Transferring connections from online to real-life

This page discusses transferring online connections into a real-life setting. In other words, it discusses interacting face-to-face with people you have already interacted with online.

Basic idea

After you have some experience interacting within a community online, it may be worth investigating whether these connections can be transferred to a real life (i.e. non-online) setting. For some, this type of transfer may be especially fruitful.

Here are some further considerations:

• Obviously personal safety must be taken into account.
• Some of the topics discussed on this wiki, such as rationality, effective altruism, and Quora, already have local meetup groups; see Less Wrong meetup groups, effective altruism meetups, and Quora meetups. Other potentially useful meetups can be found on e.g. Meetup.com.
• Remember that meeting up in person will become easier once one is older and can drive to meetups, live on a college campus where these take place, and so on.
  • A corollary to this is that if you are young, going to meetups will allow you to interact with older people who share your interests. This can be useful for both sides; see the questions "In what ways do you think older people benefit from interacting with younger people, besides feeling good about helping?" (Facebook) and "For high school and early college (or equivalent) students, how has regular casual interaction with people in their mid-to-late 20s influenced you?" (Quora).