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Building friend catchers
- thomasfl 4y agoGreat read. Friends is the best way to achieve just about anything. One day I hope to be able to meet a friend from Moscow. Even if Russia shares a border with my home country Norway, it is impossible for us to meet in person at the moment. The russian fellow took over my open source project when I had lost interest in it.
- anewpersonality 4y agoThe new friend catchers are all on Discord.
- badcppdev 4y agoReally. I'm finding Discord has a really high surface tension. By that I mean that I bounce off servers because so often nothing interesting is happening and I can't see anything to drag me back
- langsoul-com 4y agoPretty hard to find friends on discord, join a server that's too popular and it's like a twitch stream. Join one too small and no one talks or quickly runs out of topics. The best ones might be activity centred discord channels, like translating mangas. But, at that point, discord isn't the friend catcher anyway.
- est31 4y agoI know what you mean, many discords fall into either category. But there are discords that are in the sweet middle ground. Also requires time investment on your part though because you won't make friends by just lurking and never interacting.
- alimoeeny 4y agoHow do you find this subset of discords? I mean most of the ones I hear about are from creators promoting their servers and by definition they’re too busy and chaotic. Any pointers?
- whoibrar 4y agoMost sub-reddits also have a discord of their own, also do many of your favourite products and services and sometimes these are nice places beyond the marketing shills. One of my favourite servers which I later joined as mod is Tools for thought [0] (15k+ members) which is a space for discussing new tools, productivity, workflow, help with tools and similar stuff. https://forthought.tools/ https://forthought.tools/
- est31 4y agoYeah those aren't great. There are discords that are specific to topics, like your favourite hobby. Then you need to find one that doesn't have too many, but also not too few people. They will be filtered by hobby I guess.
- whoibrar 4y agoSimilar to any other medium, Discord Servers for nieche interests where there is an incentive to go back (semi regular events / activities) are better than anything else mentioned above. What makes discord better medium - Ability to have single / threaded chats - Multiple channels (#general #help #more-nieche) - Instant transition between voice and text channels - Able to screencast (watch content together, explain understand better) - Stimulating being together, not necessarily talking (music channels, work together channels)
- lysecret 4y agoMet my previous co-founder and now one of my best friends through the Machine Learning reddit talking about Using Embeddings for medical Diagnosis codes ~2017. So I can attest to "putting yourself out there".
- throwaway290 4y ago'The beginners guides to everything have already been written' -- strong disagree... there's always space to write for somebody who is getting into something for the first time. Any beginner's guide is someone's advanced topic, and vice-versa.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- 0xferruccio 4y agoAuthor here, happy to see this got picked up!
- simonebrunozzi 4y agoCiao Ferruccio
- 0xferruccio 4y agoCiao Simone, it feels meta to have you reply here! I think I've seen your name many times on HN, and a bunch of times on posts I shared :)
- simonebrunozzi 4y agoThat was the intention! Maybe we'll meet IRL in a decade or so :)
- TomSwirly 4y agoI was enjoying it, until we got to Peter Thiel, a particularly horrible person.
- jrm4 4y agoLoved this, your opener reminded me of a personal shift I decided recently. Because I have had family in politics, it had always floated around as an option, so for some time I was subconsciously like "let me muzzle myself on social media as if I may run" and today I've decided something like the opposite, "let me actively insure that I'm always able to say what I want by doing that now and if it cuts me out of something, then I probably never needed to be there."
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- rozenmd 4y agoMore on friendcatchers here: https://www.swyx.io/friendcatchers https://www.swyx.io/friendcatchers
- swyx 4y agohaha thanks for the shoutout. i definitely owe @patio11 some inspiration on this and despite people's cynicism on this page it has changed my life. just met a 5-year long mentor of mine who I've never met 1:1 before, and he knew about the friendcatchers I left out there because of the impact/word of mouth they have had.
- meowtastic 4y agoI really want to believe in this, but from personal experience it hasn't worked out. I used to spend a lot of time posting frequently on LinkedIn, nothing came out of it. Maybe I didn't try hard enough, maybe there's survivor bias in the success stories, who knows.
