
Show HN: Meet me, I'll buy you coffee - milesokeefe
http://letstalkover.coffee
======
zippergz
I have to say, as someone twice your age, I'm humbled by how many projects
you've put out there. Sure, a lot of them are small and simple, but there's
something to be said for just _doing_ stuff. I spend too much time agonizing
over whether my ideas are good enough, big enough, will make me money, etc.
I'd probably learn more and have more fun if I allowed myself the freedom to
do small interesting projects without any expectation of what they'll turn
into.....

~~~
jonalmeida
This is something that as someone in my early 20s is trying to fix. I know a
lot of people who don't like to work on projects or open source them because
they're afraid of being judged and a feeling that everyone is watching you
(this is an emotion I had tackled for a while). Once you realize that there
aren't many people looking at your projects (if any), and that those who are,
will actually help you, is when you start doing more.

This reminds me of two quotes:

\- “Fail faster.”

\- "If you're going to make a mistake, make it LOUD so we can hear it and
correct it."

------
edw519
I love it! It's interesting, inviting, and shows great initiative.

I don't live in the bay area, but next visit I'll make sure to put this on my
schedule.

2 pieces of feedback:

"See more about me here." doesn't do you justice. I didn't even notice it, but
I found your website from your hn profile. Once I visited your site, you went
from "mildly interesting" to "must meet". Is there some way to make the link
to your site more prominent, perhaps with a mini-graphic of your front page a
little higher up.

I know this may sound controversial, but "Here's my offer: I buy you a
coffee..." and "Free" actually turn me off a little. I've heard this so many
times now, I'm practically immune to it. You obviously have much to offer
without buying coffee. Anyone should be happy to spend time with you without
that. You may actually want to reconsider that offer to stand out from the
crowd of posers (who you are obviously not a part of) and allow yourself to
stand on your own merits. Don't sell yourself short. You clearly don't need to
pay to meet interesting people in the bay area. Something to think about.

Best wishes on this and on your move, Miles. Looking forward to hearing great
things about you and hopefully having coffee (dutch treat) soon someday.

------
milesokeefe
I stole the concept from tg3 who made this:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6674987](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6674987)

Don't worry though, I got his blessing before making this site.

~~~
cpayne
Never, ever say you stole the concept. Inspired, motivated, encouraged -
perhaps?

Especially since you got his blessing!!

~~~
scribu
I didn't downvote, but one possible reason: you didn't explain why using the
verb "steal" is such a big no-no.

~~~
cpayne
Fair point.

\- (I think!!) you didn't steal it! My gut says to me you were inspired or
motivated or something else. But didn't stolen

\- You said you got permission. To me, you don't steal & ask permission

\- But the biggest one for me is that you downplay / sell yourself short! Its
deprecating and doesn't serve you. In my experience in software, there are
plenty of jealous / insecure / destructive people willing to put you down.
Don't play into that game!

What you've done is very clever. The concept, + website + the TLD (*.coffee -
didn't know that existed)

It's well done!

------
jack-r-abbit
The form at the bottom is a little confusing for several reasons.

1) You say things like "Here's _my_ offer: _I_ buy _you_ a coffee" and "Tell
_me_ about _your_..." but then the form is all " _I 'm_ ________ and _I 'll_
meet _you_ ______". Notice the change in who _I_ and _you_ refer to?

2) Adding to the confusing of #1, you have an email address placeholder that
is not very obviously a placeholder. It is your.email@gmail.com but what if
that is actually your gmail account. Perhaps using the classic
something@example.com would make it a little more obvious that it is
placeholder. It kind of looks like you have put your own email address since
this _I 'm_ is you if they were all consistent in this section... but they
aren't. This is a classic conundrum of web design. (ie, should a site use
"your cart" or "my cart" in the nav?)

