Clubhouse is the new secret, invite-only social app that’s all the rage these days; but you’ll have to join a waiting list

With hundreds of social apps out there, you may be wondering why we need another one. The reason is that people are always looking for the in-thing, something new and different. In addition, some people are tired of crowded social platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Instead, they are looking for a private social platform where they could share things with friends and family.

Unless you’ve been hanging out on social media over the past few months, Clubhouse is a new secret and invite-only social app you’ve probably never heard of. Clubhouse is the new app that everyone is talking about, and it’s growing really fast!  In less than one month, the app grew from over 600,000 users in December and is now expected to cross the 1 millionth user mark in just a few days.

Launched less than a year ago, Clubhouse allows users to spontaneously join group chats. You chat in real-time, share stories, collaborate and bounce ideas off of each other using voice without the need for additional software or device. Clubhouse describes itself as:

“a space for casual, drop-in audio conversations — with friends and other interesting people around the world” that allows users to “go online anytime to chat with the people you follow, or hop in as a listener and hear what others are talking about.”

Unlike other popular social platforms like Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, Clubhouse is built on exclusivity. So you need to have a solid reputation before you are allowed to join.

Clubhouse was founded in March 2020 by Paul Davison and Rohan Seth. Just two months later, the app was already valued at around $100 million despite having just 1,500 users at the time, according to a report from CNBC. The clubhouse’s still in beta but Silicon Valley is already going crazy because celebrities and high-profile venture capitalists are promoting it.

Today, Clubhouse announced today it has secured a new round of funding that will, among other things, let them open up the app to more users. The round was led by Andrew Chen, General Partner at Andreessen Horowitz; Chen apparently also led Clubhouse’s Series A. Clubhouse also announced that it will start to support content creators with new payment features

“Our focus now is on opening up Clubhouse to the whole world. With that goal in mind for 2021, we have secured a new round in funding, led by Andrew Chen at a16z, who also led our Series A. It’s always been important to us to have investors who care deeply about diversity, and who will work hard to help us make Clubhouse a welcoming and inclusive community. We now have over 180 investors in Clubhouse—large and small, spanning many different races, genders, and areas of expertise, and including many members of our early community. While we’ve never felt that fundraising itself is a milestone, we wanted to share how we plan to use these funds to make the product better each day and to help creators on Clubhouse thrive.”

So, who is using Clubhouse? The app is big with celebrities. Everyone from Ashton Kutcher to Oprah is talking about the app. Clubhouse platform is also a goto place for celebrities to host chats.