessment note: “I think you have to have a thick skin if you're going to do startups.”

Q Can I be blunt? You founded Highlight, you sold it to Pinterest, you then worked at Benchmark, you had the experience in the network to hire those people, and you had the pedigree. If you're a normal founder who doesn't have the Benchmark EIR, the acquisition by Pinterest, Good luck hiring your very, very experienced, very, very seasoned operators that early. It doesn't happen. What would you say to them?

A I think that's absolutely true. Um, a couple of things I'd say. One is, um, we didn't actually build out the team at Clubhouse until we felt that there was real traction there that we really needed to build out a team. So when we did our series A, the company was two of us. Rohan was doing all the engineering. I was doing all the pixels and we would collaborate a lot on product. It was just us. You know, banging on things in our basement for months. And I think that's really helpful. Like don't scale the team until you need to. I think if you need to raise a team earlier, having some sort of prototype, having something that you can show them, I think that's, that goes really, really far. And I think if you're scrappy, you can find a way to do that. And, um, the way that you, uh, Find people who want to build something with you is number one, work on something that you love. And I feel so grateful that I get to work on something that I love. And again, it's not always a rational thing to do. Um, but that's been one principle I've always sort of had is, is I'm, I'm, I'm going to try really hard if I can to work on something that I love, because then you just want to talk about it all the time. You want to think about it all the time. When you go to talk with potential co-founders, potential teammates, potential investors, It shows that you are so excited about this thing. You can…

AI assessment note: “I think that's absolutely true. Um, a couple of things I'd say.”

Q which we've all hailed for so many years, and you see this across Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, towards this, and I think Mignano does this well, which is like the disregard for that and the praising now and the complete movement towards kind of recommendation media and really All companies being machine learning discovery platforms for media. Um, and TikTok really kind of pioneering that. Um, do you agree with that?

A I think there's some truth to that for content platforms, but I don't think Clubhouse is a content platform. Um, and, and so the, the way that I think about it is you have kind of a spectrum from, from communication products, like messenger apps to, to media products, and they all operate pretty differently. So with Clubhouse, uh, I think that some of that applies, like the, the real core of Clubhouse It's, um, it's friends of friends. Like if you think about it, there are a lot of products that are private five person messenger products for people you already know, small groups of friends that know each other. There are a number of great products for big admin led community management, you know, discord and slack and like legacy Facebook groups. I think the world tends to operate around friends of friends. If you think about the best social experiences you've ever had, they've probably been times When you were hanging out with a few people that you knew and maybe some other people that you didn't know, but, but that you trusted because they were friends of your friends or because they also went to the same school or they worked at the same company or they were at the same local bar and they live near you. And that's a really special thing in the world right now. And I think that hasn't fully come online yet. So if we can help connect you with your friends and, and serve that s…

AI assessment note: “I think there's some truth to that for content platforms”

Q So you mentioned that, you know, two of you when you raised the Series A, and actually it was then that you realized that something was working. What were the signs that you knew that it was working and that actually product market fit, tick, and it was time to ramp?

A Yeah, you know, um, we look at the stuff that you would expect us to look at, like retention numbers, um, that, that's really the big thing that we always come back to is retention and engagement. But if you think about it from a, from a more zoomed out view, When we launched Clubhouse, it was quite simple. It was a single room. The whole app was a single room. There was no audience. Everyone was a speaker. There was no follow up. Everyone followed everyone and you couldn't change that. And so you come in. And you, you got invited into this thing. You'd come in and you'd see your friends that are hanging out and you didn't even realize that your friends were there hanging out without you. And you'd see friends of friends and people that were here in your extended network. And you talk with them and you laugh and you'd hang out and you would spend hours doing that. It, and, uh, you know, it, it really mimics that real world behavior of, of hanging out with friends. It just takes it online. And I think that that core experience works. I think people love it. People stay for hours. They come back all the time. They spend dozen hours, dozens of hours a week on it, and they tell their friends about it, and those friends want to join. And I think word of mouth is the best way for a product to grow, right? And, and my fundamental belief is that the best communication products, they do…

AI assessment note: “that's really the big thing that we always come back to is retention and engagement.”

