h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

This is a hypothetical question but here goes anyway.
If you met a guy/girl in a chat room who offered you a flight over there to meet him would you go? They seem real nice but bear in mind you have only spoken to him/her once on the internet and once on the telephone.

Ummm...NO! No way would I do that! That person must really be off their rocker to invite someone who may be a homicidal maniac over to their house! Maybe if you had spoken to them like for months but even then that is just plain freaky! This is just another example of how the internet is destroying the foundation of meeting people the healthy way-in person! So hypothetically and realistically-no.=-)

After chatting once??? NO way....
I've met netfriends IRL, but then I'd been e-mailing and chatting with them, one for 4 years, and the other one for 2 1\2, but that's a bit different.
As meeting people IRL after talking to them on the net, you really should know them better than you do after a chat... After all Internet is different from the real world, especially when it comes to talking to people.

I've now met a lot of the h2g2 Researchers in person. And I must say they have all been really nice people. So my view has changed quite a bit. I agree you have to be careful, it's best to meet in a public place, but meeting face to face has been a really enjoyable experience.

I wouldn't meet an individual unless I'd been 'chatting' with them for some time. Months, if not years. For one thing, I'm cautious. For another, I'm married. I wouldn't say know to a group get-together of H2G2 researchers from my area (West Midlands, UK) if one could be arranged, though.

I'd go - if I had the money to stay in a motel and for the return fare, and some leave due, and especially if it was a place I'd never been to before.

I once met up with a net friend, in a public place as always advised, and here's my true story....
I had said on the phone on the day of our meeting:
"I'm not sure if I can make it Joe, I have a spot on my chin, I don't want to put you off on our first date........"
Joe replied:
"Don't worry hun, I have a bit of a shaving rash"
So off I went, concealer intact, walked into the pub, and.........

.... Joe's shaving rash was in fact more severe than I could have imagined, his face and neck were
smothered in HUGE, YELLOW, PULSATING BOILS,
with one really one nasty on his lower lip, that he kept flicking with his tongue until it
popped, and started to drool down his chin, before he swiftly licked it clean.........

Okay, so I'm shallow, but boy did I run!

Gee...teenager nightmare!
Maybe a blind date is really to heavy...

I wished to join the h2g2 meeting (public place, lot of people), just to see the real people behind the nicknames, but I could not organise...

Teenage acne wouldn't have been so bad, but we we're both over 25!!

Oh, sorry, I did not know....in this case, it´s more like an everyday hygiene problem...

(I have an allergy to shellfish that brings me out in a similar condition. Ugh.) I really tend to avoid meeting people who I only know from print media simply because you tend to build up a picture of them in your mind's eye in a very idealised way. And when you meet them and they're nothing like you expected it's inevitably a massive disappointment. Not least because almost everyone (and I include myself in that number) comes across as wittier and more intelligent in print...

I'd still recommend it. What about the blind dates that have turned into lasting friends, however you met them?That you have to kss a lot of frogs before you fins the prince doesn't mean you have to include toads with hygiene problemsi

Never actually been on a blind date.... Or for that matter met anyone I've got to know on the 'net. Hum. It may be that the fault lies with me rather than the people I meet. Will try to be more open-minded in future.

I would be still a bit afraid of a blind date - not just because the other person can turn out to be...whatever (no match), but what if that other person runs away screaming when seeing me?!? And I can start to build up my ego in the next couple of weeks, while feeling really bad (and looking so, respectively).

Of course meeting someone who you've only had a very brief converstation with is a little odd. But as long as you have a back-up plan (have enough cash for a hotel or somesuch) then sure, I'd go. A free plane trip is a free plane trip. Don't arrange to meet the person in a dark alley. But sure, I'd go in a minute.

As a matter of fact my last boyfriend came from a web board that I'd been hanging around for a few months. I invited him to visit me (he was only a state away, and he had to pay his own bus fare, I'm no sucker!) and he ended up moving in. In addition to that I've met, in person, tons of people who I first met on the internet.

Honestly, I never really understood why people made such a big deal out of meeting people, in person, who they know from the internet. Sure, you have to use your judgement, but you have to do that anyway. People can lie about their intentions just as easily in person as they can on the phone or in text. I mean I've had people who I've lived with for a while and thought they were totally cool, when they suddenly freaked out on me, and I had to get a restraining order. Maybe you've never lived with roommates, but you usually know next to nothing about the people when you move in with them. You just never know. But if you don't take a chance you'll end up all hermitlike and have no friends! Heh.

I have two extremely pleasant (though Platonic) relationships going at the moment ie coffee, buns and visits to the ballet with a slightly older gent from a very different cultural background whom I met on a train and an Englishman who is 30 years younger than I am who stopped and chatted outside the all-night shop . I see no reason why, with the above safeguards, most of the people you meet shouldn't be just as nice. If you wait for a formal introduction from someone who knows you both, you're not going to have much of a social life

I agree, and the boily man didn't actually put me off the idea! I have met, and remain friends with several others, including being "matron of honour" at a wedding of a couple that met in an AOL chat room, and subsequently had a net baby!

The boily man was a really nice guy, and I've often felt guilty about being so shallow, but maybe he should have warned me about the condition !!

So far H2G2 is not quite like a regular chatroom or usenet-forum. It is far more organized and people have been known to get their a** kicked when they went too far. This of course does not mean that it is totally safe, it's just a bit safer...

I have met someone on H2G2 from England(I am from the Netherlands) and things are going great for us !

***BUT !!!!!!! ***

1. We met on the H2G2-forums for about 2 months before even contacting each other via ICQ
2. We sent some pics of ourselves so we could see whom we were talking to(I have some on my website, that's easy)
3. We spent lots and lots of time on ICQ together first.
4. We made it very clear(both of us) that the/a visit would not commit us to anything beforehand.
5. We decided that it would be a visit from one friend to another, nothing more unless decided during the stay.

I think people who are underage or insecure should not ever accept an invitation from someone else, on the internet or not. You can get framed anywhere and the outside world is not really very safe either...

Then again I may have been lucky...

TM.

We were BOTH lucky TM I do agree that a fair amount of caution is justified...but you also have to take a chance sometime otherwise
you might as well just hide behind a computer terminal and live the the rest of your life *virtually*.Follow the rules...and your instincts! If it feels wrong then it probably IS wrong!
shazzPRME