Year: 2021

Clubhouse: The Honeymoon Is Over

Clubhouse users are unhappy
(Photo by Andre Hunter on Unsplash)

I have been listening, off and on, to various rooms on Clubhouse, yesterday and today, and to me, it feels as if the wheels are starting to come off the bus.

A brief recap of recent drama that has erupted on the social audio app includes:

1. The Black woman, introduced a month and a half ago at one of the company’s townhalls as the new face on the Clubhouse app icon (which they rotate regularly) who was, without any explanation, replaced, causing a high degree of controversy within Clubhouse’s Black community that is still ongoing, despite Clubhouse’s rather ham-fisted attempts at damage control;

2. The Clubhouse Creator Program sent out mass rejection emails to all 5,000-odd unsuccessful applicants yesterday, leading to many rooms full of salty people discussing and digesting the news, and speculating as to who the successful 60 shortlisted applicants were (the speculation is rife, with a good dash of hearsay and gossip);

3. After announcing a brand-new partnership with the NFL, an ex-NFL player who hosted the most popular NFL room on Clubhouse discovered that his club name and logo were abruptly removed without notice, and the company forced him to change his club name and logo.

In short, the staff at Clubhouse can’t seem to do anything lately without inciting drama and ill will among its user base. Many people have commented that the treatment of the woman in item 1 and the man in item 3 above was particularly shabby. Clubhouse can’t seem to put a foot right lately; perhaps the hyper-charged growth over the past 13 months has led to problems within the company?

The singular strength of Clubhouse (the ability for users to spin up rooms at will, to discuss, debate, and argue about any topic) is leading to the platform’s worst nightmare: a user base that is angrily accusing Clubhouse of being tone-deaf and ignoring them. The content creators of Clubhouse are, by and large, feeling betrayed.

Between its increasingly unhappy userbase, and competition from Twitter, Facebook, Discord, and many other companies that are now planning their own drop-in audio apps, things are suddenly not looking quite as rosy at Clubhouse as they were only a couple of months ago.

Vanity Fair magazine, in an April 23rd, 2021 article titled The Clubhouse Party Is Over (archived version), says:

“I think the app is changing. People may spend an hour or two on there instead of six straight hours. It feels more like people will tune in for programming occasionally, as opposed to using it as an online community to cure the loneliness of quarantine,” one super-user of the platform told me, who still loves using Clubhouse, but also now sees its limitations. “The app still has the rare ability to put you in direct contact with people you look up to. However, it also now feels like home to more chaotic, polarizing conversations—that make it feel like ‘audio Twitter.’” The user added that the platform has become “a bit of a cesspool of racism and anti-Semitism and shady marketing groups.” For some people, that actually might sound like a fun party—but for most of us, it sounds like an app that deserves to be lingering in the bottom of the app store.

OUCH. Will Clubhouse survive its growing pains? Stay tuned!

UPDATED! Pandemic Diary, April 26th, 2021: You Can’t Fix Stupid

Hundreds of mostly-maskless, non-socially-distanced Manitobans crowded the grounds at The Forks in Winnipeg on Sunday, April 25th, 2021, in protest of COVID-19 restrictions (Source: Global News)

Today is official Day 376 since I first began working from my home for my university library system on March 16th, 2020. Today, and every Monday (at least until the government announces a third lockdown which I feel is inevitable), I am working in my office, weeding the reference collection of the agriculture library, which remains closed to faculty, staff, and students until further notice. I am making slow but steady progress in determining what to keep in reference, what to move to the circulating collection, what to upgrade to a full-text electronic version, and what to throw away.

Yesterday, hundreds of Manitobans gathered to protest the current COVID-19 restrictions at the Forks in Winnipeg, next to the Canadian Museum of Human Rights. Global News reported:

Hundreds of Manitobans gathered around The Forks on Sunday, rallying against COVID-19 restrictions.

Most protesters could be seen without masks and not social distancing while dozens of signs were posted in the ground surrounding a podium for speakers.

