Does anyone else hate Meetup.com? (sales, homes, income)

[WiW]

I love meetup.com. We were able to meet like minded people and make friends very quickly after moving to Denver. Love it!

So a group isn't nice (assuming no mistakes were made). ...Move on. Life is short.

[Osito]

Thanks for all of your responses. I'll rejoin when I get a better work schedule (although I'm not looking to get another job since I'm using my present job to move). I agree with some of you, there are quite a few groups on there that interest me and that's what got me into it.

[suissegrl702]

I found this thread by chance, and have a differing opinion than many here. I live in OC, in Southern California. I have been disappointed in the meetups here. I was banned for no reason from one, was told I was not a good fit. I never did anything wrong. Not a threat to anyone, never got drunk and crazy, never spewed crazy political opinions. I have since learned that the organizer of that group (The OC Social Group also known as the OCGroup or Ginny's group for anyone interested) is banhappy; she bans on a whim and has even removed members from meetups they have signed up for to maintain the ratios of men/women in her group. I've been told by her organizers her ban list is a mile long. One of her friends who was an assistant organizer just did not like me.

Another group I am still in, I watched a guy get banned because one of the assistant organizers did not like him. Again, not a threat to the group, no drama, no issues. But out he went.

Another organizer of yet another group told me he banned someone once because he was drunk and did not like the guy.

Many of the groups here seem to be run by banhappy control freaks who are looking to expand their social circle. I've almost deleted my profile and left the site for good. In six months of being on that site I have not met very many people worth knowing anyways. If its not a banhappy control freak, then the group is overrun with cougars and whatever a male cougar is called. Old people who insist on hanging out with people under 40. When I say old I mean 50+. Old enough to be my parents age.

Meetup has been disappointing so far. Very very disappointing. It might be a great site elsewhere, but meetup in Orange county is awful and not very useful at all. If you want banned, there are no shortage of banhappy nutjobs who organize groups, nerd and non-nerd, rich and poor here, and if you want to hang out with cougars, no shortage of that either.

[geldryk]

Yup. I was banned for the following reason...

"Members of the planning committee have received several complaints about inappropriate comments you've made to other members recently. Since this has happened before, as have snide comments you've made on our Meetup pages, the committee decided to ban you from membership."

They gave no specific reason nor detailed the complaints. When I spoke to the leader, They said the reasons were "confidential." When I pressed, the only reason he gave was that I complained about not enough dances.

I have pointed some flaws in the meetup software that causes misleading automatic messages to be sent to members incorrectly stating interest in another member. The leader denied this was happening in the face of direct verbal evidence from members who received the messages and the members who supposedly sent them. The leader took this personally and launched a pattern of personal harassment by strictly applying rules to me that were not being strictly applied to others - he said once that my photo did not clearly show my face while many members had no photo at all and one woman's photo was a picture of cat in a cooking pot. One member of the group has a criminal record of bank robbery and stalking.

The real and immediate reason for all of this is that i broke up with a woman who is a personal friend of the leader and most of the board.

Several months after the breakup I started dating a woman I met outside the group. She and I were eating at La Posada and listening to some favorite musicians when about a dozen members of Friends First showed up already drunk. They sat down at a table nearby and began harassing me and my date. At first it was verbal. Then one of the group came over and sat down at our table to "settle a bet" with one the others about whether he could get me to smile! As an hour passed they got drunker and drunker. I told them their behavior was inappropriate and asked them to leave us alone. The next news I got was that I am banned.

Most of the people in this MeetUp are very nice but the core group that runs the show behave like they never grew out of high school.

[ShampooBanana]

I only had very good experiences with Meetup. When I was in Phoenix and was new to the city, I joined a group that had over a thousand members (at the time - now over 2,000) so there were events going on about every night of the week. I went to enough events where I got to know the people and made a lot of friends, dated a few, and then finally met my wife. We met at a live music event, went hiking up Camelback the next day, and then spent the weekend in Sedona with the Meetup group. I personally know of three other couples that got married after meeting in the same Meetup group! We have some amazing memories through it, and even though we now live in Denver, we are still friends with several of the members from the group. If you make a concerted effort it's a good thing, but just like other social groups, you get out of it what you put into it.

