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I one of the organizers of a meetup called Coffee and Code in Toronto, Canada. We used to be a bi-weekly meetup in cafes pre-pandemic. After the pandemic starte

I one of the organizers of a meetup called Coffee and Code in Toronto, Canada. We used to be a bi-weekly meetup in cafes pre-pandemic. After the pandemic started we moved online to a weekly Discord. We still posted the meetups on Meetup and now attract an international audience. 2 years later we are still going. Now that restrictions are lifted in Ontario we will be going back to in-person meetups and probably by the end of the month we will be posting them on Meetup. I am optimistic that we will be able to bring people back.

MrWiffles 5y ago
Comparing this to some of the other comments, I'm jumping to a conclusion here, and doing so to see if you agree with this thinking - It sounds like your success can be attributed to, at least in significant part, having a strong/sticky "base" BEFORE the pandemic started. Would you agree/disagree that? More applicably to guiding the OP here, would you say that if you guys DIDN'T have that sticky base of attendees that you'd be as well-off or even around at all post-pandemic? In other words, was it just popularity that got ya'll through (obviously you and yours did all the work, not saying otherwise!), or can you point to something else that the OP can replicate? Again, not at all to "throw shade" at you here, just trying to see if your outcome is a reasonable expectation, and how applicable/likely it is for the OP, especially given the wide disparity in outcomes mentioned by others. Either way I'm happy to hear your meetup is doing well!
- ToddWBurgess 5y ago
  No offence taken. We do have a fairly regular group of core users that are usually there. Of course this core group will change with time given life commitments and other things that come up. Not uncommon for regulars to disappear for a while and show up later when life permits. Something we have discussed about our longevity is early on we decided against using webcam meetups. All our meetups are voice only. I had a lot of feedback from people early on they preferred the voice only meetup. Now almost 2 years later, we question if this decision allowed us to avoid the webcam fatigue that most other groups seemed to suffer. It probably doesn't hurt we are in Canada's biggest and hottest tech hub.
mysql 5y ago
Can't wait to see the meetup back in person.

MrWiffles 5y ago

Comparing this to some of the other comments, I'm jumping to a conclusion here, and doing so to see if you agree with this thinking - It sounds like your success can be attributed to, at least in significant part, having a strong/sticky "base" BEFORE the pandemic started. Would you agree/disagree that? More applicably to guiding the OP here, would you say that if you guys DIDN'T have that sticky base of attendees that you'd be as well-off or even around at all post-pandemic? In other words, was it just popularity that got ya'll through (obviously you and yours did all the work, not saying otherwise!), or can you point to something else that the OP can replicate? Again, not at all to "throw shade" at you here, just trying to see if your outcome is a reasonable expectation, and how applicable/likely it is for the OP, especially given the wide disparity in outcomes mentioned by others. Either way I'm happy to hear your meetup is doing well!

ToddWBurgess 5y ago
No offence taken. We do have a fairly regular group of core users that are usually there. Of course this core group will change with time given life commitments and other things that come up. Not uncommon for regulars to disappear for a while and show up later when life permits. Something we have discussed about our longevity is early on we decided against using webcam meetups. All our meetups are voice only. I had a lot of feedback from people early on they preferred the voice only meetup. Now almost 2 years later, we question if this decision allowed us to avoid the webcam fatigue that most other groups seemed to suffer. It probably doesn't hurt we are in Canada's biggest and hottest tech hub.

mysql 5y ago

Can't wait to see the meetup back in person.