…

Clare MacKay, vice president of strategic initiatives and executive director of The Forks Foundation, told Global News on Friday the group was not granted access to the space.

“We have not been asked for, nor would we be in a position to grant, permission for this group to be on site,” MacKay said.

The Forks closed its doors Sunday afternoon due to safety concerns surrounding the rally.

You can’t fix stupid, people. And this pandemic has certainly shown us all just how many stupid people there are here. I have zero sympathy for these idiots, who are putting themselves and their contacts at risk. Here’s video of the event:

These protesters will soon have even more to complain about. This afternoon, the Manitoba government announced a new series of public health orders. The new restrictions, starting April 28th, 2021, and in effect for at least the next four weeks, include the following:

  • Zero visitors to private residences, either indoors or outdoors (except for one designated visitor for those people who live alone);
  • Indoor gatherings are prohibited, and outdoor gatherings are limited to a maximum of 10 people in public spaces;
  • Outdoor restaurant patio dining is restricted to a maximum of 4 people;
  • Food courts in shopping malls must close;
  • Retail stores will be restricted to 25% capacity or 250 people, whichever is lower. Shopping malls will be restricted to 25% capacity (although how they are going to enforce this part in malls with multiple entrances is beyond me);
  • Church, synagogue, and mosque services will be limited to 25% capacity or 10 people, whichever is lower, and mask-wearing is required;
  • Gyms and fitness centres will be limited to 25% capacity, and all gym users must stay at least 3 metres (9 feet) away from each other.

I’m very glad I visited my mother and stepfather on Sunday, and brought some home-baked cookies as an early Mother’s Day gift; it looks like we will not be getting together for Mother’s Day this year.

In my opinion, the incremental approach of the Manitoba government is simply not good enough at this stage of the pandemic. The majority of new cases are coronavirus variants of concern, most of which have been shown to be more easily transmissible, and some of which make younger people sicker. Lacking any domestic vaccine production, we are still far, far behind the U.S. and other countries in our vaccination program. Under the circumstances, I feel strongly that non-essential retail stores, churches and gyms should be closed completely, as they were last November during our second wave, in order to bring the number of new cases and deaths down to as low a level as possible (the so-called “zero COVID” approach taken by the three Northern territories and the Atlantic provinces here in Canada, and in countries such as Australia and New Zealand).

The government says that they are trying to avoid a full shutdown, but I predict that they are going to be forced to implement one anyways, as cases and deaths increase. They are promising to crack down hard on people who are flouting public health orders, but they’ve been saying that all along, with little evidence of success. For example, the premier stated that some of the people who attended Sunday’s rally were issued tickets, but he had no specifics (you’d think he would have gotten that information before the press conference today).

There just seems to be a whole lot of stupid going around, both in a government that is too timid to take the necessary bold steps to halt transmission in its tracks, and in a populace who are getting lazy, rebellious, and non-compliant after more than a year of restrictions.

Under the circumstances, the best that you can do is to take care of yourself, STAY HOME as much as possible, and listen to the doctors and the scientists.

Stay home, people! (graphic from the City of Vancouver)

UPDATE April 28th, 2021: Chris Sky, who spoke at the Winnipeg anti-mask rally on Sunday, was arrested after speaking at a similar rally in Thunder Bay, Ontario. And apparently, only two people were fined as a result of the Winnipeg rally (the tickets come with a $1,296 fine).

Pandemic Diary, April 25th, 2021: There’s Many a Slip ‘Twixt the Cup and the Lip

Twitter CFO Ned Segal’s chocolate chip cookie recipe makes delicious cookies, which are very, VERY bad for my blood sugar! 😉

I have had a fairly productive weekend ensconced in my apartment. I made tuna casserole, baked chocolate chip cookies from a recipe provided by Ned Segal, the CFO of Twitter (we got to chat in a Twitter Spaces room recently), worked my way through a mountain of dirty dishes, and finally cleaned my kitchen counters. I also worked on a presentation I will be giving at the iLRN 2020 virtual conference, tentatively titled Herding Cats: Developing a Taxonomy of Metaverse Platforms (Social VR and Virtual Worlds), which must be submitted to the conference organizers by May 10th. I’m also working on moderating a May 29th panel discussion for the Educators in VR UniVirtual Experience conference, which will be taking place on various social VR platforms during the month of May. I’m quite busy!