Having said that, I work in Berkeley and could probably meet up some day. I
don't drink coffee though.

~~~
jack-r-abbit
I _tried_ to offer a constructive critique for a "Show HN". I sincerely
apologize to the offended party. :/

~~~
milesokeefe
I appreciate the feedback! You can shrug off those downvotes.

~~~
jack-r-abbit
You're welcome. Welcome to Berkeley and good luck.

And I don't care about the downvote itself. There are plenty of cases where I
know what I'm writing is going to be downvoted because that is what people do
to other people with opposing opinions on certain topics. But I am baffled by
them when I truly have absolutely no clue about why.

------
peteforde
There's a lot of folks in this thread that are posting "go to school" comments
without knowing a whole lot about you. I'm sure that from their perspective
it's the obvious best advice. I am commenting to say that people who have
invested the most valuable years of their life in school tend to spend the
rest of their lives hunting for evidence that they made a great decision.

The simple fact is that their answers are more about their own confirmation
bias than giving actionable advice.

While it's true that lots of successful people went to college, the simple
fact that you taught yourself to code and you're hanging out on Hacker News
puts you into a completely different category than 99.9% of people that don't
go to college.

I've seen people talk here about ROI on degrees and "the path" and what makes
a good student. I've seen far less about how people are highly unlikely to
know what they should be doing with the rest of their lives right out of high
school. That there's so much focus on 18 year olds paying crazy tuition to get
a piece of paper that proves they attended some generic lectures on a generic
subject is criminal.

Anyhow, I'm ranting. I'm projecting. I didn't go to college and I have been
very successful. It's because I decided early on to feed my intellectual
curiosity and give myself permission to fall in love with things that
themselves lead to other things. It's way more important that you learn about
music and travel and optimize for interesting than push your square peg
through a round hole.

That's not to say that you won't ever go. But if you don't think this is the
right time, then you are the best person to know that. Just don't be idle; try
to imagine that your life will be a series of well executed five year plans.

Don't let yourself get burnt out along the way, it sucks.

What I recommend is that you join a startup and work there for about a year.
Then get the hell out of California for a year; I recommend that you go work
at a startup in Berlin or Amsterdam for a year. Get a global perspective.

Hacker News is an incredible resource, but it's also really full of people
that buy into a California tech ideology that can be self-limiting. It's just
one of many lenses through which you can see the world.

Good luck; I'm really excited for you. Just remember: no person has ever been
on their deathbed and thought, "man... I wish I'd made fewer interesting
decisions".

------
pnathan
I thought this was like a match-making service which would pair up people
quasi-randomly who lived in the same city.

~~~
TimJRobinson
Is there anything like this? Sets up blind meets / dates with people with
similar passions?

~~~
pnathan
I don't know. I'd definitely sign up for a "Meetup with 3-4 random people at
coffeehouse in Seattle" thing.

