I'm from UK and the same is true here. People make friends by doing things together, and spending time together doing similar activities, e.g. working in an office, playing football, going to school/uni together. Finding someone random to be friends with online is just plain wierd. I feel like this kind of 'hook-up' friendship is more acceptable in the US, especially SV.
In British culture we are only just getting over the social stigma of internet dating, and it is starting to become more widespread for people to be proud of meeting their spouses online, but meeting friends online is still a social hurdle, and arguably, less efficient than just turning up to a local football club.
Hopefully she can quit her job and still maintain her friendships - but people also tend to compartmentalize, and without something like a common job, there isn't necessarily a compartment for her anymore.
I am not talking about merely needing to do something together to meet new people. I'm not talking about going down to the court and asking random people to shoot some hoops, and basketball being the pretext. I'm talking about "we need to work together or have met in some context where it was clear that we had stuff to do other than make friends with each other". There might not need to be a pretext after a friendship is established, but you sometimes need to get over that hurdle.
Saying you like hiking and snowboarding on a friend meeting site will never get you anywhere. Go to the mountain. Join the Mountaineers.