Tag Archives: VoIP

Goodbye Clubhouse!

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Clubhouse was fun for us in the UAE, at least for a couple of weeks

The buzz came and went faster than you can say ‘two-shot vaccination’. Clubhouse has been the invite-only app that everyone has been talking about, at least iPhone users (the application isn’t available on Android phones, yet). The app, which is audio-based and is designed around the idea of creating rooms where people can listen in to speakers in a talk-radio format (think a live stream but with no video), has proved to be wildly popular in the Gulf.

Some users have likened Clubhouse to the early days of social media, where people were open and discussed anything and everything. Eman Hussein wrote a very good piece on how Clubhouse is giving a voice for people to discuss a myriad of socio-political issues in a way that hasn’t been possible for years. Others have speculated that the app would soon be banned or be eroded by fake accounts and trolling.

I’ve loved the application, and the ability to listen in and engage in talks and debates, both scheduled and on the fly. You can find rooms by interest, follow friends and colleagues, and be as involved or as uninvolved as you want. There are talks about current affairs, social issues, and even silence (which is very handy if you’re living in Cairo). And there were also a myriad of PR possibilities for the platform, which made it so exciting.

Sadly for me and all my friends in the UAE, you won’t be able to use Clubhouse. The service has been throttled to the point that the audio is, frankly, inaudible. Have a listen to the below (and Omar is on a 5G connection, which is going to be faster than my wifi).

I don’t know the reasons why this is happening. I assume it’s due to the UAE’s VoIP laws, which requires any application that uses voice over the internet to be regulated (in theory, you can call another individual via Clubhouse, but that’s not really the purpose of the application). Have the country’s networks deemed that Clubhouse is an application whose performance should be reduced to the point that it’s unusable? The only way that the application can be used is via a VPN, which is also not ideal.

It’s a shame that this is happening; Clubhouse looked to be such a fun place to hear others and hold group chats. And it doesn’t help the region in its goal to become a technology leader. But anyone who has lived here for a while knows how these things are (we can’t use Facebook messenger calling, for example). Ah well, anyone up for another WhatsApp group chat?

The Real #EtisalatChallenge – Where are the eGlobe Cards?

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Do you know about the eGlobe card and where to find it? Is this the real #EtisalatChallenge?

Do you know about the eGlobe card and where to find it? Is this the real #EtisalatChallenge?

It’s Gitex week, and its technology time. For those of you who don’t know Gitex, imagine tens of thousands of people talking about hardware, software and all things geeky. But I digress.

We’ve had our little bundle of joy and we’ve been lucky enough to have another addition to the family this month. To help her feel at home, we wanted to buy phone cards so that she could use the landline and she’d know how much she’d spend each time she’d call home (why not a mobile you ask? Well, landlines offer better voice quality, more stable connections and are usually cheaper).

After a little bit of research and a lot of shop visits, we realized that the VoIP calling cards which were being advertised at the start of the year by the two phone companies Etisalat and Du, Five and Hello! respectively, were no longer on sale (though you’d be hard pressed to find an announcement in the media).

Instead, Etisalat, the UAE’s largest phone company, was offering on its website a solution called eGlobe. To quote:

Use your prepaid, disposable Calling Cards for services such as recharging and renewing your Landline Prepaid (Maysour) account, Home Country Direct calls, Prepaid Internet, eVision pay-per-view, Hotspots, and more, in addition to national and international calls from any phone.

All well and good. But where can one buy them?

Buy Prepaid Calling Cards at
• Your nearest Etisalat Business / Service Centres
• Supermarkets, grocery and convenience stores, other outlets

So off I went. To the first store, where the response was, “What?” Ok, it’s a small store. Maybe they’ll have the cards at the local Co-op here in Abu Dhabi. “No, sir. We only have mobile recharge cards.” And then, after calling up the help line and getting no where, I marched off to the Etisalat shop, where, after ten minutes, I finally spoke to someone who knew about the eGlobe cards. “We have them with a chain called Fatima Stores…” So, off I went to the Fatima Store behind Dana hotel in downtown Abu Dhabi.

After walking around for a while, I finally found the shop. And what happened? “No, I’ve never heard of eGlobe cards.”

As the Thursday afternoon and evening passed me by and having driven, walked and talked in circles all of the afternoon and the evening, it dawned on me. What I had written about a couple of months back was a hoax. You launch a product on your website, and yet you tell none of your staff about it or sell it through your traditional distribution channels. It’s almost like one of those impossible game shows where the odds are rigged forever against you. The eGlobe card is the original, the true Etisalat Challenge.

Are you up to the task of finding the eGlobe card?