Meeting IRL. LOL. OMG!
Going to SXSW in 2000 by myself, only knowing a couple people in real life, was a huge thing for me. I mean, there I was, introverted geek spending what little money I had to go half way across the country to Texas (my first time in that state) to speak on a panel about weblogs in a big room full of people. I was sharing a room with a woman I never met and I was about to meet 50 people I'd never met but knew everything about their lives. It was surprisingly fun and weird, because you'd meet a stranger and 30 seconds later talk like old friends since you knew so much about each other.
MetaFilter meetups were kinda like that, but they're always weird because I never have any idea what people are like outside of the site so it's a total crapshoot.
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And you were the first person I met in Austin and then we got together with Robert and went to dinner at Jazz and we all laughed and laughed and life was good and we all learned how to smile again.
Yeah, how awkward was that to walk to meet a couple people you've never met before, but after a couple minutes of icebreaking, everything was grand?
Brad, it was definitely a highlight to meet you there and it served as a perfect introduction for the week, as every other first meet kind of followed the same pattern.
I wonder if someone starting their first blog in 2006 would ever get to experience something like that?
I've always loved this picture even though I wasn't part of it. It seems to capture those first meetings "IRL" so well and how cool they can turn out.
I remember that's when I met most of the blogger people outside of Seattle. I was hanging out with jjg and rcb a lot of the time. Maybe I met you there as well. Any idea?
I know that's where I met ya, Jessamyn, but not until the final day at the closing party. Remember?