LessWrong has rolled out a new feature on the user preference pages under "Location":

 

 

This is UNCHECKED by default.  Also, we don't know by default where you live.

If you think you might want to meet up with other LWers, please input your location and check this box. Once enough people have signed up in a new area, it will make starting a LW meetup there that much more straightforward for the future organizer.  (You'll just get that email; they won't see your email address.)  In general, it seems like being able to know something about where LWers live would be helpful, so please consider entering your approximate location even if you don't check the box.

Thanks to Wesley Moore for deploying this upgrade to the LW backend.

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Thanks. Is there a way to see the usernames and locations of all LW accounts side by side, or search for people near you?

Thankings and gratitudes. This should help for those of us who live in backwater low-LW-density regions, among other things.

[-]Rain30

Note: your location will appear to anyone else looking at your account as public information.

Does this mean we won't have as many posts about meetups taking up space?

Probably the opposite, since this will make people in existing groups more likely to make meetups on the site. I have not been posting meetups to the site recently (just our mailing list), but this will probably make me do so.

Could we maybe get a setting to autohide meetups not in out area? (Or at least the ones on different continents?)

Oh, good idea. That sounds like the right solution to me.

Nice. I found out about one of the nearest meetups to me about a day or two before it happened, and about three days before I coincidentally discovered that my town's forgotten tiny airport has service to that area for quite cheap (as in, actually within my barely-existent budget). Anyway, it would be helpful to get information on the general population of LWers within a certain distance.

Thank you Wesley.

Thanks