Making Friends Online

About a dozen years ago, I lived in San Francisco. I loved music, and had a list of upcoming bands that I planned to see in the sidebar of my blog. One day I posted about a show that I was going to see, and that I wished I had someone to go with me. As it turned out, one of my readers lived in San Francisco and also wanted to see that show, and told me in the comments. We’d been following each other’s blogs, but had never met in person before. We wound up not only seeing that show, but becoming great friends, thanks to the common interest we discovered through our blogs.

Have you ever made a friend — either in person or just online — through the comments on a blog?

Comments

  1. Love seeing how communities are created online 🙂 About a year before I started college & even knew where I wanted to go, I started following a professor’s writings on a blog. I don’t even remember how I found it but I remember waiting each week for a new post. Fast forward two years and I found myself sitting in a lecture hall with that same professor. While there had been comments back and forth over the years, I remember the nervousness of going up to reveal myself. I ended up staying about two hours after just to chat with her! Needless to say, it was one of my favorite classes to take.

  2. I was commenting on a parenting blog when I noticed another commenter had a child with the same (somewhat unique) name as one of my children. I followed her blog, she followed mine, we started chatting via email and Facebook as well. Five years on, we haven’t met in person, but we’ve discovered we have a lot more in common than our taste in naming children.

      1. Well, we both have three boys, we both like to run (though she’s much faster than me!), and a lot of the time we end up blogging about similar subjects without realizing it.

  3. A few years back I had a frequent commenter on my blog. I was posting daily at that time and over time it became quite normal to have a constant conversation going on with this person. From blog comments we moved to emails and then we started chatting IM on a daily basis. I was living in a little town in Italy and she was living in Naples. We decided to meet up in London as we were both invited to the same tech party. No more than 48 hours after knowing each other in person we both got hired as the Italian crew of a WebTV that had just started broadcasting. Many things happened afterwards and we are still best friends.

    1. That is the coolest story!

      Many things happened afterwards

      My overactive imagination has gone straight to the movies, where you and your best friend are the stars of a rom-com with quirky sidekicks and wacky encounters. Hilarity ensues. 🙂

  4. One of my greatest friends was a regular commenter on my blog about 12 years ago. We didn’t live in the same city but we chatted online for hours about music and other common interests. We saw each other every now and then (mostly around music related events) but now she lives in another country so it’s not as frequent. We are still great friends and share everything.

    1. Liking the same music (or books, or art) can be such a uniting thread, I’m surpised more bloggers don’t post about the stuff they like (vs. only posting about the stuff they think, or the stuff they do). That’s awesome that your friendship has lasted so long!

  5. I made a ton of friends through a blog that I started 10 years ago, some of them I became extremely close with. One particular close friend of mine began by leaving comments on my blog because he was just starting his own and wanted advice. I ended up meeting him in person and helping him setup his WP blog. He became quite good at it, and moved on to become a successful web developer. We only see each other rarely nowadays, since he lives in another city, but keep in touch as often as we can.

  6. I’ve met many wonderful folks who commented on my blog and then I returned the favor. There are gardeners literally around the world, some special grandmas, and some folks instate. I’ve never personally met any of them but look forward to exchanging comments and info with them.

    1. Gardeners are such a great group to connect with, and blogs have made it so easy! I remember the days before blogs when I used to engage in letter-based seed swaps through the regular mail to connect with other gardeners. These days it’s as easy as leaving a blog comment or sending a message on Twitter!

  7. WP featured a writer last year who was blogging through his divorce. I was going through something very similar. Literally his wife left him 10 days before my husband left me. We live several states away but have become great friends nonetheless and have encouraged one another through different milestones. I absolutely LOVE the WP community!

  8. Funny you should mention this, Jen! My blog friends call ourselves “blog buddies” and we recently launched a little blogger action called Save the Soils where we got to interact by email, snail mail and, if you can imagine, land line! 😉 Here’s a little story about overcoming my trepidations by interacting with folks thru WordPress. http://whattheducks.com/2015/01/14/how-i-stopped-worrying-learned-to-love-blogging/ Cheers!

