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Comment by gfxgirl | Hacker News Reader

I would argue the issue is there are only so many people talented at this particular skill, "making a meet up that works" and so it doesn't scale.

There are all kinds of issues. Setting an agenda. Getting people to follow the agenda. Fostering conversation. Finding venues. Getting the right mix of people. I've been to so many meetups where these kind of issues were not handled well.

If you just want random people you can go to a bar. If you want "like" people it's much much harder.

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Victorian etiquette was on to this. You need social market makers who are skilled at knowing a lot of people, introducing them to each other, starting conversations based on common interests and butting out when no longer needed. Formalizing this process would help to some extent, technology could help with remembering names, interests, and whether people have been introduced. Somebody could build this, gamify it and make money all day long if they did it right.

I’ve been thinking for a while that this is needed too. This is a big role that priests play in communities.

If I were to start something up, it would start with a clubhouse and probably two employees—one is an event organizer who plans parties and other special gatherings, and the second would be a host/hostess that is responsible for welcoming new members and ensuring they’re comfortable as they try to fit in. Maybe something like an “onboarding partner” would work too when you’re trying to scale.

The problem with any idea in this direction is that someone ends up having to deal with all of the toxic people, and in this market, there are a lot of them.

In my experience the toxicity you're talking about doesn't usually carry through to in person gatherings. Most people have at least some manners even if they are awkward and being in a group face to face adds social pressure to mind them. It's fairly rare that you see someone who is a complete boor since they are usually excluded from gatherings due to their behaviour. To make something like this work you'd need to leverage all of that cultural machinery that's already in place, networks of trust and reputation, consensus, expectations of politeness, etc. We still have all that social technology that's been built up over millennia, I think we're mostly just lacking the hubs around which we used to organize. Build the hub and people will provide the etiquette.

> In my experience the toxicity you're talking about doesn't usually carry through to in person gatherings. Most people have at least some manners even if they are awkward and being in a group face to face adds social pressure to mind them. It's fairly rare that you see someone who is a complete boor since they are usually excluded from gatherings due to their behaviour.

I think in-person power dynamics are often not immediately obvious, and "inclusive" groups sometimes make it worse.

For example, cases where the inclusion of someone who's socially awkward lead to the self-exclusion of some other people.

Someone's social awkwardness could lead them to constantly stare at people they find attractive; the leaders or organisers of the group might be too nice to exclude said person, since they didn't do anything criminal like harass people, just awkwardly stare at them; and other people might choose to self-exclude themselves because of this.

If the goal of attending gatherings of new people is to expand your social circle then you'll inevitably run into a lot of people that you don't like. A product that enables people to host and attend these events would have to account for such faux pas and gaucherie, maybe having a way to pass anonymous feedback to others at the event (moderated by the hosts first of course) so you could politely inform people that their staring is making people uncomfortable. My thoughts on the initial concept were along the lines of a way of automating not just introductions but also learning how to interact well with others, providing structure to those interactions that people usually fumble through and hopefully avoiding or lessening situations like the one you mentioned.

It’s a real role that’s hired in the Jewish community. Both to encourage in-faith marriages and to foster a sense of community. Usually one person for teens, another for young adults, and others for men’s club, woman’s club, newly parents, retirees...etc

It’s generally funded by synagogues and charity foundations.

I’d of thought the Christian churches/denominations have similar programs.

It could be unique to Jews due to historical and present anti-Semitism. E.g. Jews were (and still are in a few establishments) barred from many fraternities, country clubs, athletic clubs, summer camps...etc

Making it a paid position is a great idea, it provides incentive for the person to do their job well and adds some status to it. I'd like to see this idea carried over to other groups since it's done so haphazardly everywhere else or added on as a soft skill for people in other roles where they either have it or they don't. Is there a name for this role? I'd be interested in knowing more about it.

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