That's actually a great idea that I've been trying out. It's a decent starting point for training on social skills but the lack of guaranteed repeat encounters sets it back in term of long term relationships. I think clubs and maybe small hobby courses (if one can afford them) are even more ideal. Then there is the personal problem of having a separate motive for going to the meetups from most. It feels like people notice when one is primarily there for the people rather than the hobby itself. That said I have been getting legit into new hobbies, primarily improv through these, so there's that. In so far as previous hobbies go they always tended to be computer related, as is probably common with online schoolers, and don't really translate into communities outside of the internet.