~~~
nickbarnwell
Then you'll love Tea With Strangers
([http://teawithstrangers.com](http://teawithstrangers.com)) – we're coming to
Seattle soon!

~~~
jacalata
random note: because of the favicon I think that you mean the Earl Grey kind
of tea, but mentioning a two hour commitment makes me not quite sure that you
aren't a British guy saying Dinner.

------
alain94040
Just launched, similar idea for lunch:
[http://colunchers.com](http://colunchers.com)

EDIT: whoa, take it easy, don't overload my VPS instance :-)

EDIT2: fine, I'll do my own Show HN here
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8592812](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8592812)

------
sillysaurus3
What does clicking "Let's meet" do? I clicked it to find out and it said
"Message sent, thanks! I look forward to meeting you."

I, too, look forward to meeting you! But that probably won't happen. Good luck
with your experiment, though.

Also, a few things to remember: You're much more valuable than your first
employers would have you believe. Don't let that go to your head. Do go to
university. I know how eager you are, having been in that position myself, but
it's a mistake to drop out of one of the most effective social networks ever
devised by humankind. Go for the social experience and the social doors it
opens. If you're still not convinced, take a hard look at the background of
all of the YC partners and realize that all of them seem to have attended some
good schools. While you can make it without university, and you can lead a
happy life and do whatever you want and be in the upper 1% of quality of life
across all of humanity without attending university, you only get one chance
to choose not to follow "The Path," which is high school -> good university
(undergrad) -> better university (graduate student) -> learn how to be around
rich people and convince them of your way of thinking. Normal people who don't
attend university simply don't get this opportunity. Specifically, the
opportunity to test out what works and what doesn't, socially, with wealthy
people. Why is this important? Well, if you want to do something big, and you
don't have any money, wealthy people are by definition the only ones who can
help you. Even at absurdly high salaries, it's very hard to save up money to
do something that involves hiring other people. Possible, but difficult. So
where do you turn? Investors, of course. Except, crap, they're wealthy, and
you have no idea how to be around them as equals. But wait, you attended
university, and so maybe they have some shared ground with you... Hm, nope,
you didn't. Well, of course, your website demonstrates traction, and traction
is what matters to an investor. But what else do investors care about? Your
team. Where (or whether) you went to university says a lot about you,
fortunately or unfortunately.

Really, there's no reason not to go. Make some reasonably intelligent
decisions and you'll have a great time while getting the debt paid off in a
reasonable timeframe.

But if you don't go, you may find you'll want to later but never really get
the opportunity. Not in the way you once had. Once you depart from The Path,
you'll have to beat your way back onto it, surmounting bills and work and all
kinds of annoying stuff that people fresh out of highschool don't really have
to worry about just yet.

Speaking of bills and debt: whatever you do, don't get into credit card debt.
Don't get into credit card debt! I can't emphasize this enough. It's so
tempting, but just don't.

Do use a credit card though. Just pay it off every month. Otherwise you may
not be able to get services (internet, phone, whatever) at a new apartment, or
buy a car. Had it happen to me once, and it sucks. No credit history = unknown
risk = "I'm sorry but we will never do business with you."

Kind of an awkward place to end a ramble, but whatever. Maybe some of the
ideas might be useful.

Maybe consider leveraging this particular experiment to help you attend one of
the local top-tier universities as an undergrad. Ask people if they have any
advice on this, and maybe you'll find someone who could help with the
admissions process. Who you know matters more than what your highschool
history was like, so maybe some strings could be pulled somewhere.

~~~
milesokeefe
>What does clicking "Let's meet" do? I clicked it to find out and it said
"Message sent, thanks! I look forward to meeting you."

Sorry about that. It's hypocritical of me to implement a system like this
instead of just showing my email address. I actually wrote a blog post about
why you shouldn't do what I did with this website:

[http://blog.milesokeefe.com/post/56981311556/dont-use-
contac...](http://blog.milesokeefe.com/post/56981311556/dont-use-contact-
forms)

>I, too, look forward to meeting you! But that probably won't happen.

There's a good chance that would've been true had you not made this comment :)

I hope to meet everyone I receive an email from but to be honest I did not
expect this to get so much attention. I am used to my projects getting very
little to no visitors.

>college...

I started typing a long response to this explaining the circumstances around
my decision but I've decided against it.

The bottom line is that I've made the decision to not go to university and I'm
perfectly happy with that. Not being in college doesn't mean I can't still
learn, it just means I have to teach myself, which is what I've always done
and will continue to do. People may judge me based on my lack of college
degree, I am at peace with that.

Surprisingly, my father is a professor and my mother is a university director,
and yet they both support me in what I'm doing. My mother wrote about her
feelings on the matter here if you're curious: [http://www.csmonitor.com/The-
Culture/Family/Modern-Parenthoo...](http://www.csmonitor.com/The-
Culture/Family/Modern-Parenthood/2014/0619/Why-I-said-yes-when-my-son-said-no-
to-college)

Thanks for taking the time to write out your thoughts, I'd love to go over the
details with you in person.

>credit card...

The day I turned 18, I signed a lease for an apartment and got a secured
credit card, which I use exactly the same as I would a debit card. I still
need to get a second credit card to help continue building my credit but I
definitely got started as soon as I could.

