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Show HN: Meetup with other travelers in a new place
- rscnt 5y agothis looks dangerous.
- sgt 5y agoBecause everyone will go to Bulgaria?
- imgabe 5y agoThis is really cool. Added a profile. Happy to meet anyone passing through where I live.
- alkonaut 5y agoLove the idea. I also think the manual approval is a key factor here. I wouldn't expect this to work without it (sadly). But with some delegation it could hopefully scale even though it has a manual element. Social networks full of bots and trolls are 13 to the dozen, but there is a real chance to make something really useful if it's based on manual vetting.
- NKosmatos 5y agoNice idea, nice execution but I can see it going downhill. I sympathize with the idea/intention but it feels like a dating site. On top of that there are some privacy concerns. Kudos for the clean design, speed and ease of use of the page.
- deepstack 5y agoJust like couch surfing, anything like this will become a dating site. Usually people who knows how to travel don't need sites like this, and they can meet interesting people where ever they go. Instead sites like this it would be better to find a seasoned traveler and learn from him/her.
- danieltait 5y agoI used to rely on my hostel to meet other travelers in a new place, but now I stay alone in airbnbs so I can work during the day. I’ve found this to be a lot more isolating so I’ve created a map where I can add my profile and explore if there are any other travelers nearby to meetup with - https://travelfriends.xyz https://travelfriends.xyz It’s pretty basic but would love some feedback if any of you would use it? My friends liked the idea and a few of them have added their profiles. I’ve also asked the local hostels to post it on their boards because I thought it could also be a nice way for shyer people to meet others in their hostel. What do you think?
- ricksunny 5y agoGood luck! I always miss the travel experiences of meeting temporary friends for a hike or urban exploration. Even for staying in very loose touch on facebook afterward it's not the same thing; There's something to be said for the ephemeral-yet-genuine quality of these kinds of serendipitously shared travel experiences.
- Tepix 5y agoLooks great, i hope it catches on!
- danieltait 5y agoThanks!
- hutzlibu 5y agoI think it is nice and I hope it stays nice, but I would predict, that quality will drop a lot if it goes viral. I mean, there are pictures and contacts of real women in there. That approach works bad with certain parts of the internet. But this part is usually not leaving their basement and goes travelling, so I hope it catches on with the right people and stay nice at least for a while.
- h0l0cube 5y ago> that quality will drop a lot if it goes viral One thing I liked about Couchsurfing that I think could have potential is the concept of vouches. You can only vouch for someone once you've received enough vouches. That along with with references provided a good way to quickly gauge the character and trustworthiness of a person. To gain vouches and references you had to have invested in the community. Not perfect, but often good enough. Couchsurfing also had volunteer community safety ambassadors, but I think less people seem motivated to do that kind of thing these days. I think a lot of the oldschool Couchsurfing moved to BeWelcome and Trustroots
- elbajo 5y agoLove the idea! I've been using Couchsurfing for many years and tried their "hangout" feature a few times. It's 95% males harassing traveling women that happen to log in but the 5% left can be great to meet and I've had great experiences. Hopefully you find a way to navigate away from that even as you get more users.
- hutzlibu 5y ago"95% males harassing traveling women that happen to log in but the 5% left can be great to meet" That sounds like a general description of way too many internet communities, too.
- alisonatwork 5y agoBasically, this. For some reason any kind of "meetup" site always seems to end up having this undercurrent of being a crypto dating site. I wish there were sites where people could sign up for hanging out that were 100% guaranteed platonic. It's so exhausting to have to try filter out that weird dating/sex dynamic apparently shoehorned into everything outside of work.
- RealityVoid 5y agoI think that's impossible. The crypto dating undercurrent is basically life. Even at work, depending on the age of those around you, it's still there. Of course, the older people are, they have better odds of having families so the feeling fades, but I think it never truly goes away. Anyways, I love the initiative and would love to see it catch on, I love communities like this, but, to be honest, as much as I like looking at them from a distance and admire them, I'd probably be too busy to properly participate in them.
- hutzlibu 5y agoThat people are also having sexual desires is normal and allright with me. But when it becomes the dominant topic everywhere, it is a problem. Solution is hard of course, with so many singles out there. But I was also single for a long time and as far as I know, I did not harass any women in that time. So it might partly also still be macho thinking, that women are there mainly for sex. It might be even only a small minority doing it, but some aggressive machos can be enough, to destroy a whole community, or make it mostly male. So moderation will be key. "Report user" Etc.
- 123anonanonanon 5y agoCan I add a profile for the place I live? I can show you arround.
- danieltait 5y agoNice idea! Adding an option now
- danieltait 5y agoAdded now!
