Ask HN: Where did all the meetups go? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Where did all the meetups go?

35 pointspeterlk32 comments

I stopped attending meetups as frequently some time around 2018, and am interested in hanging out with humans again. Perhaps I'm still too soon given COVID, and I know that meetup changed their business to wipe out a bunch of meetups, but when I look now, I'm having trouble finding in-person meetups for technical topics. Is there a new place where people are scheduling these events?

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In the case of my city (Indianapolis), I have found that many meetups are now coordinated on specific Discord servers instead of meetup.com. There are probably other places I'm not aware of where others have moved to. The result is that in 2022, it's probably best to search for meetups via Google rather than relying solely on meetup.com.

What kinds of meetups have you found in Indianapolis? Pretty curious what the tech community is like there.

indyhackers.org has a calendar with most of the tech meetups in Indy. The tech meetup scene hasn't yet fully recovered to it's pre-pandemic levels, but it's improving. I've been thinking about starting a general Indy Tech meetup for people in the tech community to socialize and meet. Today, most of the meetups I go to are non-technical, like those organized by the Indy Social discord:

https://www.indianapolissocial.com

Are you based in the midwest, too?

I hope to see more pure virtual ones like one I started on software internals this January [0]. Means anyone within a few timezones can present and attend and there's no hassle finding a physical space. Of course you miss out on chatting and free pizza but I think it's awesome to be able to get speakers from anywhere in the Americas.

The only hazard is zoom-bombers. Don't make your zoom link public or you'll have weirdos join.

[0] https://meetup.com/hackernights

Can’t you accomplish the same thing asynchronously via YouTube?

All these talks are recorded and published on YouTube afterward so sure?

Not sure what you mean.

I mean that if you only want to watch the talks from the comfort of your home without conversation, then why attend a synchronous meetup? Why not watch YouTube instead?

Because the point of meetups isn't to just hear lectures.

Have you attended virtual ones which "work" in that regard? I've been to a few and to be honest discussion dies out nearly completely.

Sort of depends on what you're looking for. To me, the best value of a meetup or conference is meeting individuals and having one-on-one or small group conversations, as well as being able to hang out with people after an event. When I've hosted meetups, I usually get together a group of people to hang out at a pub down the street after the event. It's both fun and good for networking. Fake "meetups" will never ever fulfill that. Can a fake "meetup" work for honest discussion? Yeah, I've even hosted ones like that. It doesn't mean I think they're optimal that way. A fake "meetup" still necessitates that everyone participates in a single conversation and that not everyone gets enough of a word in.

I really don't have anything against virtual meetups. I'm really more against the idea that they are equivalent or superior.

> Of course you miss out on chatting

I spoke at a virtual meetup recently and it was awful. The talks were fine and interesting, but the "meetup" aspect was missing. What's the point of an event that could just as easily be a YouTube video?

To be fair, I've been to meetups that are exactly the same. People walk in, sit quietly, nobody talks, someone does a presentation, people look around at each other, maybe eat a slice of pizza, and leave.

The point being that whomever is hosting an event, whether online or IRL, needs to take some initiative to make it a good event and put some structure in to welcome people and encourage engagement. That is easier in person, but can be done either way.

That doesn't speak for every meetup. I've been to plenty of tech meetup where people talked and had fun. Even when people are being introverted, at least there's the opportunity for people to have their own conversations. With virtual "meetups", you can't have one-on-one conversations, and that sucks. And good luck networking at a virtual "meetup" if the crowd is big enough that you can't get a word in.

Chat functions and breakout rooms are getting more common in virtual meetings all the time. I agree that in-person is easier, but if you don't know how to use the latest features in the tools to communicate, I recommend learning those tools first, before rejecting all possibilities.

I can't speak for everybody, but for me, virtual meetups feel more like work meetings than any sort of social activity.

Yeah, I don't get that mentality.

Actual meetups come with a huge advantage of being able to have one-on-one conversations with people who may be able to hire you. I've gotten a few jobs and contract work because people knew me from meetups and conventions. I don't buy it when people say fake "meetups" are just as good. When I hear someone tout fake "meetups", I'm hearing a person who hasn't networked.

Here in the SF Bay Area some meetups have resumed in-person events, but I'm not attending them yet. I still attend lots of online ones. People aren't going to offices as much, which is where many meetups used to be held, so we've probably permanently lost a lot of those in-person meetups that no longer attract enough people to make it worth it.

I kind of feel like that era is also over. Tech, start ups, and the ruby community used to be really fun. People were genuinely excited to do the meetups. And I'm sure some people still find it to be, but it feels to me like most of that energy is gone, even before the market crash. And I certainly don't see it getting more energized from here any time soon.

Who knows, maybe I changed more than the communities.

For technical topics I agree with everyone else that they've moved online; probably not Zoom or whatever other video things, but more text based chat rooms to facilitate technical discussion. Depends on the tech, I guess.

One thing that confounds me is that physicality-based meetups in my region have moved entirely online and show no indication of changing despite miniscule chances of disease. Look, I didn't join a yoga meet-up group to spend half my time trying to focus on my 13" laptop screen while balancing on one foot. I didn't join an escape room group so that I can play a shitty $3.99 Android game together while staring at everybody else's faces on a 13" laptop screen. I didn't join an animal husbandry experience group for us to sit inside and talk about what we did or will do.

Remote is not the future if you move beyond the bits. Disease is not a factor unless you're too feeble to be doing some of these things to begin with. This exaggerated fear shit needs to stop.

Hmm. I wonder what could have happened recently? A mystery that will forever go unsolved.

Meetup introduced a reservation fee, so people looked for alternatives. This happened almost at the same time COVID-19 broke out.

Meetup’s $2/RSVP Charge Looks Set to Trigger an Exodus https://techmonitor.ai/leadership/strategy/meetup-charges-rs...

Not a fan of meetup but there’s no reservation fee in place. You can host free meetups like you always could.

I’m in two meetup groups that have regular meetings and attendees pay nothing.

IIRC they backed down but it was too late already. Competitors such as Event Brite had already eaten their lunch.

I have been organizing meetups since last August. Initially we are purely online- mode through Zoom.

Starting May this year, we tried out the Hybrid mode - in-person meetup for people who miss the deep engagement (and perhaps free pizza ;-)) and are comfortable to show up, while broadcasting the sharing and discussion live - and the past three events turned out pretty well.

Location: SF Bay Area. Meetup group: https://www.meetup.com/bay-area-cloud-native-database-meetup...

Discord and Reddit! It's great not to have to interact with people on person or carry on a conversation beyond 1-2 sentences if you don't want to. Meetups with prerecorded talks are also great, because I can just watch them later, instead of a specific time, in some arbitrary specific place.

Good question - I definitely noticed not a ton of activity on that specific site

Knowing generally where you're located may help in getting suggestions.

I keep paying for its subscription but not able to host one. unless hosted at a brewery it is difficult to get people to show up! Beer is the new Pizza.

> unless hosted at a brewery it is difficult to get people to show up! Beer is the new Pizza.

I went to Ruby on Ales once for that specific reason. I'd gladly make the drive again to Bend should RoA make a comeback.

I have noticed the same thing in portland, or. Finally found one or two, and we'll see how it goes. But nothing like what it used to be.

Pretty difficult with covid still rampant, yet onlines still come handy!

In-person events aren't really happening where I live (Seattle).

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