My credit could be better, but there's not much more than waiting that I can
do at this point. Please correct me if I'm wrong about this.

~~~
sillysaurus3
Your mother's blog post is mostly about salary, which seems to be beside the
point. There's more to life than money.

If your long-term goals include (or will ever include) "Start my own company,"
the odds are overwhelmingly not in your favor. First, when you're in
university, you have a unique opportunity to become known as the smartest
person in the class, and thus build a ridiculously valuable network. But you
could do that at work too, right? Well, not really. There are legal issues at
play: it's not so easy to just pack up with a coworker and start your own
company. California makes this easier, but it's still hairy. Whereas you
almost never have to worry about that as a student. Plus, your student network
will be gigantic in comparison to a network you can build from work alone.

Someday you'll be old, and without a degree you'll be doubly vulnerable to
ageism. If you're not a manager by then, you may be out of a job. While it's
nice to think you'd be retired by then, reality has a funny way of making that
unlikely. In particular, if you meet someone and fall in love, your finances
and other ambitions tend to become affected.

You may be interested that I once interviewed at Justin TV, which eventually
transformed into Twitch and was recently sold for a lot of money. Maybe I
would've had an equity stake, maybe not. I didn't make the cut. Official
reason for passing on me? Kan met with me and said that his investors
recommended they not hire anyone without a degree when they were in such early
stages. Now, that could have just been a convenient social excuse; at the time
I remember not really demonstrating enough value during the interview stage,
otherwise I'm sure that wouldn't have stopped them. On the other hand, if I
was a borderline "hire" with a degree, then maybe that would have been enough
to push me into the zone of "Let's try this person out and see how he does,"
which would have let me demonstrate my abilities directly, rather than by
solving interview puzzles like "how would you implement a way to evaluate 2 +
3 = 5?" (At the time, being self-taught, I wasn't very versed in lexers,
parsers, etc, so I had to flub my way through that particular question.)

You can have a wonderful life without a degree, but the vast majority of
startups are started by people who went through universities. You know how Sam
Altman has given a series of wonderful lectures at Stanford? Pg has also
written at length about universities and startups:

[https://www.google.com/search?q=site:paulgraham.com+startups...](https://www.google.com/search?q=site:paulgraham.com+startups+college+OR+university)

 _I 've claimed that the recipe is a great university near a town smart people
like. If you set up those conditions within the US, startups will form as
inevitably as water droplets condense on a cold piece of metal._

I've been operating under the assumption that you moved out to SF to go live
the startup dream. The fact is, that dream is much less likely when you
haven't attended university. It's unlikely in terms of raw statistics (I'm
personally aware of only a few people who have made a successful startup
without having been through university, tptacek being one of the notable
counterexamples) and in terms of your network. As a student, you're a
potential founder. As an employee, usually you're going to remain an employee.

Isn't it interesting that Loopt was objectively not as big of a success as
once was hoped, but Sam still succeeded brilliantly from it? I wonder if his
network had anything to do with that, or the fact that he attended a top-tier
university?

By the way, if you don't really care about starting a startup, please just
disregard everything I've said, since your current path may in fact be
optimal, as your parents noted. But if you're going the startup route... Well,
"the rest of your life" is a long, long time, yet you only have a very narrow
timeframe to reconsider. I hope I'm wrong, though!

One of the most important points that I don't think I stressed enough, which
took me a long time to fully accept, is that university isn't really about
learning. Not when it comes to software. Yes, your education will be well-
rounded and you'll have a much deeper knowledge of architecture and theory and
etc, but the primary value to you as a potential founder is the network and
the social acceptance that comes from attending a top tier university.
Prestige. It's lame to an extent, and maybe someday the world will be
different, but that day likely won't be in the next decade, which is the
timeframe you care about the most.

Also, consider this: All of the opportunities before you now will still be
there, enhanced, after university. Ever play poker? It's probably best to
follow the path of highest EV. There's almost no way that university is
anything but the highest EV in this situation.

I wish you the best of luck. I apologize for coming across as negative.

~~~
milesokeefe
You make good, valid points.

My perspective is that as a student, I don't stand out. My grades/ECs/etc are
not very exceptional. However, as a "rogue" (for lack of a better term)
developer, I do stand out. I started making websites in 4th grade, I've worked
professionally as a developer since a year after I was legally able to have a
job at all, I have an entrepreneurial spirit, I have a history of shipping
software, etc. Read that in the least egotistical tone you can (if at all
possible) please; I'm walking imposter syndrome in reality.

I'd really like to continue this conversation right now but I think it'll
stretch out too long, can we pick back up at this point in person? I'll email
you right after I post this.

