Comment by rickcarlino
18 hours ago
The way people get information online is changing rapidly.
I run a local makerspace. It is not quite the same thing as a local entertainment business, but there are certainly some similarities. We are local, and we are very event-based.
For the last 10 years, the way we would get new members was to host Meetups. Meetups are slowly bringing in fewer members. When I ask tour guests how they found out about us, they recently started saying that they found us on ChatGPT. They did not know what a makerspace was but they explained their problem and ChatGPT presented our space as a local solution. This has been good for us because we offer something useful to the community but struggle to explain it. In the old days of search, this was a problem because many people were not using the correct phrase to describe what we are. That doesn’t matter anymore.
How does a local business optimize for this though? I am not sure.
The question is how LLMs will get that kind of information in the future, if not from the web. By scraping TikTok and Discords?
>By scraping TikTok and Discords?
One of two ways. Yes, by scraping, even it it requires users to 'sell' their own browsing data to the AI companies because places like Discord lock them out.
Or, the other way is for particular event organizers to pay directly for their services to be advertised/incorporated into the LLM itself. Those that don't pay get more and more of their data erased from the LLM maybe?
Oof, that second one is ugly. Like Yelp style.
I anticipate a cottage industry of “AI optimization” types similar to the current SEO crowd. I have not seen too much of it yet, though.
Business directory for most of the telephone era was simply known as "the yellow pages". About once a quarter we get a color mailer with all the local plumbers, fencing companies, electricians etc. for homeowners who want a company that is actually licensed and insured.
instead of hosting a website you host... SERVICE.md, BUSINESS.md, .... or maybe a MCP server describing what you provide /s
Have a look at llms.txt
Are you using "Meetups" to mean Meetup.com or just events in general? Meetup.com has completely gone to shit. Trying to find an event is super frustrating. They show the same events over and over. They don't enforce categorization. People mark online only events as in person and the platform doesn't care. They also started trying to charge users (people looking to attend events) instead of only planners (people hosting events) so it drives people away.
Sadly I don't know any better platform but it seems ripe for a new entry.
What’s super depressing about Meetup.com are those Modal popups that want you to sign up for Pro. You can’t dismiss them. It’s like they’re intentionally destroying their product to squeeze the last remaining dollars from their users, which I assume are becoming fewer and fewer.
There is a meetup-like platform called Spontacts here in Germany. I suspect that for the moment it is only available for meetups in Germany, but who knows, maybe it'll expand internationally if it's successful.
I meant both, and you are correct 100% that meet up has entirely gone to shit.
Yeah that is my experience entirely with meetup these days