Q against games in, in my mind. I compete against Netflix. It's not just, you know, invest like the best. Um, there's many other things that we compete against. Love you, Patrick. Um, but my point being there, like, who do you compete against then? Cause like, are you, are you competing against the phone call with my mum? Or are you, you are competing with podcasts still though on you?

A I think it depends. It depends on what the person is looking for. There are people that open up Clubhouse to listen, but I think the, the most magical experience, the thing that people, when you talk with people who love, love, love Clubhouse, like the millions of people in the core community, what they love it for is the people that they meet, the friends that they're hanging out with, the conversations that they have. And, um, at the end of the day, everyone is competing for time. That's true. But there are certain contexts, certain times during the day where I feel like passively listening or passively watching videos. And there are other times where I feel like hanging out and talking with people. And I think Clubhouse competes more on the latter.

AI assessment note: “I think Clubhouse competes more on the latter.”

Q generation of, kind of, decadence and perfection, to now we want selfies of our friends with no makeup looking terrible, or me, you know, without coffee looking like an ogre in the morning, and that's cool now. I feel like such an old man here, but I'm like, how do you think about the rise of authenticity and kind of that realness, uh, integrated into the next generation of social?

A I think authenticity is a means to an end. So when you provide a stress-free environment where people can be themselves, it helps build friendship and connection in the same way that for us, I think of audio as a means to an end. It allows you to hear nuance and intonation and tone without worrying about what you look like or how messy your house is. So, so I think authenticity is a means to an end, and that is why we built Clubhouse, right? We, we have actively seen more and more rooms going private and semi-private over time. So you, you actually only see a fraction of what's happening on the Clubhouse network when you open the app, and that's increasingly true over time. And, um, I think there's a lot of value in that. Right. And they're just different products, right? Broadcast is one thing. And there are people that just want content that is not interactive. I think authenticity works with friends and friends of friends and people in situations where you want to build relationships with people. And that's a very powerful thing.

AI assessment note: “I think authenticity is a means to an end.”

Q Can I be blunt? You founded Highlight, you sold it to Pinterest, you then worked at Benchmark, you had the experience in the network to hire those people, and you had the pedigree. If you're a normal founder who doesn't have the Benchmark EIR, the acquisition by Pinterest, Good luck hiring your very, very experienced, very, very seasoned operators that early. It doesn't happen. What would you say to them?

A I think that's absolutely true. Um, a couple of things I'd say. One is, um, we didn't actually build out the team at Clubhouse until we felt that there was real traction there that we really needed to build out a team. So when we did our series A, the company was two of us. Rohan was doing all the engineering. I was doing all the pixels and we would collaborate a lot on product. It was just us. You know, banging on things in our basement for months. And I think that's really helpful. Like don't scale the team until you need to. I think if you need to raise a team earlier, having some sort of prototype, having something that you can show them, I think that's, that goes really, really far. And I think if you're scrappy, you can find a way to do that. And, um, the way that you, uh, Find people who want to build something with you is number one, work on something that you love. And I feel so grateful that I get to work on something that I love. And again, it's not always a rational thing to do. Um, but that's been one principle I've always sort of had is, is I'm, I'm, I'm going to try really hard if I can to work on something that I love, because then you just want to talk about it all the time. You want to think about it all the time. When you go to talk with potential co-founders, potential teammates, potential investors, It shows that you are so excited about this thing. You can…

AI assessment note: “I think that's absolutely true. Um, a couple of things I'd say.”

