I wrote this paper for a class at university in 2002 that relates to some of what you're saying: https://web.stanford.edu/class/symbsys205/facetoface.html https

I wrote this paper for a class at university in 2002 that relates to some of what you're saying: https://web.stanford.edu/class/symbsys205/facetoface.html https://web.stanford.edu/class/symbsys205/facetoface.html It's funny to read now because it predated social media for the most part. When I say social networks in the paper it's a theoretical concept which we might call a "social graph" now. I didn't mention it in the paper but that class also introduced me to the concept of Dunbar's number (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunbar%27s_number https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunbar%27s_number) I guess I'd TLDR it this way now: Internet connections are weaker than in person ones but they probably still take up a slot in your social graph. That graph is probably capped somewhere around 150. So it's not super surprising that when you freed up some space by disconnecting from the internet communities, you felt compelled to fill it back in with people in physical proximity with you. It's a cool personal experiment and it would be interesting if it could be replicated more scientifically.