- karthikkolli 5y agoUsed to use nomadlist for this. Probably share it on their slack[1] to see it helps them. [1] https://nomadlist.com/chat https://nomadlist.com/chat
- nvilcins 5y agoProps for YYYY-MM-DD
- taneq 5y agoShould be yyyy-MM-dd :P
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- gigatexal 5y agoWell this is an interesting twist on modern dating/hookup apps. Using the guise of travel friends is hilariously smart.
- thih9 5y agoWhy do you assume this project is about dating/hookups?
- taneq 5y agoMaybe we're both just too cynical because my first thought was "meet up with strangers in an unfamiliar location, sounds like great fun for anyone tired of having both kidneys."
- danieltait 5y agoGreat to see some randoms have posted! Thanks everyone. A few more posts and you'll get to see if my dodgy pagination works lol
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- tarkin2 5y agoThe 3d rotation on the map is really unsettling. Surely you'd only need to span and scale it?
- journeynepaladv 5y ago[flagged]
- crhutchins 5y agoIt would be great to improve the website more, as the buttons and text fields are a bit out of place.
- jmacd 5y agoThere was an app in 2007 called Dopplr. [1] It was part of the wave of new social networks that were to (and did) change how we use software. It was actually really useful and I met many people through it that I never would have otherwise. I count many of them as friends to this day. "meeting random people and being curious about them and become friends" is a bit of a superpower in your 20s IMO. It's something I, usually by choice of venue (sleep early, eat properly, etc), don't do any more. It happens a bit with friends-of-your-kids when you get to that stage of life, but the factors of who they are become much more constrained to certain things like schools, neighbourhoods, programs, etc. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dopplr https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dopplr
- crawl_soever 5y agoGreat concept. A few pointers: - The map select seems to spazz out when I pan and zoom, often panning far greater distances than I intended. - Maybe support something like Gravatar for profile images so you don't have to upload if you don't want to. - I am impressed that I can mostly use this with NoScript enabled! I don't just get a white screen whin I disable JS. I always give sites a +1 if they can support some sort of non-JS fallback. More sites need to do this instead of the blank page dark pattern
- personjerry 5y agoFYI after some nomading I have learned that after Meetup, the Couchsurfing app is the second best way to meet people.
- hutzlibu 5y agoThe best way would be directly meeting them in real life? How outfashioned.
- camc0m 5y agoHave you found a good way to see good places to work in various cities?
- alhirzel 5y agoLong time couchsurfer here; I am sad that it is withering as a community, but it is still full of very good people.
- _august 5y agoI switched to https://couchers.org/ https://couchers.org/, they are just starting out but already have many members who switched from CS after they started asking for a monthly subscription.
- randomopining 5y agoIs couchsurfing still good? I thought it died hard once they made it pay to use. But I still get a good amount of couch requests from younger people, so maybe it came back en vogue. I did it in 2014-2018 and it was awesome. I heard pre-2010 was even better.
- pydry 5y agoIt would be better if this was less of a "dating" site and was set up as a way for groups of people to find additional people or groups to link up with for specific activities. The annoying part of, say, organizing a hike or boat trip and the part that an app would help the most is not necessarily finding people but reaching out and getting the various kinds of commitment from people you barely know when you want to share costs, share cars, sharing taxis, a boat trip, a guide, etc. Meeting people is way more fun organically and and I would tend to avoid apps for that (or use tinder, i guess, but ick) but if there are 8 of us who want to share $320 for a one day boat trip and somebody you just met drops out the day before... that's where IMHO the pain and profit potential lies. An app that takes deposits, sets deadlines for commitments, finds replacement people, etc. that I could share with somebody I'd met organically that helps deal with people's inherent flakiness OR finds replacement people - I'd use the hell out of that. And, you'd have taxi drivers, boat trip organizers, hiking guides, etc. clamoring to join too once it reached critical mass coz the economics of their services often only work if they've got groups of tourists of a certain size. Unfortunately in its current form this basically looks like a tinder equivalent with "just looking for a travel partner" written as your description with zero chance of reaching critical mass.
- globular-toast 5y ago> It would be better if this was less of a "dating" site I think that's the point. "Travelling" (and others like "finding yourself" etc.) is essentially synonymous with no strings attached sex.
- MimiKG 5y agoLightbulb: an app to help travelers stuck at the airport meet each other so they can share the cost of a rental car when their flight gets cancelled. (I've shared a cab with a fellow traveller so we could catch a train when our flight got diverted.)
- SOLAR_FIELDS 5y agoI carpooled with a fellow traveler who lived in my city when our flights got cancelled at Midway and we picked up the same outbound from Indianapolis. The friendship eventually fizzled but it was a great experience during and for the few times we hung out after.