I’m glad that I am so busy, because otherwise I would be consumed with worry about the latest twists and turns in the coronavirus pandemic, both close to home and far away. I have been following the increasingly grim news out of India, which has been setting daily records in the number of new COVID-19 cases and deaths. The chart of the seven-day average for cases and deaths in India is starting to turn vertical! The following charts are from the Daily Mail:

I have seen interviews where some expert say that the official figures may be too low by a factor of ten. The healthcare system in many Indian cities such as Mumbai and New Delhi is already on the verge of collapse, and the peak of the current wave is not expected for another two to three weeks! I fear that we will witness the first country to be utterly overwhelmed by the coronavirus, to the point of a complete breakdown of Indian society. Things are not looking very rosy in Pakistan, either. Canada has already suspended flights from both India and Pakistan, but the coronavirus variant suspected to be behind this unprecedented surge, named B.1.617, has already been identified in the Canadian provinces of B.C., Alberta, Ontario, and Quebec.

Meanwhile, here in Manitoba, stubborn premier Brian Pallister has resisted a rising chorus of calls from scientists, doctors, and Manitobans to enact a full shutdown now, before things get out of hand here. CBC reports on an open letter sent to the premier by 37 current and former Manitobans:

Author and gynecologist Jen Gunter, former Olympian Clara Hughes and kids’ entertainer Fred Penner are among a group of 37 well-known Manitobans and expats urging Premier Brian Pallister to take more action to stem the third wave of COVID-19.

In an open letter, the signatories urged the premier to enact tougher restrictions now or risk prolonging the pandemic.

“We watch in alarm as our province is led directly towards the same fate as Ontario, where some of us are now living and watching an unfolding humanitarian disaster,” the letter states.

“The attempts to stall the inevitable broader scale provincial shutdown for as long as possible appears to amount to a calculated decision to allow an increased number of Manitobans to become sick or die in order to keep a number of non-essential services operational.

“This approach has been shown to prolong the ultimate period of closures and is actually more harmful to our community via virtually every meaningful metric.”

Ontario has already declared a provincial emergency, locking down the province until May 20th, and closing its borders with Manitoba to the west and Quebec to the east to non-essential travel (the international border with the U.S. remains shut since March of 2020). Hospitals in many provinces, including Ontario and British Columbia, are at the breaking point, reporting that the newer coronavirus variants are making younger people sicker. Ontario has gone so far as to transfer sick hospital patients out of the Greater Toronto Area to parts of the province which have been hit less severely, like Northwestern Ontario, in order to free up beds for an anticipated surge.

So it is surreal to hear many Americans talking as if the pandemic is almost over, about a return to “normal” by summer. There is an English saying: There’s many a slip ‘twixt the cup and the lip. Most countries outside of Israel, the U.K. and the U.S. still have not vaccinated most of their population, at a time when coronavirus variants of concern are spreading much more quickly. Although vaccination programs have made some good progress, there is still a lot that could go wrong.

Stay safe and stay healthy!

To Teleport or Not to Teleport: Teleporting Versus Walking in the Metaverse

Ever wish you could teleport in real life?
(Photo by Chris Briggs on Unsplash)

Earlier this week, I had a guided tour of the blockchain-based social VR platform Somnium Space, where I was informed by my tour guide that the virtual world had just implemented teleporting. Scattered throughout the one large, contiguous virtual landscape which comprises Somnium Space were teleporter hubs, where you could pull up a map, click on the teleporter hub you wanted to travel to, press a button, et voilà! You were instantly transported to your destination.

