The days are starting to get longer, the temperatures already feel like summer and the mind caresses the return of the outdoor concert season. That time of year when twenty and thirty-somethings spend most of their savings from festival to festival to have fun and dance but also to hook up and make new friends.
As we grow up and move in together or work from home a lot, we have fewer and fewer opportunities to meet new people and live events can be an oasis of hope in the desert of our sociality.
However, I think I'm a bit rusty in this too, so I asked ChatGPT, with the participation of Siri, to give me some practical tips for meeting new people at a gig.
And what it takes
First of all, it has to be said, however, that one thing artificial intelligences can do a lot better at is precise identification, despite the best efforts of us humans.
If I explain that I am a person who tends to be shy and often keeps to himself, the first piece of advice should not be “be open and sunny". Don't be afraid to approach and make conversation with others present" starting with "simple compliment about the band or event". Wouldn't do it, won't do it.
Come prepared
More interesting are the subsequent points that make up the OpenAI chatbot's diabolical plan to expand my circle of friends. One of the tips I hadn't thought of, not being a GenZ, is to get in touch with online groups or fan communities of the bands I'm going to see. This is because, he explains, they sometimes organize meetings before concerts. By making a date it should be easier to get to know someone.
ChatGPT advises in any case to arrive prepared with some "light" topics to break the ice and to choose the right moments for conversation: between the opening and the beginning of the main performance or between songs. A caution not to risk getting a few slaps in the face, I would say.
If you want, you can
Pushed, ChatGPT goes into mindfulness mode, with a “just visualise something to get it” tone. First, it advises me to be myself and accept the risk of approaching strangers, then, when I ask if I should go to Calcutta again to meet like-minded people more easily, the app gets excited and says: "Yes, of course", but "be ready to make new connections", of course always "with a smile". Advice I certainly won't forget.
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I didn't understand, sorry
Less helpful was Siri, the voice assistant for iPhones and MacBooks, unwilling as it turns out to make me look up from a screen in search of kindred souls. When asked for help with my social debut at the upcoming roman lives, she simply delegates. He links me to three articles, not even too recent, which I later discover are the first three Google results.
The most pertinent one mentions Tinder's feature introduced in 2022 to bring people together during a music festival. Nice, but I don't think I will even try it as a social experiment so as not to risk jeopardizing my relationship. I insist and ask for more details, practical advice, something, but she pretends not to understand and says she can't help me.
Talk amongst yourselves
Then perhaps more than IA it is the artists themselves who can do something for me and for us. A practical decision to foster interpersonal relationships in real life at a concert was made by Cosmo, for example. On the Ivrea-based musician and singer's new tour, there will be no way of wasting time and isolating ourselves by taking photos and videos on a continuous loop. Phone cameras will be covered with a sticker as if you were in a Berlin club.
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Then I could have the courage to ask someone for a cigarette without worrying about disturbing them.
Illustration by Gloria Dozio - Acrimònia Studios
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