Q talk about the future, Number one reason for decline, which I often think too, is as you mentioned COVID there and the consumer behavior. We were fucking lonely. We were bored and we were isolated and we were given this drug of Clubhouse, which made us not lonely and not bored. My question to you is, was Clubhouse the COVID antidote and was it a short term consumer behavior change?

A I think that COVID is temporary, but remote living is permanent. And, um, and what you see over time is that we have offline experiences and then online compliments come and they're not as high fidelity, but they have other advantages. And over time they get better and they take share from offline and then they expand the market for it. And I think, you know, like I was saying shopping, it was Amazon and dating was Tinder and meetings with zoom. And I think. Friendship and hanging out and being with people is going to go the same way. Uh, we're a funny company, right? Like we, we tried really hard to grow slowly and, and we succeeded for nine months, right? The reason we had the invite model is because it was two of us and, and we didn't want to grow too quickly because things break. The reason we didn't do press was because we didn't want to grow too quickly. Um, you know, Six months after the series A, the company was still probably like seven of us, eight of us. And then we had a couple months where we just grew like 10 X every month. And, and, and that does a couple things, right? The first thing is it gives you two months of silly download numbers that, that everyone will compare the company to. Um, but it also stresses the system, right? That those numbers, uh, during those couple months, they looked really good on paper, but we weren't giving people a good experience. It…

AI assessment note: “I think that COVID is temporary, but remote living is permanent.”

Q Always worth a try. Um, okay, so we, we discussed COVID there. The other one that I actually spoke to Mike Mignogno about, which is obviously the founder of Anchor, um, years ago, he said the thing I learned is live does not work, Harry. Um, people want on demand, uh, people want to listen in their own time. Why do you think that's wrong?

A Yeah. I, I think that that's generally right for content, right? Mike's great. And I think his, um, his background, he usually works more in content and, and Mike, Mike and our friends, he's great. Um, but I think he's generally right for content, right? News is an exception where you want to talk about what's breaking, what's happening right now. I think sports is an exception where, where you need to know who the winner is. Another exception is interactive. Content. Like if you think about a zoom concert, wouldn't be really fun because the experience of being there is such a part of it. It's a sensory experience. Being able to look at other people in the audience and see that they also know all the lyrics and they're just as excited as you are. That, that matters. And there's some online experiences where you're in the chat, talking with other people, you might interact with the speakers. So, so interactive can be an exception. And I do think there's something qualitatively different about live that we don't, we don't really understand. Like if I'm sure you've had the experience in the past where you're in the car and a song comes on the radio that you like, and you're like, oh my gosh, we've got to listen to this, but you wouldn't open up Spotify and listen to it in the moment, even though you could, there's something about live that feels special, but generally I think Mike…

AI assessment note: “From my perspective, Clubhouse is not about content. Clubhouse is about talking.”

Q I do just want to ask, I place a lot of value on serial entrepreneurship and the lessons that come from it. You mentioned the time with Highlight there, and the 10 years before building in Consumer Social. What did you do with Highlight that you took with you to Clubhouse? What did you do that you did not take with you? How did it impact your building of Clubhouse?

A Oh man, I think there's a lot that I did not take with me intentionally. I mean, I love that line. I loved it. It's a story for another time, but you learn so much, you know, it's, it's, um, it's not a rational thing to keep like going back to the table with consumer social stuff. But one thing that has been heartening is that I do feel like you get better at it over time, right? You, you learn to pattern match. You learn things like not to overbuild, not to spend a ton of time on some secondary or tertiary screen that, that no one's really going to visit. You learn that tactical growth hacky things aren't really going to make your product work. That's not the right thing to focus on. So we, we talk about durability a lot and, um, you know, you just kind of get better at the craft. You're never, you know, you've always got so much more to learn, but you pattern match. I think the most important thing though, is that You learn how to build a company the right way. And again, it's an area where I've got a lot to learn, but Rohan and I spent a lot of time before we decided to build Clubhouse aligning on values. We, we sort of said, okay, if we're going to do this, we're going to keep the team really small. We're not going to raise money unless we really think something's working and we think we need to raise money. And we're going to move really quickly because that's a huge advan…

AI assessment note: “You learn things like not to overbuild, not to spend a ton of time”

Q against games in, in my mind. I compete against Netflix. It's not just, you know, invest like the best. Um, there's many other things that we compete against. Love you, Patrick. Um, but my point being there, like, who do you compete against then? Cause like, are you, are you competing against the phone call with my mum? Or are you, you are competing with podcasts still though on you?