- azarovalex 5y agoDid you hide the Mapbox attribution in the corner of the map on purpose? Most likely it's a violation of the User Agreement.
- danieltait 5y agoThanks for the flag, fixed now
- Mikeb85 5y agoNot going to lie, when I travel I specifically try to stay away from other travelers and meet locals. It's fun to hang out and party with other travelers, but you don't really learn anything about the country when you do that. The country you're traveling in gets reduced to an amusement park for you and your fellow travelers. Meeting locals and getting a feel for life in the country is IMO slightly deeper. That being said, obviously the amusement park model of travel is a thing, hence guided tours, all-inclusives, parties catering to travelers, etc... Also this app low-key feels like a hookup site.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- Emma_Goldman 5y agoI think this over-states the case. There's a lot of reasons to meet up with other travellers. Unlike locals, they are free in the weekdays and often don't have any fixed plans, and want to - yep - travel. Travelling with other people is usually more fun than by yourself or just with one or two others. Also, depending on where you visit, travellers are often very internationally diverse. It can be a great opportunity to meet a highly cosmopolitan cross-section of people. The fact you're with other people doesn't mean you can't meet and interact with the local people and culture. It's also possible to spend time with travellers one day, and locals the next day. The point is they're not mutually exclusive.
- thehappypm 5y agoYeah, it’s fun to talk to a local, but they’re not gonna want to take the subway across town for that pizza you saw on Instagram.
- notahacker 5y agoTo be fair, they might have a better recommendation for food somewhere that puts more emphasis on cooking than their social media game. And be prepared to travel a long way for the novelty of foreign company sometimes. Then again, they might also take you somewhere they haven't been to before either because they're convinced it'll impress you more than the dive bar or McDonald's they usually meet their friends at, and sometimes the cheesy backpacker bar is more fun than both. Sometimes the cheesy backpacker bar has more local people in it than the reputable local restaurant too!
- jb1991 5y agoIf I understand correctly, all messages you send to another member are actually read and approved by the app’s creator, which sounds very strange.
- josefrichter 5y agoI guess most people have trouble meeting locals, it's not so difficult to meet fellow travellers. For meeting locals it's good to attend local meetups. For meeting travellers, you can just go to any coworking center.
- MimiKG 5y agoWhere is a co-working center in Irvine, CA?
- josefrichter 5y agoHow am I supposed to know? I'm in Europe. I don't even know where Irvine, CA is. But I bet you have Google there.
- odiroot 5y agoA word of advice: I'd eliminate photo avatars to reduce the creep factor. Go for symbolic ones or something like Apple's custom emojis.
- giantg2 5y agoYeah... I think this could be end up being easily misused and abused.
- pelagicAustral 5y ago`overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y:auto;` suits better on those description boxes.
- tristor 5y agoAs someone who has extensively traveled both in groups and solo, this looks like a hookup app. This is not something I would have used back when I was traveling. What I'm most interested in seeing while I'm traveling is a way to organize things with people who I may not see the next day to help do things like get commitments on time/place, shared costs, etc. Right now it's a spreadsheet, apps like Venmo, and luck if you want to plan something out with someone else who's also a traveler. Folks who live a nomadic lifestyle tend to be rather mercurial, so I know it's a tall order to expect technology to address the social issue of people flaking or not following through, but that's the biggest challenge of group activities with other travelers in my experience. As for meeting individuals, I don't see the point of trying to specifically meet other travelers unless it's for hookups, and if that's your thing you can just stay at a hostel and hookup with random people, that's essentially what hostels are for. The only way this type of app makes sense other than hookups is if it's intended for groups to meet other groups and plan shared activities.
- intrasight 5y agoI think it is in fact a hookup app
- corwinstephen 5y agoIt seems like some people on here are into the idea and would use it. That's cool, but for me personally, I'm amazed that anyone is still into this kind of thing in 2022.
- ruph123 5y agoInteresting behaviour when you right-click and drag the map around, neat!
- wayoutthere 5y agoIsn’t this what hostels are for? Not shitposting at all; the organic aspect of it is why I stay at hostels well into my 30s.
- mnd999 5y agoWAYN (Where Are You Now) had the same idea. They eventually got bought out by lastminute.com and shut down.
- gdsdfe 5y agoas with any app where you get to meet new people, how do I make sure I'm not meeting a serial killer? at least locally in my city I have some sort sense of which neighborhood is safe, etc. but in a completely new place ??
- Yuletidez 5y ago
- icemelt8 5y ago
- erezsh 5y agoLooks like a great start. I'd love to see a feature that says where travelers are going to be, not just where they are. Also, a list of interests / desired activities, so I can see what we have in common.