Some say “finally someone found something like this!” he will say. Others, on the contrary, will bemoan and exclaim that “this is the last thing we missed,” because if there is one thing the new social network AirChat will probably produce, it will be completely polarized comments.

And this will provoke them for the simple reason: Users broadcast voice messages on AirChat. The platform has just emerged and is invite-only, but perhaps that’s exactly why it’s become the new social network the entire tech world is talking about.

The idea was put forward by Naval Ravikant, co-creator of the investing platform AngelList, and Brian Norgard, Tinder’s chief product officer. The interface is a sort of mix of Twitter (X) and Instagram, showing a vertical flow of blocks of text and images with a very special component: they are (probably) not written by users.

In fact, these texts These are transcriptions of voice messagesBecause that’s exactly what the platform does: It takes voice messages and then converts them into text so it can be read. Logically, any user can also listen to them, and the beauty of the service lies precisely in the mix of voice messages that have been successful on platforms such as WhatsApp (which will soon allow them to be converted to text) and the text that is preferred for many. It comes to consume thoughts and ideas.

The tool is not used to know what this or that person is saying while we’re not looking at the phone, but instead “to see what’s going on around you right now,” Ravikant told Bloomberg. I compared it to when you’re at a house party and you sneak in on the conversation. “It’s like having a house party in my pocket.”

The tool is receiving a lot of attention in the media, but the number of downloads is quite low for now: according to Sensor Tower, the tool has been downloaded more than 45,000 times since its launch in mid-2023.

So almost a year has passed; AirChat at your fingertips Due to the technological landscape, however, the recent popularity of voice messages, which WhatsApp will allow to be automatically transcribed, seems to have triggered interest in the offer.

This interest has also spread among investors: OpenAI CEO Sam Altman “almost blindly sent a check,” Ravikant admitted, adding that Altman was not involved in the development but was confident that the use of artificial intelligence that transcribed these voices was necessary. The messages piqued his interest in the idea.

The debate on AirChat is very reminiscent of the debate that once took place on the ClubHouse platform. allowed you to create voice chat rooms in which one or more “speakers” can discuss a topic while the audience listens and eventually even participates. The project is losing steam: Last year it halved its staff and became a traditional messaging app.

Time will tell whether the excitement around AirChat will get the app and the platform off the ground. A stream of voicemail messages waiting to be heard (or read) can be striking if they are interesting and spark a good discussion; However, as we said, the idea is ultimately very similar to the one proposed by ClubHouse and has resulted in its spread.

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