The most visible and recognizable part of meetups are talks. That's what's advertised to get people to join the events and a good chunk of time and attention during the event is given to them. But there's more to meetups than just talks.

Don't get me wrong: the talks are an integral part of developer events and that's where we learn about new things and get inspired by what others have built and learned. If you haven't been to a lot of tech events, you may have missed the sometimes bit hidden part of them that makes them so beloved. We call it the "hallway track".

Hallway track is what happens outside the official program - in the hallways outside of the "track rooms" where the scheduled talks occur. In our meetups, that means the mingling before the talks start, between the talks, after the talks at the venue and in the post-meetup discussions at the pub.

I highly recommend everyone to take part in those discussions to meet new people.

Here are a couple of things that can help.

The Pac-Man Rule

The Pac-Man Rule, coined by Eric Holscher is one way everone in an event can make it easier for others to join the discussions:

When standing as a group of people, always leave room for 1 person to join your group.

So when you're in our events and you chat with people, be open for others to join the discussion and you can communicate that by leaving a spot open in a circle and welcoming people to join those discussions.

If someone new joins your discussion, do a quick round of introductions. If you know both parties but they don't know each other, why not introduce them to each other! Helping each other to meet new people is a win-win for everyone.

The Snowball Rule

Another rule, coined by Eric as well, is The Snowball Rule:

For every year you have attended an event, you should try to meet that many new people each day.

I like it because it reduces the burden from the new people in the community and puts it bit more on the shoulders of those who've been involved longer. I often invite people to chat with someone they haven't met before to encourage people to make a new friend - and giving the social permission to be a bit awkward when approaching a new person without any real discussion topic in mind.

Of course, you're more than welcome to participate exactly as much as you feel comfortable. You will be always welcome to our events if you only wish to just sit and listen to the talks.

Post-meetup discussions and dev lunches

Third tip is to join us in the post-meetup discussions in the pub. I've often heard the reason for people not joining is that it's a weekday evening and drinking late until the night isn't the best option fo them. I want to emphasize here that drinking isn't the point. We go to a pub because those are the only places that are open past 21 in the evening. Grabbing a soda or water is more than welcomed option.

Sitting together with people who are interested in similar things than you are who live in the same city as you is a fantastic way to make friends. The discussions in these post-meetup gatherings also tend to be more varied than what we end up discussing during the events.

In the events, discussions are more tech focused and while we do talk about tech in the pub too, we also talk a lot about life and entertainment and what's been going on in our lives lately. Personally, I find those discussions often the best part of events. (These discussions also happen during lunch time in our Turku Dev Lunches that are often organized and shared in our TurkuDev Discord.)