A I think it depends. It depends on what the person is looking for. There are people that open up Clubhouse to listen, but I think the, the most magical experience, the thing that people, when you talk with people who love, love, love Clubhouse, like the millions of people in the core community, what they love it for is the people that they meet, the friends that they're hanging out with, the conversations that they have. And, um, at the end of the day, everyone is competing for time. That's true. But there are certain contexts, certain times during the day where I feel like passively listening or passively watching videos. And there are other times where I feel like hanging out and talking with people. And I think Clubhouse competes more on the latter.

AI assessment note: “And I think Clubhouse competes more on the latter.”

Q generation of, kind of, decadence and perfection, to now we want selfies of our friends with no makeup looking terrible, or me, you know, without coffee looking like an ogre in the morning, and that's cool now. I feel like such an old man here, but I'm like, how do you think about the rise of authenticity and kind of that realness, uh, integrated into the next generation of social?

A I think authenticity is a means to an end. So when you provide a stress-free environment where people can be themselves, it helps build friendship and connection in the same way that for us, I think of audio as a means to an end. It allows you to hear nuance and intonation and tone without worrying about what you look like or how messy your house is. So, so I think authenticity is a means to an end, and that is why we built Clubhouse, right? We, we have actively seen more and more rooms going private and semi-private over time. So you, you actually only see a fraction of what's happening on the Clubhouse network when you open the app, and that's increasingly true over time. And, um, I think there's a lot of value in that. Right. And they're just different products, right? Broadcast is one thing. And there are people that just want content that is not interactive. I think authenticity works with friends and friends of friends and people in situations where you want to build relationships with people. And that's a very powerful thing.

AI assessment note: “I think authenticity is a means to an end. So when you provide a stress-free environment”

Q Um, there is this unbelievable ability for us today to build up these heroes in technology, and the desire to do that is so we can then smash them. As bluntly, many media people have liked to do with Clubhouse, they've liked to do with Hopin, many other companies. Um, how does it feel?

A I think you have to have a thick skin if you're going to do startups. You know, I, um, I think, I think that's something that I've kind of developed over the years, because I think in the earlier days when I was doing Highlight, I would take it, I would take it really personally, right? Like I remember someone wrote us an email one time, uh, when it was just two of us at Highlight and they, they're like F you for not having an Android app. And we're like, geez, it's just two of us and we're trying hard. Um, And, and I think that, uh, I think you just have to have a thick skin or else you're just going to crumble, right? I feel personally, I feel that I really admire entrepreneurs. I really admire people who take a swing and it's, it's so easy to, to, you know, try to dunk on people and shit on people and say why something can't be done. But I get personally really inspired by the people that, that, that are out there trying, right? Like I read this book on the Wright brothers a while back and it, you know, it was like a hundred years ago. It wasn't that long ago, but they're, they're, you know, sitting there on the ground Looking up at the sky going, I'm going to figure out how to make man fly. And, and everyone who was trying to just died. Like so many people just died. It was so dangerous. And everyone was just like laughing and saying it couldn't be done. But I think the peo…

AI assessment note: “I think you have to have a thick skin if you're going to do startups.”

Q Final one for you, Paul. Clubhouse in five years, which is what, twenty-twenty-seven. We do another show. Where is Clubhouse then?

