To add to your point about meetups, I don't think there's been a better time to start an IRL tech meetup in a long time. The local tech scene in the SoCal area

To add to your point about meetups, I don't think there's been a better time to start an IRL tech meetup in a long time. The local tech scene in the SoCal area has definitely not been the same since the pandemic, and I recall a few threads on HN with remarks about how local tech meetups didn't come back. If someone can't find a meetup in their area, they might as well start one and have a good chance of getting networking value out of it.