I just wanted to let people know that this service is no longer available.

Thank you to those who completed the survey.

I hope your groups continue to meet. If so or if not, still feel free to contact me if there is any way I can help your group.

I received excellent feedback from a participant whose group never met. She recommended starter questions in my initial emails to the group. I'll put them here too:

• What is your preferred software for doing a video call?
• What times of day and days of the week are you usually available for a call?
• How did you originally become interested in one of your shared interests?
• What are you currently doing to explore one of your shared interests?

If you're in one of the groups just formed, please take a moment and reply all to answer some or all of these questions.

And if you're in a group that was emailed weeks ago, but you haven't met, go back to the email and reply all with answers to some of these questions. It's never too late to form community!

Hello all,

I've advertised "Distant No More" on lots of subreddits, and I'm not sure if there are any more that would be appropriate for me to advertise on. Consequently, I expect that if any more people subscribe to the service, it will be a trickle, and there will not be enough people to form groups every week.

If you haven't done so, please still feel free to subscribe. Whenever there are enough people to form a group of 3 or 4 people who share at least two main interests (i.e. they all answered 4 or 5 on the survey), then those groups will be formed and emailed. It will likely take much longer than a week between when you fill out the survey and when you are contacted.

Lastly, if anyone has any recommendations in how to promote the service, please let me know or promote it yourself.

Thanks!

To date, 8 groups have been formed, and I'd love to hear how it's been going. If you're group is ok with you sharing, could you either message me or comment here?

How has this been beneficial?

Is your group doing anything that has helped you form community and get to know one another? Do you have advice for the other groups?

Any critique of the service and how I can do better?

Thanks!

If you've subscribed to this subreddit, but haven't done the survey, please do so in order to be included in a community group. There is a good chance that this will be the last time groups are formed.

I also want to apologize to those who signed up about a week ago. As you can see, it's taking a while for enough people to join to make groups with enough shared interests.

My plan is to run the sorting algorithm and email people their groups on Thursday (and worst case, Friday). If you've subscribed to this subreddit and want to be placed in a group based on your share interests, please fill out the survey by the end of Wednesday:

Survey

To help start community groups, the "Distant No More" service matches people based on shared interests. So here's a bit of information about the service:

• In order to get in a group, one has to fill out the survey by providing their email and indicate their interests on scale from 1 to 5.
• The service uses a machine learning algorithm to place people in groups based on similarity.
• The groups are between 4 to 8 people, and once a group is formed, the service does not add more people to it.
• The group will be emailed together and be told their shared interests, i.e. which items everyone from their group ranked either 4 or 5 on the survey.
• Then, the group of people can decide which web conferencing software they would like to use in order to connect with one another.
• Other than the group being given one another's email and being told their shared interests, I'm not and no one else is giving, sharing, or selling anyone's personal data.
• It's free.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Edit: Modified the post slightly to focus on the service instead of the subreddit.

Any questions?

I'd like to make an FAQ, but something has to be asked at least once. :-)

Groups formed through Distant No More do NOT have to discuss anything spiritual or religious, and if they do, it certainly doesn't have to align with my beliefs. Nevertheless, I want to recommend having a spiritual component. I have personally found that extremely helpful in developing community.

To get started, why not discuss what we're all thinking about anyway: COVID-19? I put together a few Jesus stories on overcoming fear and learning to love one another in the midst of the pandemic. I call it "Fear and Love in the Time of Coronavirus."

Here are the passages:

1. Fear and Focus Luke 8:22-25

2. Fear and Provision Luke 12:22-34

3. Love and Sacrifice Luke 10:25-37

4. Love and Healing Luke 5:15-26

And every passage gets the same questions:

• Read the story at least once.

• Can anyone put the story in their own words?

• What does the story tell you about God or Jesus?

• What does the story tell you about people or yourself?

• How do the previously mentioned insights relate to life during the COVID-19 pandemic?

• How can you apply what you learned in the next few days?

• Is there anyone with whom you can share what you learned?

If you decide to do this in a group, please message me, and I can provide a few additional pointers. Have fun!

So, I was googling for advice on building community, and pretty much everything was about forming a community around your product or brand. Not what I was looking for.

Can you find and share a helpful link on building community?

Thanks!

Here are three questions I always ask when a community gets together.

• What are you thankful for this week?

• What are you struggling with this week? Is there any way we can help?

• Are you aware of anyone else’s needs that we can meet?

This way, you can be happy for one another, grieve with one another, and try to help one another. And while the first two questions help you focus on one another, the last question keeps you from becoming insular.

Feel free to give the questions a try and see if it helps build community.