A Our mission at Clubhouse is to increase friendship in the world, right? To, to create a place where you can be among friends, meet their friends, talk about anything. And, and we have a lot more to do to, to make sure everyone has that experience when they join. But, but in five years, my hope is that everyone listening to this uses Clubhouse whenever they want to talk with friends, whenever they want to have a good conversation. And by doing that, They, they've made a ton of new friends. They've learned, they've connected with people and, and they have a place where they can always just open their phone and they can feel at home. And I think that if we can do that, if we can fill everyone's life with, with fun and interesting people, no matter where you live, no matter where you work from, no matter what networks you have access to, I think that's a pretty amazing future to imagine.

AI assessment note: “in five years, my hope is that everyone listening to this uses Clubhouse”

Q if you're in the room, you know, you hear me, and fine. I hope you don't tweet it. But when it was recording, I was like, oh, shit. I don't know. Do you know what I mean? Like, like, you know, I was very much on guard, because people can hear this. How do you feel about, like, losing that authenticity with being, Introduction of recording and making that possible.

A Yeah. So I think it is a, I think it's a customer segmentation thing. I think that with Clubhouse, there are two sides of the platform. There, there is the broadcast side, right? There are people that are broadcasting. That's fantastic. That, that, that's a reason why people come to the app. They come to these rooms with their friends. They talk about those rooms and the in-between moments, but the majority of the network is people hanging out and talking, and those people are not recording their rooms. Uh, and I think it's fine for broadcast and, and, and hanging out like conversation to coexist. Like think about Instagram, something like, I think. 40% of, of accounts are public and they want reach and followers and branded content and monetization and something like 60% I've heard go private. And those people want something really different. They want to share photos with their friends and they don't care about how many likes they have. They care about who liked it and what they said and The interactions that they have there affect their real life friendships. So I'll say, oh, Harry, I saw you went on vacation. That looked amazing. Where were you when we, when we hang out in person and they work really well together. Like I'll follow some of these accounts and some of these accounts and the system kind of works. Clubhouse is very similar. So if there are people that want to d…

AI assessment note: “I think it's fine for broadcast and, and, and hanging out like conversation to coexist.”

Q I do just want to ask, I place a lot of value on serial entrepreneurship and the lessons that come from it. You mentioned the time with Highlight there, and the 10 years before building in Consumer Social. What did you do with Highlight that you took with you to Clubhouse? What did you do that you did not take with you? How did it impact your building of Clubhouse?

A Oh man, I think there's a lot that I did not take with me intentionally. I mean, I love that line. I loved it. It's a story for another time, but you learn so much, you know, it's, it's, um, it's not a rational thing to keep like going back to the table with consumer social stuff. But one thing that has been heartening is that I do feel like you get better at it over time, right? You, you learn to pattern match. You learn things like not to overbuild, not to spend a ton of time on some secondary or tertiary screen that, that no one's really going to visit. You learn that tactical growth hacky things aren't really going to make your product work. That's not the right thing to focus on. So we, we talk about durability a lot and, um, you know, you just kind of get better at the craft. You're never, you know, you've always got so much more to learn, but you pattern match. I think the most important thing though, is that You learn how to build a company the right way. And again, it's an area where I've got a lot to learn, but Rohan and I spent a lot of time before we decided to build Clubhouse aligning on values. We, we sort of said, okay, if we're going to do this, we're going to keep the team really small. We're not going to raise money unless we really think something's working and we think we need to raise money. And we're going to move really quickly because that's a huge advan…

AI assessment note: “You learn things like not to overbuild, not to spend a ton of time”

Q person, Blutney. You wouldn't know it looking at us, but I'm a little bit younger than you, and I'm on the Clubhouse team, say, I do not have such a thick skin. How do you maintain morale and leadership when there is negative press cycles? And although you're good, You need to uphold your team and instill that fighting confidence in them. How do you do that as a leader?