A teleporter hub in the central city square of Somnium Space (at night)
The red arrows indicate the location of teleporter hubs on the map

What makes Somnium Space unusual among metaverse platforms is that you cannot simply teleport from one place to another distant location; you either must make use of the provided teleporters, or walk/run/fly/swim to your destination. (Of course, you can certainly “short hop” using a limited form of teleporting, but that is only for shorter distances, not for instantly getting from one end of a large, contiguous landmass to another.)

In other words, the teleporter hubs of the Somnium Transportation System are set up much like a modern urban subway system, where you can only travel to a particular, pre-built subway station that is situated the nearest to your intended destination, and then walk the rest of the way. Many people might remember that in the very earliest days of Second Life, there were also teleporter hubs in the days before avatars could instantly teleport themselves from one location to another!

Another thing that sets Somnium Space apart from other social VR platforms is that there are only going to be so many “public” teleporter hubs. In face, some of these hubs are going to be auctioned off as NFTs (Non-Fungible Tokens), and the successful bidders with such a teleporter hub on their properties will be able to charge a cryptocurrency fee in order to use their teleporters! (In other words, they would operate much the same as a real-life toll road or highway.)

Closely intertwined with the idea of teleporting vs. walking is the layout of a metaverse platform. Is it one large contiguous landmass, like Somnium Space, Decentraland, Cryptovoxels, and (to a certain extent) Second Life? Or is it a collection of smaller worlds, like VRChat, Rec Room, Sansar, and Sinespace? If it is the former, then means of transportation (and ease of access to transportation) becomes more important. If it is the latter, then another tool which many of the newer social VR platforms offer is the ability to create a portal—either temporary or permanent— between two worlds. (Of course, you could consider a teleporter hub a portal.)

So, keeping all this in mind (particularly the distinction between SHORT HOP teleporting and teleporting to a DISTANT location), we can create a chart outlining the transportation affordances of the various metaverse platforms:

Name of Platform (Layout)Walk/Run? *Distance
Teleport?
**		Create Portals? †
Second Life (mostly one contiguous landmass, with private islands)YESYESYES
Sinespace (separate worlds)YESNOYES
Sansar (separate worlds)YESNO (but you can create teleport hubs)YES
VRChat (separate worlds)YESNOYES
Rec Room (separate worlds)YESNOYES
AltspaceVR (separate worlds)YESNOYES
NeosVR (separate worlds)YESNOYES
Cryptovoxels (one contiguous landmass with some islands) YESNO (you can add coordinates to a URL, though)YES
Decentraland (one contiguous landmass) YESYES (/goto X,Y)NO
Somnium Space (one contiguous landmass)YESNO (but there are teleport hubs)NO (unless you count teleport hubs)
* – Can a user walk/run/fly/swim from one location to another? This includes SHORT HOP teleporting.
** – Can a user personally choose to teleport from one location to a second, DISTANT location?
† – Can a user create a temporary or permanent portal from one location to another?

Obviously, all metaverse platforms offer some form of personal locomotion for your avatar (walk, run, fly, swim, short-hop teleporting, etc.). This is standard.

It is also clear from this table that the metaverse platforms which consist of many smaller worlds (Sinespace, Sansar, VRChat, Rec Room, AltspaceVR, and NeosVR) all prefer the creation of temporary and permanent portals to allowing users to teleport great distances on their own steam. On the other hand, all the social VR platforms and virtual worlds which consist of one contiguous landmass tend to allow some form of teleportation across great distances.

You will notice that Cryptovoxels uses a rather brute-force method of “teleporting”, which consists of appending the coordinates to the end of the URL you enter into your web browser client (which are much the same as the coordinates which form part of the SLURLs used in Second Life, but not nearly as convenient in my opinion).

Transportation affordances are yet another way to classify metaverse platforms in my continuing effort to create a taxonomy of social VR platforms and virtual worlds.

So, what do you think? Have I made an error in my table? Do you have an opinion about the benefits of teleporting and portals versus walking around and exploring the landscape? I’d love to hear your opinions, so please leave a comment, thank you!