Facebook Tests Hotline, a New Clubhouse-like Q&A Platform

Facebook starts testing clubhouse-like hotline

Post-obit the massive popularity of sound-based social networking platform Clubhouse, we have seen numerous companies start work on a similar feature for their platforms. So now, Facebook has started testing a new Q&A-based service dubbed Hotline, which looks similar a combination of Clubhouse and Instagram's Live feature.

Facebook Hotline

Developed past the New Product Experiment (NPE) team at Facebook, Hotline is a make new platform to host alive events with a big audience. At first glance, it looks to be similar to Clubhouse and allows creators to host audio-based live events with their audience. While Clubhouse is designed for coincidental sound-conversation experiences, Hotline is more of a professional platform with some additional features.

UI and Features

For starters, unlike Clubhouse, Facebook'south Hotline offers live video support for the event host as well as the listeners. Besides, for current tests, users will need to sign in with their Twitter accounts and and then verify their IDs via SMS to access the platform.

The UI, when viewed on a smartphone, looks similar to the interface of Clubhouse and Twitter Spaces. The screen is divided into two sections – top (speakers) and bottom (listeners) on smartphones and left and right on a desktop. Moreover, the listener department is further divided into two sections for those who are just listening to the conversations and for those who are asking questions.

Listeners can ask their questions by typing on the platform. Other listeners can and so see the asked questions at the top of the listener section and fifty-fifty upvote or downvote them. The issue host can then await up to the section and choose a relevant question to answer. This is something that is missing from Clubhouse and other similar platforms.

At present, the event hosts have complete control over the user experience. This means that hosts can add or remove guests during a live event. They can also bring a user to the "stage" expanse for a one-on-one conversation. As of now, the guests are represented by their profile pictures when brought "on stage". However, there is an option for listeners to plow on their camera from the settings card which is currently dysfunctional.

Another significant difference between Clubhouse and Hotline is that Hotline automatically records the live outcome and presents them to the host equally an MP3 and an MP4 file at the cease of the events. The creators can then share the recordings or clips of the recordings to other social platforms. Information technology is something that is not present in Clubhouse.

Hotline is not bachelor to global users yet. The NPE team at Facebook recently started testing the platform and Nick Huber, a popular real manor investor was the beginning one to publicly effort information technology out. As per Facebook, individuals like Huber, who aid others to expand their professional skills and finances, represent the target market for Hotline.

"With Hotline, we're hoping to understand how interactive, live multimedia Q&As can help people larn from experts in areas similar professional person skills, just as information technology helps those experts build their businesses," said Facebook in a statement.

Availability

The platform is currently out every bit a public beta for users in the US. It is currently unavailable here in India and shows the same if you go to its official website.

However, if the platform garners enough users over the course of fourth dimension, there is a loftier adventure of Facebook launching Hotline in the global market. It might become a pretty useful tool for professionals and experts to interact with large audiences from their homes amidst the ongoing pandemic.