Show HN: Meet people, have more conversations about what truly interests you

23 points

2 years ago

Hi all, Andrew here. I hate smalltalk[1] but love deep conversations and want more of them, for myself and for others. This is why I made pairup.social. It's a conversation-finding and friend-finding app based on the things you'd most like to talk about. Sure, you have your friends, colleagues and family you can talk to, but it can be hard to go deep on your unique interests. Finding and reaching out to people on the internet is possible, but in practice I find I don’t really do it that much. It’s a bit awkward. If I found them on a single-topic discussion group, I don’t know much else about them, including other interests or even if they’re open to meeting people at all. None of this is impossible to overcome, but there's enough friction to mostly stop me from doing it. The goal of this app is to make this easy enough that it actually happens.

How it works:

1. Install the iOS or Android app. Sign-in can be deferred until after you’ve tried it out.

2. Add a bunch of links to capture what you are interested in at the moment. These can be links to accounts you follow, communities you've joined, books, movies or podcasts you love, causes you support – anything really. Your links/interests simultaneously describe you to others and enable the app to match you to people with overlapping and compatible interests. Your combination of links can be incredibly specific and nuanced but also very easy to build and maintain (try it!)

3. Complete your minimal profile: one picture, a name, optional bio, and locations you spend time in (if you want to emphasize local matches). Your interests are already a great way to describe you, so this kept very simple.

4. Fuzzy matching occurs. People with overlapping interests (either the same links or other links about the same or similar things) are suggested to you. You can see their interests and decide if you’d like the option to chat with them. Typical mutual-opt-in mechanics result in “pairups” and you can both take it from there and start chatting whenever you’re ready. No pressure, you already have things to talk about.

I'd love it if you gave it a try and let me know what you think!

[1] I did enjoy coding in Smalltalk in a past, past life https://techcrunch.com/2006/03/11/dabbledb-online-app-buildi... https://www.mercurynews.com/2010/06/10/twitter-buys-software...

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