The reason Clubhouse didn't have staying power is that there its value proposition is hypocritical, and therefore doesn't work: On Clubhouse, it only matters who's talking (for example, Elon). It doesn't matter who's listening. The more important the speaker is, the more it is a one-to-many broadcasting platform, and the less it matters if it's live. That makes it as useful as podcasts, which is already a saturated space.
Even if I take your first statement to be true, I'm not sure the rest of the comment follows. If we look over at video content livestreaming is popular (and increasingly so). Why have companies like Twitch been successful enough to be bought by Amazon rather than losing to YouTube or similar? Is there something special about audio that video doesn't have?
Yeah, audio is better suited for hands-free interaction, pseudo-anon interactions (which might be helpful for strangers talking to each other), much lower bandwidth requirements, etc. The ergonomics of audio is better, as there is no need to stay in frame. It also focuses the conversation more around what is being said rather than being distracted by someone's environment.
