David_Gerard comments on How do you approach the problem of social discovery? - Less Wrong

18 Post author: InquilineKea 21 April 2014 09:05PM

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Comment author: David_Gerard 21 April 2014 10:11:57PM *  7 points [-]

I have long made an explicit practice of trying to be a social supernode. It pays off, it really does. (Today's example: free Skype speech therapy sessions for my daughter from a friend I haven't seen in a decade, who I met because another online friend had mentioned to her that I was in the same city.)

Comment author: seez 21 April 2014 11:50:59PM 17 points [-]

Can you explain more about how you do this?

Comment author: David_Gerard 23 April 2014 11:25:57AM *  2 points [-]

Join social networks of various sorts, offline and on. Get to know as many people as you can and interact with them. Have fun interacting with these lovely people. Consider it a task, as you would if you'd just moved to a new city and had to find friends afresh.

But mostly it's something I just do 'cos I'm like that.

Comment author: ChristianKl 24 April 2014 11:14:19PM 8 points [-]

Consider it a task, as you would if you'd just moved to a new city and had to find friends afresh.

You might think that it's obvious what one would do when one moved to a new city and had to find friends afresh. There's a good chance that you do things that are not obvious to a lot of people reading your post.

Comment author: jobe_smith 25 April 2014 06:44:16PM 0 points [-]

When you say that it pays off, is the main benefit just the pleasure you get from having lots of friends and social interactions, or are there actually substantial tangible benefits? Do you think you could reproduce all the tangible benefits with an extra $10K/year of income, or is it worth a lot more than that? I am curious because I have often felt like people who are good with people and know a lot of people should have a substantial advantage over someone like me, who is terrible with people. But then in practice I don't really see it.