A I think it's, um, I think it's really challenging. It's one of the bigger challenges of building a company when you're, uh, when it's not a linear path, right? Um, and, uh, you know, one other thing I would say about having, having personal perspective on it, I, I feel immensely grateful that I live in a world where I get to spend time building something I love. That's insane, right? How blessed and fortunate, uh, do you have to be to get to spend your time doing that? So I think having that perspective is important. I think kids changed my perspective too. You kind of don't worry as much about, about Silicon Valley nonsense and you kind of know what matters. And, and, um, but I think for the team, it's hiring, it's hiring really great people. Um, and, Talking openly about it. Right. And sort of saying like, I think good people really respect transparency. They don't want you to sugarcoat stuff. They, they don't want you to bullshit them. They, they want you to be straight with them. And the reality is startups are not a linear path. If you look at most social platforms that have eventually succeeded, they went through some messy middle period and some didn't make it and some did. And, um, so we sort of tell them, here's where we think we are. Here's what we know. Here's what we think works. Here's what we think, um, the, the, the right next step is. Um, if you disagree, like, …

AI assessment note: “Talking openly about it. Right. And sort of saying like, I think good people really respect transparency.”

Q person, Blutney. You wouldn't know it looking at us, but I'm a little bit younger than you, and I'm on the Clubhouse team, say, I do not have such a thick skin. How do you maintain morale and leadership when there is negative press cycles? And although you're good, You need to uphold your team and instill that fighting confidence in them. How do you do that as a leader?

A I think it's, um, I think it's really challenging. It's one of the bigger challenges of building a company when you're, uh, when it's not a linear path, right? Um, and, uh, you know, one other thing I would say about having, having personal perspective on it, I, I feel immensely grateful that I live in a world where I get to spend time building something I love. That's insane, right? How blessed and fortunate, uh, do you have to be to get to spend your time doing that? So I think having that perspective is important. I think kids changed my perspective too. You kind of don't worry as much about, about Silicon Valley nonsense and you kind of know what matters. And, and, um, but I think for the team, it's hiring, it's hiring really great people. Um, and, Talking openly about it. Right. And sort of saying like, I think good people really respect transparency. They don't want you to sugarcoat stuff. They, they don't want you to bullshit them. They, they want you to be straight with them. And the reality is startups are not a linear path. If you look at most social platforms that have eventually succeeded, they went through some messy middle period and some didn't make it and some did. And, um, so we sort of tell them, here's where we think we are. Here's what we know. Here's what we think works. Here's what we think, um, the, the, the right next step is. Um, if you disagree, like, …

AI assessment note: “I think good people really respect transparency. They don't want you to sugarcoat stuff”

Q Um, I did think, was it tempting with the Twitter offer?

A Um, I can't comment on that, but, um, but I will say that we, um, we, we, you know, we've thought a lot about how this world plays out. And who ultimately wins and what is the right to win? And I think that, um, I think what we're working on has the potential to really, really impact society in a big way. And, um, it feels obvious to me that this is going to exist. And I think the company that wins is going to be a company that is fully focused on the medium. Right. And maybe I'll be wrong, but if you look at history, that is how it has played out. New networks don't come along very often. They, they tend to happen when there's a new medium that emerges on the internet. And, um, historically the company that is focused on that medium has tended to win. Like text was Twitter, photos was Instagram, video was YouTube, and now TikTok. And I think spoken audio, talking, conversations, I think that's going to be the same. And the reasons for that are, are really tied to the fact that when I use a product, When I use it, how I use it. So much of that is a function of the medium. If I'm using an app that is short form text or photos, I usually open it. When I have 20 seconds to spare, I have two minutes to spare. I'm walking down the hallway. I'm waiting in line for a cup of coffee. I don't have AirPods in. I'm not looking to participate. The set of people who I follow are the people w…

AI assessment note: “I can't comment on that, but, um, but I will say that”

Q talk about the future, Number one reason for decline, which I often think too, is as you mentioned COVID there and the consumer behavior. We were fucking lonely. We were bored and we were isolated and we were given this drug of Clubhouse, which made us not lonely and not bored. My question to you is, was Clubhouse the COVID antidote and was it a short term consumer behavior change?