>I apologize for coming across as negative

I also struggle with wording what I say to sound positive, but you have
nothing to worry about, your tone has been very neutral.

EDIT: I sent an email to the address in your profile, if that's not your
current email, please tell me so I can send it to the right one.

~~~
grayclhn
I want to be clear up front that this isn't really a comment for you, but a
more general comment for any students reading it. FWIW, I teach at a
university, but this is just my own opinion and others might disagree.

> _My perspective is that as a student, I don 't stand out. My grades/ECs/etc
> are not very exceptional. However, as a "rogue" (for lack of a better term)
> developer, I do stand out._

It is easy to stand out as a student: attend lecture every day, show up early
and sit in the front row, prepare for the lectures by reading the assigned and
optional readings in advance, ask questions that help you deepen your
understanding of the material (not questions that are designed to "show off,"
if your understanding of the material is much deeper than what the class
covers, don't be an asshole, but do ask questions before and after lecture),
and use the resources the class has made available to you to understand the
subject as well as you can.

I've had students "stand out" despite getting Cs on all the tests, because
they've clearly busted their ass to get a C and had a good attitude about it.
I've also had completely anonymous students get As.

If you work hard at the class and are also any good at the subject, you'll
stand out even more. And, just in case you need this advice later (this is
actually for you, Miles), you can actually pull this off without being
enrolled at the university and can probably hustle/charm your way into
enrollment at Berkeley if you ever decide you need it. The same thing applies:
take classes you're interested in (through UC's extension education program),
show up, work hard, and engage with the Prof. Undergrad enrollment numbers can
make that tricky, but that's literally how I got into grad school. (UC
extension program and all...)

But Berkeley's great. Have fun!

~~~
joshAg
Can Confirm that it is insanely easy to hustle your way into berkeley. I had a
friend or two do while I was there.

In the meantime, there's no need to not follow along, and there's no need for
enrollment through extension (and with no added work for the teaching staff).

the intro websites archives are at: 1)
[http://inst.eecs.berkeley.edu/~cs61a/archives](http://inst.eecs.berkeley.edu/~cs61a/archives)
2)
[http://inst.eecs.berkeley.edu/~cs61b/archives](http://inst.eecs.berkeley.edu/~cs61b/archives)
3)
[http://inst.eecs.berkeley.edu/~cs61c/archives](http://inst.eecs.berkeley.edu/~cs61c/archives)

the current semester is at
[http://inst.eecs.berkeley.edu/~cs61a/](http://inst.eecs.berkeley.edu/~cs61a/)
and so on.

If you click through you should notice that all the readings and lecture notes
and assignments are totally publicly viewable. the only thing standing between
you and doing that whole class on your own (minus, the final) is your will
power. At least one semester of the courses are at webcast.berkeley.edu or on
youtube. Again, totally public.

If you really want to, you can even attend lecture since berkeley is an open
campus and no one will check to see what you're doing there. Be warned,
though, the classes are really impacted right now, so you might not even get a
seat.

The only downside to doing it this way is that you don't get official credit.
If you really want that, you could take it via extension, but I highly doubt
they'll let you in since even declared majors are having all sorts of trouble
signing up for classes (the intro series went from like 300 students to >1200
per semester in like 2 years, so they are having some growth issues :).

------
issa
How people feel about the "going to college" question is usually just a
reflection of their own experiences and nothing more. You can't live life
twice.

IF you want to be a doctor/lawyer/etc where a degree is required, then by all
means you must go to school.

For anything where only results matter (for example, the open source software
world) no one will care one way or the other what you do.

A lot of things will fall in between. Some doors will open, some will close.
It's impossible for anyone to say which is a better choice.

Certainly, no matter what, there is no pressing need to go to school NOW.
School will still be there in a year. Or two. Or even 20 if you find a reason
to go later in your life.

The only thing you should avoid at all costs is wasting time. If you're
skipping school to get high and play video games (doesn't sound like you!)
then you are going to pay a heavy price as the years slip by. Be sure to make
use of the time you "save"!

Good luck!

