In some ways it’s easier. In my 40s I was meeting ppl online and one mentioned that she knew my name, where I had gone to university, and from those starting points learned a lot about me. Not enough to sustain more than a few dates but at least she knew I was not a convicted mass killer. And nowadays reverse image search and such means you can scope out your prospective date’s background.

Around the same time I met my now wife online and it turns out I knew several of her neighbours (she knew them all), had visited some of them, yet she and I had never met. So community cred isn’t automatic.

And I have friends who met in a bar 30-odd years ago, both who were there alone. So…?