Ask HN: Do You Socialize Offline?

I perform open mic stand up comedy two nights a week. Made a lot of great non-tech comedian friends. I also go to in person tech meetups too to make some tech friends.

I live in a pedestrian friendly city (Taipei) which helps, here's some general tips for meeting new people:

1. Get roommates. Not for everyone, but moving in with two other people even though I could afford my own place made it really easy for me to jump into their friend circles quickly.

2. Meetup.com, Eventbrite and similar sites. Just pick a couple of things you’re vaguely interested in (for me it was language exchanges, salsa dancing, board games, and startup meetups) and show up every week. Even if you’re shy, you’ll naturally start chatting to people after a couple of events.

3. When you meet a couple of people, make your own events and invite them. E.g. If you meet someone at an event who likes rock climbing send them a text the next day saying “Hey, I’m going to a new rock climbing gym on Wednesday, do you want to meet me there?” Once you invite people to a few things they‘ll start inviting you too.

Does all this take effort on your part? Yes. But its worth it. And you’ll get better. I was bad at this when I was in LA, but after working on these skills I built up a friend circle in Taipei (arguably harder because of language barriers) within a couple months. Good luck and don’t give up!

No, most of my friends are old enough to be killed by the plague, or the latest variant of it. We'll be meeting online forever, I fear.

If the plague actually does end, I might join PS:One in Chicago again. They've got a Tormach I'd like to get to know. Even better is the community of interesting folks to make cool stuff.

I exclusively socialize offline. I like to be alone for my online work. Completely immersed without distractions.

I am quite nomad, spending several months in random cities around the world, so socializing is important as I can’t rely on just building a circle of friends.

- I volunteer in things related to kids education

- I eat outside my home twice a day, I often put up a piece of paper saying I am willing to entertain a conversation

Quite often, people will just come and sit at the table and we will chat. Often we exchanged contacts and meet later

An old friend talked me into getting back to gaming (RPG) a few years ago, we still meet weekly in the mornings, just three of us presently. There were a couple larger instances but COVID squashed that for now. Our "city" is rural sprawl so most people drive or carpool to the friends' house.

I think if participants have a desire and commitment to form a gaming or social group geography will be secondary.

Precovid pandemic, yes. Coffee shops, music gigs, gaming at the local gaming cyber cafes, board games at semi local shop, meetups for coding, meetups for electronics.

PostCovid, no, occasionally I'll go out to a meal by myself, but lots of places closed or are empty.

In cities it is generally easier. The bigger the better. Much more possibilities. It's independent of pedistrian friendly or not imo. But, having a nice or expensive car is a magnet. Even in pedestrian friendly cities.

Yes. Going to Friends’ houses. Yes.

It’s difficult to get started if you haven’t already, though. A good way is to volunteer, since you inherently need to socialize to volunteer in person generally.

Well, my favorite pancake place got shutdown so there's that. Like another comment said, the pandemic is making it slightly harder to socialize.

Absolutely if you aren’t socializing offline after 2 years of the never ending pandemic then perhaps socializing isn’t a priority for you.

Haven't seen much need to socialize outside my family.