(Reuters) – Audio-chat app Clubhouse and the National Football League (NFL) are teaming up to produce an exclusive lineup of programming throughout the week of the 2021 NFL Draft, the social media app said in a statement on Sunday.
The NFL will host a series of rooms throughout the week around the Draft starting from Monday, which includes a pre-Draft assessment of the prospective players, Clubhouse said.
Fans can drop in on the NFL’s rooms to follow the picks live as they are announced and listen in on discussions featuring key NFL figures from athletes and coaches to network personalities in the Clubhouse platform.
The audio-chat app said fans will have the opportunity to join the conversation and be invited on stage by moderators to ask questions or share their reactions to the Draft.
The NFL has previously worked with emerging platforms, partnering on programming with Snapchat in 2015 and TikTok in 2019.
San Francisco-based Clubhouse, which allows people to discuss varied topics in audio chatrooms, saw its popularity surge after appearances by billionaires Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg.
The early success of the invite-only, year-old platform, which recently reported 10 million weekly active users, has demonstrated the potential of audio chat services, particularly as people stay inside their homes due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
(Reporting by Nandakumar D in Bengaluru and Elizabeth Culliford in New York; Editing by Ed Osmond)
