While Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram were dominating the world of social media, seems like new face showed up: Clubhouse. This 11 months old application connects its users only with live voice chats; in other words, you literally can have a phone call with unlimited number of people who share similar interests with you. As the current pandemic limited people’s social interaction, Clubhouse nowadays is becoming a phenomenon.
The biggest difference between Clubhouse and traditional social media platforms is exclusivity. If someone who already is a member of Clubhouse does not use one of his two invitation ticket to invite you, you can never use it. Unlike the traditional social media applications that can be used by anyone just by installing the application and creating a profile, Clubhouse is thus making a new realm of invite-only social media.
This craze reminded me of two sociological concepts: hunger marketing and the inevitableness of social hierarchy.
First, let me remind you of the definition of hunger marketing. It refers to a psychological strategy that lures the customers by igniting their desire to possess or use something scarce. Because it is a natural emotional impulse for people to wish for something that their friend doesn’t, hunger marketing targets on it to encourage people to crave something rather than making rational decisions. The best example is Hermès Birkin bag. Even though a lot of celebrities like Kendall Jenner or Cardi B constantly boast their Birkins to the public and thereby most of the people know about it, Hermès only manufactures a limited quantity of bags each year in order to artificially generate scar city which will lead to peoples’ hunger. This is what exactly Clubhouse is doing. By limiting the number of invitations a person can send, a membership of Clubhouse now looks like a special status and a privilege only allowed for the selected ones. Also, when those selected ones brag about their membership and other social media, it generates bigger desires of non-members to join the community in the future by making them feel like they are running behind.
The exclusivity of Clubhouse can also prove the inevitableness of social hierarchy in our world. If we look around, there are hierarchies everywhere; bourgeoisie and proletariat; blue-collars and white-collars; lieutenants and private; and even class representatives and ordinary classmates. Because of this human tendency of creating different hierarchies in most given situations, there are some scientists claiming that social hierarchy is inevitable by nature. And in my opinion, this argument is further consolidated by the success of Clubhouse. Before the emergence of Clubhouse, social media was one of the rare things of our time that are equally open to almost everyone. If someone wants to participate, all she had to do was to create an account. That was everything needed for her to communicate with anyone, anytime, and anywhere. But now, things are different. Because the popularity of Clubhouse is exponentially increasing and those exclusive users are sharing information only between themselves, they are automatically generating a new type of social hierarchy: those who are a member and those who are not. In other words, people who have access to Clubhouse are considered higher in this new hierarchy compared to those who were not invited. Regardless of whether this hierarchy was intentionally created or not, this is definitely becoming a new hierarchy of our time.
Other than my personal analysis, there are numerous ongoing controversies about Clubhouse including privacy concerns, misinformation, and group polarization. However, no one knows how will this young platform transform as time goes on. Neither do I. Right now, I am neither for or against but probably will not be a member even though someone invites me. Let's see how it goes. Who knows this can be the next future of social media?