A I think that COVID is temporary, but remote living is permanent. And, um, and what you see over time is that we have offline experiences and then online compliments come and they're not as high fidelity, but they have other advantages. And over time they get better and they take share from offline and then they expand the market for it. And I think, you know, like I was saying shopping, it was Amazon and dating was Tinder and meetings with zoom. And I think. Friendship and hanging out and being with people is going to go the same way. Uh, we're a funny company, right? Like we, we tried really hard to grow slowly and, and we succeeded for nine months, right? The reason we had the invite model is because it was two of us and, and we didn't want to grow too quickly because things break. The reason we didn't do press was because we didn't want to grow too quickly. Um, you know, Six months after the series A, the company was still probably like seven of us, eight of us. And then we had a couple months where we just grew like 10 X every month. And, and, and that does a couple things, right? The first thing is it gives you two months of silly download numbers that, that everyone will compare the company to. Um, but it also stresses the system, right? That those numbers, uh, during those couple months, they looked really good on paper, but we weren't giving people a good experience. It…

AI assessment note: “I think that COVID is temporary, but remote living is permanent.”

Q Um, I did think, was it tempting with the Twitter offer?

A Um, I can't comment on that, but, um, but I will say that we, um, we, we, you know, we've thought a lot about how this world plays out. And who ultimately wins and what is the right to win? And I think that, um, I think what we're working on has the potential to really, really impact society in a big way. And, um, it feels obvious to me that this is going to exist. And I think the company that wins is going to be a company that is fully focused on the medium. Right. And maybe I'll be wrong, but if you look at history, that is how it has played out. New networks don't come along very often. They, they tend to happen when there's a new medium that emerges on the internet. And, um, historically the company that is focused on that medium has tended to win. Like text was Twitter, photos was Instagram, video was YouTube, and now TikTok. And I think spoken audio, talking, conversations, I think that's going to be the same. And the reasons for that are, are really tied to the fact that when I use a product, When I use it, how I use it. So much of that is a function of the medium. If I'm using an app that is short form text or photos, I usually open it. When I have 20 seconds to spare, I have two minutes to spare. I'm walking down the hallway. I'm waiting in line for a cup of coffee. I don't have AirPods in. I'm not looking to participate. The set of people who I follow are the people w…

AI assessment note: “I can't comment on that, but, um, but I will say”

Q And it's so funny. Bubba was like, ask him how he has so much energy all the time. I'm going to save that for a bit later in the show. I want to start with, um, basically the founding of Clubhouse, obviously a name we all know and recognize today. Take me back to that founding aha moment for you. And what was that aha moment?

A You know, Rohan, my co-founder and I have been building social apps for over a decade now. So we've been at it for a while, and we've always been interested in this problem space. You know, the first company I started was a location-based social network called Highlight that helped you learn more about the people around you. And the whole thesis behind it was that the people in our lives, the people we become friends with, the people we marry, the people we do things with, the people we start companies with, they're the most important thing in the world. Nothing affects our lives and our happiness more than the people around us. But the way that we learn about people and the way that we decide how to bring new people into our lives and get to know them is just incredibly random and inefficient. And I didn't even realize that there were thematic similarities to Clubhouse till someone pointed it out to me on the app in Clubhouse. Um, but, but we've been working on this stuff for a long time. Uh, eventually we sold highlights Pinterest and I spent some time there and Rohan was working on social apps as well. And we reconnected in late, and we sort of said, man, we've always wanted to work together. Timing is lining, lining up right now. Let's do it. What should we build? Obviously we're not going to do a consumer and social app because those things are crazy and we love them so mu…

AI assessment note: “And we started to get deeper into audio and we were looking at it”