    1. When we care about the same things- it really helps to get the word out! Lori did a great job of putting together a Save the Soils for our blogger buddies that care about nature:-)She contacted me due to a post, I just had written + told me I missed International Soil Day. We learn from each other:-) It helps us keep updated with what is going on in other parts of the world, country, state, towns etc!
      It is through our blogs that we all meet one another and it is how we can make a BIG difference in causes that need our help:-) I look forward to our next year adventure in Blogger Action Day Save the Soils.
      Another fellow blogger is coming to the USA + she contacted me to see if I would be able to meet up in DC, but I was unable to on the dates they were gathering. None of these people had met before outside their blog-it truly is a great way to meet kindred spirits.
      Lori also sent me some stickers to pass on to my local friends to celebrate Blogger Action Day- Save the Soils-I am so glad, I have blogger buddies! I shorten blogger buddies to BB’s now:-) LOL
      Lori is one of the best BB’s you can meet! Truly a shaker and mover:-)

      1. OK, I’m blushing now… it was a group thang, believe me–Robbie is too modest. So, three cheers for Robbie!!! And three cheers for WordPress for creating such a civil place for people to meet/connect/make a diff! 😀

  9. When I first started blogging, I read that commenting on other people’s blogs can be a good way to network and get people to visit your own blog. At that point, I was writing mostly about dating and relationships, so I started seeking out blogs similar to mine and chiming in on people’s dating lives, basically offering whatever insight I could. Many of these people did end up checking out my blog and offering their insights into my life, too. I think a lot of relationship bloggers using blogging to process whatever drama they might be going through, and ironically, it helps to get an objective perspective from people who don’t know you personally.

    Although my initial motivation to comment on other people’s blogs was pretty self-serving, because of the personal nature of our writings, a small group of us ended up getting to know each other pretty well through our interactions on each others’ blogs. Someone started a private Facebook group for us, and many of us still keep in touch and are friends on Facebook today.

    I may never meet many of these blogger friends that I’ve made over the past few years, but I sometimes feel like I know more about them — and they about me — than some of my real-life friends. I definitely consider them my friends now.

  10. Hi Jen, just recently one of my readers brought a small child (the grand-daughter of a friend of hers) out to the farm who is having trouble at school. Neither of her parents are present in her life and she had taken to screaming at everyone and running away from everything as fast as she could. Now she comes out to the farm twice a week to hang out with the animals and is slowly getting that sparkle back. Without the blog she would never have known about the animals. Blogging is a pretty powerful medium. c

    1. And remember, Cecilia, how before one of your trips there was problem (with passports or something? It’s been a while) and everyone started networking to make sure it all worked out just right for you? And others offering advice about livestock problems? All that was, and continues to be, great.
      We’ve seen it with Wild Rider Susie (“Susie Lindau’s Wild Ride”) when she was diagnosed/treated for breast cancer. Instant support group. Never underestimate the power of positive thinking focused by a pack of bloggers.
      The Big Sheep’s blog asking for help when her small town’s library was in a contest for money they really really needed (They won it, too. Thanks to bloggers.)
      Now if we can just get Jimmy Fallon connected with hotel bellman Hook (“You’ve been Hooked” blog)…
      Bloggers who have never met in person, but meeting up on blogs, joining forces to gather information and solve problems – sort of a spontaneous hive response as needed. An application for blogging no one ever expected. Something of a wonder.
      Cecilia’s right: blogging is a pretty powerful medium.

  11. Pingback: Introducing Community Conversations | Press Publish

  12. Back in the early 2000s, I was living in Australia and blogging about writing some code to help interact with blogs via APIs. Somewhere along the line someone commented and offered to help out with some of it, and we ended up being “online buddies”. Years later, while we were still in touch, I ended up relocating to San Francisco, and we both realized that we were going to be attending the same “bar camp” event. We finally met face to face, and have kept in touch ever since then! Hi Bill!

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