------
partisan
This guy is silicon valley's dream. Self re-locating, driven and talented, and
young enough to pay peanuts in salary. You late twenty-somethings have an
expiration date now.

~~~
whatmeworry
you forgot to add: "and from a wealthy enough background to never have to
worry about taking risks"

~~~
partisan
I didn't want to bring that up on HN for fear of facing some backlash, but my
wife and I were having that very same discussion just now.

I won't dismiss whatever risks he took to get to where he is. That said, I am
guessing he can still get that free education through his parents employment
if he ever needed to and it must make things a lot less stressful knowing that
the risk is not quite so great.

I always reflect back on my interviews. Whenever I went for an interview, but
had a decent job that I could stay at, I KILLED. Then, those few times when I
was dying to get out of my situation, I lost some of my confidence and charm
and bravado and those were the times I didn't get the job. It honestly helps
(me) to take risks when there is a cushy landing if you fail.

------
tomahaug
Hi Miles, I really like the page and the idea behind!

Do you know www.startuptravels.com? There's approximately 42 entrepreneurs at
the moment of writing in the bay area who'd like to meet other entrepreneurs
for a coffee and a chat.

Direct link to the SF search:
[http://www.startuptravels.com/search?location=San%20Francisc...](http://www.startuptravels.com/search?location=San%20Francisco,%20CA,%20USA)

Edit: If anyone wants to show a little support. Show HN:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8592850](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8592850)

~~~
rickduggan
Very cool. I've been doing this for about 3 years in Las Vegas for the
VegasTech community. It is definitely a great way to meet other people and it
keeps you from getting too focused on your own thing and not getting other
perspectives.

I've also signed up for startuptravels as it looks to be a great way to create
conversations.

------
zaporozhets
I'd like to think i'm a relatively successful 20 year old.

I left high-school and jump straight into a front-end dev role at a branding
agency.

Two years on I'm not building a creative agency, hireable anywhere and I have
a business network that most people would kill for.

I think that what you're doing is great but you'll do better by getting some
business cards made, going to events and networking with every single person
you can. That relaxed environment usually yields for more exciting and organic
business relationships. Simultaneously, work hard in places that are versatile
in their offering. You'll get broader and ultimately more valuable experience
rather than taking a higher paying job somewhere where you're not growing
properly.

Also I recommend you jump into some fast-paced, crazy work at an agency before
you move into a product focused team.

------
imaginenore
Your page is way too tall for the amount of information you put. And the most
important stuff is at the bottom.

~~~
milesokeefe
Thanks for the feedback.

I was going for the "narrative" style design for this, I intentionally didn't
put all the information "above the fold" like the original site did:

[http://coffee.tgriff3.com](http://coffee.tgriff3.com)

~~~
aembleton
I prefer that original website. It makes it much clearer what's going on.

~~~
woven
I prefer Miles' "narrative" style. :)

------
philip1209
I know somebody who did something like this in St. Louis and was quite
successful:

[http://www.freecoffeewithaubrey.com/](http://www.freecoffeewithaubrey.com/)

It helped build her network, find a new job, and meet people doing cool
things.

------
stockkid
Seeing this website reminds me of myself. I too have been building computer
stuff since I was a 5th grader. I was going to study CS in college. After I
was rejected by my dream school, I went on to study economics and mathematics
instead, because it was the one of the best program that my school offered.

I've seen your projects and they speak for your passion. I think it's amazing
that you are doing what you are doing. I'm not going to lecture you about
whether to go to college or not. College has its merits and demerits. All I
can say is keep up the good work!

------
terramars
This is an awesome networking hack! If you're looking to "meet" a bunch of
employers, check out Hired -
[http://join.hired.com/x/WF25Mp](http://join.hired.com/x/WF25Mp). We placed
someone with a very similar background to you (18 years old, web dev) a while
ago. Everyone loved him, they'd be excited to meet you too.

Side note, I'd be happy to chat over coffee and discuss the valley,
opportunities, and how to not get screwed over, regardless of your interest in
Hired.

~~~
zorrb
I'm surprised, a couple of guys I know went on Hired in the bay area and it
said there weren't enough jobs at this time.

~~~
partisan
They aged out.

------
davb
This is a great idea.