[Suzatlarge]

Wow, this thread was a revelation to me. I belong to a handful of meetup groups here in the Denver area. But they're almost all photography groups, vs. some kind of "social" group. Our meetups are focused [sorry couldn't help it] events - we're shooting an event or location, or it's a class. I've met some nice people, had fun, haven't been subjected to any interpersonal dramas, and learned a lot.

Note to self: stick to subject matter groups, avoid the social ones. Because I like meetup.com. And I want to keep it that way!!

[ackmondual]

It varies per geography, group, organizers, circumstances, and events.

I've used MU out on the east coast and IL. Good events, and nobody (for the most part) was ban happy. Some groups do have policies how if you RSVP yes but not show up without advance notifications or talking with the event organizer afterwards, they'll either restrict your activities, or ban you.

I understand how we psychologically take it personally in this case, so while it's wrong to not at least reflect briefly on it (as sometimes, you truly may have done something to warrant it), indeed, don't dwell on it too much.

.

I've been in one group where we had over 400 or 500 gamers. Then the organizer said he had a lot of stuff coming up and being busy, so they'll have elections on someone to be president, VP, treasurer, secretary, etc. of the group. One source of conflict was how the organizer, despite saying he was stepping down, still wanted full control over the group. The rest were confused b/c when you step down, you're supposed to cede that power. Another issue was how funds were being allocated. One side they were spent on necessities, like MU fees and for the surplus of food ordered for one event, another said it didn't seem like that.

As folks spoke out against some of these practices, some of them got banned. A subgroup ended up starting their own MU group. As some folks also joined this group, the organizer of the original one banned them. A while later, most people who were in the original group now participate in the new group.

.

I signed up for some casual gaming + social group. I'm 2.5 hours away, but figured if I'm ever in the city, I can check them out. As you all may know, as a member, I get emails from the organizers, asst. org., and members. One of them was how someone wanted to know if there was still space for an upcoming event. The organizer said since a couple before who couldn't get in, pleaded with her to let them in, and then RSVP-ed no after getting in, they're banned, and you guys can now sign up for those empty slots. This might be over the top from some of my previous groups, but if there's limited space, I can sort of respect that.

.

If there's something with a higher commitment, like role playing games, or construction projects, the group will often have a policy where you're allowed 1 miss, but after that, you're banned.

.

In Meetin.org group (another social site, but not MU), I've heard a story from a guy who got banned b/c a woman said he kept hitting on her, and doing so in an inappropriate way. He got banned. But then other men got banned too in the same manner, and at this point, folks were wondering who the real culprit really was. It turned out this woman was making false accusations, so really, SHE should've been the one to be banned, not those other 5 dudes. Meetin.org lifted their bans, but at that point, they were frustrated, and moved on to other things. The guy I talked with did rejoin and continue doing events. In fact, since he's married, women like him since he won't hit of them, and men like him since he's no longer competition for the women

[chartbury]

Glad I found this thread as I needed to vent about Meetup and the power organizers have over the brave souls who turn up to a meeting/outing solo. Yes, there's definitely a tendency for organizers to get "block happy" and publicly shame others with fake "no shows" etc (I've had that one!) My advice? Use a nickname and skip the photo when you sign up. You never know who you're going to be running into.

[SQL]

Originally Posted by Osito

Hey all,

I wrote this Denver-specific because that's where I am. About a month ago I signed up for Meetup.com because I've heard good things about it and I was hoping to meet some people with some of my interests. I deleted my account tonight when I realized I had been removed from one, Reading Between The Wines.

Is this normal if a user can't attend too many meetups? I hadn't attended any of the meetups because I work overnights at my job, which include weekend days and all of their meetups were on weekends. Other groups that I was involved in, the meetups were across town.

Is this the way one can expect to be treated trying to get to know other people??? I was eventually planning to attend these meetups when time/schedule permitted. I didn't think there was any pressure. Thoughts?

I get your POV, but I also get the group admin's POV. With Meetup groups, people tend to be flaky. You'll have 100 people RSVP for a rooftop bar event, and only 25 show up. The Meetup group admin wants active participation, because they have to pay a nominal fee to set the group up on Meetup. If you get people who sign up for your group and events and rarely show up, it can be frustrating. After all, you set up and paid for the group so you could get active members to come out and participate in something you have shared interest in.

[nick4242]

Some of them seem legit, but probably 70% of all meetups are just people trying to sell you something. That is extremely unethical, and I would never do business with someone who had to resort to such BS to get business.