Discord has propped up my social life for years now. And I mean outside of the internet as well! I also engage in independent, more traditional social engagement and it usually ends in nothing more than a hangover.
Not unexpectedly, the internet makes it easier to bring people with similar interests/believes/personalities together. There’s also some weird demographic issue where apparently the internet is the only place where people my age seem to exist. I meet a ton of people irl m, mostly much older, with some only several years younger or several years older. In the past year for example, I’ve met maybe 2-3 people who were within a year of myself.
Also I often find myself mindless swapping discord channels or refreshing HN or Twitter constantly, when I’m bored and want to talk/argue/whatever, typically at night.