I really wish we had half the community community you guys have, here in
Aberdeen, Scotland. You could throw a rock and hit a tech guy in SF. Here, the
only groups of any prominence are MS .Net groups.

I've been struggling to find or build such a network here. I'm an open source,
Linux, Python type of guy and feel I don't fit in the myopic tech culture
here. I'd emigrate to SF in a heartbeat.

Good luck networking, I reckon you'll do alright. If you ever visit Scotland,
hit me up!

~~~
voltagex_
Have you tried [http://aberlug.org.uk/](http://aberlug.org.uk/) or
[https://opentechcalendar.co.uk/group/](https://opentechcalendar.co.uk/group/)
or [http://www.meetup.com/Aberdeen-Python-
Meetup](http://www.meetup.com/Aberdeen-Python-Meetup)?

(not having a go, I have the same problem (sometimes) in Australia)

~~~
tomahaug
(Disclaimer: I'm cofounder)

I'd recommend also giving
[http://www.startuptravels.com/](http://www.startuptravels.com/) a go, we're
not a huge crowd yet, but we've got a few entrepreneurs in Australia, and the
responsiveness and willingness to meet new people amongst our users has been
overwhelmingly positive so far.

~~~
voltagex_
No one near me. Can I register as a non-startup tech?

Edit: Ah, I don't use LinkedIn.

~~~
tomahaug
@voltagex_ Definitely. We believe that entrepreneurial spirit is more a state
of mind, than what you might be doing on a daily basis.

Edit: Ah, bummer. I believe that's a +1 for native signup! :) Also, which city
are you living in?

~~~
voltagex_
Native / StackExchange / GitHub / Google might hit the other part of your
target market.

I'm in Canberra.

------
smegel
I suspect this is just a ploy to get to the top post on HN which is surely of
more value than this webpage in and of itself...so congrats I guess.

------
brimtown
Great idea. Just a heads up, the email validation in your index.js isn't
functioning; it accepts any arbitrary string (or none at all).

~~~
milesokeefe
I didn't bother with any validation client-side, I have the email validation
happen on the back end only.

In retrospect, I should have placed the inputs in an actual <form> element so
that Chrome's email validation would take effect.

~~~
brimtown
No worries! As someone only a couple years older than you, I have to say,
congrats on making the move out there. It seems like you've got a lot of
passion and commitment; wish I was in the Berkeley to take you up on the
coffee.

------
yurylifshits
Hey Miles, we have Mission Hackers meetup this Wednesday. Come join us
tomorrow:
[https://www.facebook.com/events/1549813885231948/](https://www.facebook.com/events/1549813885231948/)

Everyone else is welcome too! We are a group of hackers and entrepreneurs who
get together in Mission District, work on our own projects and have fun.

------
lowglow
I tried this with burritos last year. The results were mixed. I got a lot of
great people, but even with screening, I had a ton of very weird characters
come through because I got some press on it.

I found a lot of people just wanted a free burrito. Not a problem, but not the
community I hoped to build out of the experiment.

Needless to say I had put on about 20lbs in burritos.

[edit] sent you an email! :)

------
drawkbox
You are gonna go far kid, _scratch that_ adult. Keep those hands firmly
gripped on the wheel, noone else driving it but you.

------
agentultra
I've went more or less a similar route as you. I've met people who swear by
going to university. Many who went and dropped out. Others like myself who
didn't go.

We're all in roughly the same spots not far from some imaginary standard
deviation.

Best of luck with this interesting idea. How do you vet the people you intend
to meet? Do you get any spam or trolls?

------
pcthrowaway
I _love_ that you have overandoverrickandmortyadventures.com! I just binge
watched season 1 and checked every domain name; surprisingly there are a few
mentioned in the show that are still unclaimed (I think one was mentioned by
the fake door salesman in a later episode where they watch interdimensional
television)

~~~
milesokeefe
Thanks! I really appreciate the praise, some of my friends didn't get it.