- CalRobert 4y agoLinkedIn probably isn't a great choice. Randomly, have you looked for local groups that share an interest on Slack or Discord? There's an Irish Tech Community slack, for instance, where I've made many friends (real life ones too!)
- meowtastic 4y agoI tried Slack and Discord groups, but they had too much noise.
- dewey 4y ago> I used to spend a lot of time posting frequently on LinkedIn Maybe it's just the people I have added on LinkedIn but it always strikes me as a very superficial place and not the one for deeper connections or discussions about projects. Twitter on the other side seems to be more promising (at least in my case).
- hobofan 4y agoI'll throw in Reddit into the mix. For deeper discussions about projects, it has a way better interface than Twitter, and also as a "newcomer" you have way better chances if you pick out the right communities. One other factor is probably also frequency of posting. While my posting cadence of "something interesting" every few months works well for Reddit, that's not something that gets people to follow and engage with you on Twitter.
- meowtastic 4y agoI got a few really good exchanges on Reddit. But I always feel weird reaching out to people directly afterwards, I feel the platform isn't made for that.
- 4dregress 4y agoCan can attest to this, a small random alt hip-hop forum in the early 2000's changed my life because of the people I met on there. Met some people from the forum, started making music, going out to clubs etc. 20 years later not only has my life been shaped by those encounters so have many other people who know me!
- freddref 4y agoAnd from the other side, I've had good success reaching out to people in response to something posted on the web. An email only takes 5 minutes, and it can lead to a life-changing new friend, project and business.
- bigDinosaur 4y agoSome people here seem to be talking about them as in making actual friends, but it's more in the sense of a friendly party (e.g. followers who have gratitude due to something you've provided for free) rather than the kind of traditional friendship experience we actually have one on one conversations with. https://twitter.com/search?q=from%3Apatio11%20friend-catcher&src=typed_query https://twitter.com/search?q=from%3Apatio11%20friend-catcher... just worth noting.
- 0xferruccio 4y agoAuthor here, I think a lot of the examples I made are friends for life! The projects I started working on with strangers are mostly dead, but I still meet up and spend a lot of time with a handful of them. Even the example I made of Francesco and Fabrizio are of people that met online serendipitously and now have been business partners and friends for almost 10 years
- rozularen 4y agoI don't know, I think your dad's advide is pretty spot on? Just that it isn't mutually exclusive with the fact that IF you want to be recognized by the content you put up, you'll have to associate your name with it. I started surfing the web in the early 00's when I was like 3 or 4 yo so it sticked to me the whole nickname thing way before asking for First Name and Last Name, cell phone, ID number, street address was the norm (depending on the service ofc)
- bgdkbtv 4y agoYeah righto mate, you started browsing the web when you were 3?
- krageon 4y agoWhy is that weird? I recall starting videogames around that time, and if the internet had been easier to access I probably would have been on there as well.
- yourusername 4y agoMost 3 year olds can't read.
- krageon 4y agoThe statement was "<year>, when I was 3 or 4 years old". I took that to mean it was closer to four, which is not that weird of an age to be able to read. Or at least I thought so, until I looked it up. I guess it is pretty unusual.
- poisonarena 4y agoWhen I was 4 years old I was playing mac games on Mac OS 7 I think..
- 1123581321 4y agoChildren who can’t read browse the Internet using visual cues (bookmark buttons, suggested sites, sometimes recent site autocomplete, etc.) All mouse or trackpad based. It’s obviously limited and from my observation, they have no idea they’re missing so much.
- giantg2 4y agoI don't think I've ever met someone online and later met them in person. Except for dating sites. It seems more difficult to make friends the older I get. I think at least part of it is that everyone is so busy.
- jagged-chisel 4y ago> More difficult to make friends… For me, it’s intolerance. I have a low threshold for bullshit, the (intentionally?) inarticulate, and stubbornness in conversation. I’ve kept some friends. We’ve physically separated, but we stay in touch and meet in person. Making new ones is indeed challenging.