It was fun being able to register a domain and have the site for it done
before the DNS finished propagating. Plus the whole site, favicon and all, is
just one file which is 3kb unzipped:

[https://github.com/MilesOkeefe/overandoverrickandmortyadvent...](https://github.com/MilesOkeefe/overandoverrickandmortyadventures.com)

------
cblock811
Good for you! I'm from the South and moved out here without knowing anyone
before. I would love to meet you and hear how things are going. I would be
happy to introduce you to people too. Included my email when I responded to
your web app but my personal email is listed in my profile. Coffee is on me
though ;P

------
BrandonY
This would be cool as a generic tool, like a 1:1 version of Meetup. Which I
guess is what dating websites are, but explicitly focused on just talking one
time with an interesting person about stuff they are really excited about over
coffee instead of dating.

I would like to have coffee with interesting people from time to time.

------
Blahah
You can basically ignore any life advice you're being given on this thread -
you've got your head screwed on better than anyone here. Keep doing what
you're doing; you're doing it all right.

I'm not in SF, but if you're ever in the UK (London/Cambridge) feel free to
look me up.

------
eddotman
Pretty cool stuff, dude. I filled out the form (which, I assume, sent you an
email). I'll be around Berkeley in January, so if you like chatting about
science stuff, then that could be fun. You have really good initiative
(especially normalized for age).

------
michaelq
The college experience for most Millenials can fit into 14 lines of
JavaScript:
[https://twitter.com/freecodecamp/status/531824655573602304](https://twitter.com/freecodecamp/status/531824655573602304)

------
yawz
Many commented about the merits of college already. I'm just going to say
college life was great. There's more to life than money and professional
success. If you have the opportunity, go through college and experience the
social benefits.

------
V-2
While the main website is very aesthetic...

[http://miles.codes/](http://miles.codes/)

\- this is not a particularly good design. Project descriptions are hardly
readable and it looks plain ugly, to be frank

------
rglover
Might be too late, but would be cool to show off your dev schools by adding
some sort of slot/budget feature that shows how many cups (or money left) you
have open for people to "book."

------
gniquil
Your Meet me at "noon" placeholder got cut off (reads "no" right now). Had to
pull up the trusty inspector to resize the input element to see the full
word... Otherwise awesome!

------
tempodox
If you're one of those strange people who do social networking, this approach
is really cool. I like it :) I'll let you know when I'm in the vicinity.

------
voltagex_
Have you thought about letting other people put up subdirectories/subdomains
on this site? It'd be really useful for a friend of mine (in Australia)

------
mattlogan1
F the haters, you're clearly doing something right.

------
tuxguy
Very impressive Miles !

You should speak to Sahil
[http://sahillavingia.com/](http://sahillavingia.com/)

Wish you all the very best !

------
afar
I like the .coffee domain. Nice get. Although, with 190+ points, "I'll buy you
coffee" might get a bit expensive.

~~~
milesokeefe
I don't doubt it will, but I think it'll fetch a pretty good ROI.

------
trekky1700
I'd love to take you up on this, but I'm afraid I'm thousands of "Miles" away.

Sorry I had to.

Nice Rick and Morty site on your portfolio!

------
chrismorgan
[http://miles.codes/](http://miles.codes/) doesn’t work well in Firefox, by
the way.

~~~
milesokeefe
My bad, I need to get better at testing on environments that I don't use
personally.

I take chrome for granted and know that that's a very bad thing (re: the IE6
era v2.0).

------
Pinn2
Neat! Just remember that it's not just who you know--it's what you know!
You'll go far.

------
too_many_miles
[http://imgur.com/DtAqDBU](http://imgur.com/DtAqDBU)

~~~
milesokeefe
This got a laugh out of me :)

Pretty impressed you make an account just for this.

------
jclish
Welcome to California.

------
Multiplayer
How are you marketing this page?

~~~
milesokeefe
I posted it here, then tweeted this HN post to my measly 134 followers.

I also have this site linked to on my personal site,
[http://miles.codes](http://miles.codes). But my personal site doesn't get
much traffic so I don't think that had any effect.

I've really done no marketing besides posting here and on Twitter. It's just
luck and how you phrase the title I think. For example, I posted this link for
the first time a few days ago with the the title "I'll buy you coffee" and it
only got 2 upvotes.

------
ashah
go to college, dont miss your chance to have sex with human women

------
martinvol
beautiful website, by the way!