- Cilvic 4y agoWhat interest me the most is whether old friends would actually pass today's low thresholds (which seem to get lower over time in my case)
- otikik 4y agoHi, I clicked on your recent comments (they are public, btw) and saw that you worry about low human interaction and also are interested into killing hornets as well. I couldn't help but pattern-match to this video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TUlxth701GM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TUlxth701GM I am not that into killing hornets right now, but I will be moving to the countryside soon. I might hit you up later this month to talk about killing them, if that's alright.
- saiya-jin 4y agoMoving to a new location triggers interesting effect in many people - they shed their social fears and laziness and try to socialize more. Living in a hub that attracts many such folks gives one an endless stream of people that are looking for friendship, consciously or sub-consciously. The drawback is, long term retention is not high in such a location. Its not nice to see people with whom you connected so well leave. But its endlessly better than some stale rural place where you either have really close people from childhood/school years, or you are pretty lonely.
- fbanon 4y agoI've met my best friend on Last.fm 16 years ago. I still cherish that initial PM from him that said: "want to exchange music?".
- EZ-Cheeze 4y ago
- mikewarot 4y agoI've been online forever as MikeWarot or KA9DGX, depending on username requirements. It has served me well for finding stuff I found interesting in the past. Now that I've met another Mike Warot, who live(d?) in London, via the web, that might not be quite as useful as it was in the past.
- langsoul-com 4y agoNiche activities or are always the best friend catchers. As it automatically filters out anyone not interested. Anyone who does chat would immediately have a common interest. Because it's niche, there tends to be original or unique ideas, making connection easier. That being said, you can't hide your identity and sing it loud and proud to any and everyone. My blog is anonymous so there's no friend catcher effect.
- Cerium 4y agoAgreed. A number of years ago I started a small hobby business in a niche. It has been a great friend catcher.
- moviewise 4y ago"Finding new interests and joining others in play is certainly one way to stop feeling lonely or misunderstood." From: Movie Wisdom On Making Friends https://moviewise.substack.com/p/movie-wisdom-on-making-friends https://moviewise.substack.com/p/movie-wisdom-on-making-frie...
- dncornholio 4y agoI've been in multiple communities under a fake name. Every birthdate I entered online is always 01-01-1970. I don't think you were being rebellious, you were the complete opposite! I've met people IRL from Finland, Lebanon, South Africa, basically all over the world, who I met online. Sometimes I would introduce my real name only when we met IRL. Not using my real name has not held me back from meeting new people, online or IRL.
- nottorp 4y agoFunny one. I've met IRL a guy who I've been playing Minecraft with on a private server for years recently. I was driving near his area so I took a detour, visited him home and we chatted for like an hour. We totally forgot to exchange real names :)
- egypturnash 4y agoEverything described in this history could have happened just as easily if he'd posted everything under the name "Raver Tomato". Aliases give you the option of more easily disassociating things from your legal identity, as well as making it harder for people to find all the embarassing shit you posted when you were a teenager.
- tartoran 4y agoThat’s what I was thinking as well. Using one’s real name adds the possibility of that being used against you as well as feeding spammers and other nefarious actors.
- pwinnski 4y agoHis experience would also likely have been very different had he been a she, in which case "raver tomato" would have been much preferred.
- egypturnash 4y agoYEP
- 0xferruccio 4y agoThe core message is “The internet is great at organizing information and making you find things you like. If you express your true interests, like minded people will discover you.” If you prefer using an alias that’s totally cool!
- dncornholio 4y agoWondering if this is some state-sponsored post to prevent people entering bogus information online. Everything in this article is true, except the "Lesson learned"
- egypturnash 4y agoIt’s not as if corporations haven’t had their own reasons to push for “real names” to make tracking easier.
- tpoacher 4y agoI'm with dad on this.
- daveslash 4y ago"Another way of doing it is by sharing polarising, unconventional ideas you have. These ideas will repulse those that are close minded towards your ideas and attract more people like you." This is absolutely true, regardless of the medium - but the internet allows you to do this at scale. If you have an unconventional idea, it makes sense to try to seek out the few like minded people with whom you can discuss. However, in today's world I would be very cautious of encouraging anyone of building their own echo chamber. It's one thing to go against the grain and seek out like mindedness; it's another to live in an echo chamber.
- antonymy 4y agoThis reads like satire.