During an interview we did, mk once referred to Hubski as like Paris in the 20s. It may have been the NPR Michigan radio interview. I'm not sure, but what I am sure of is that there are a lot of creative people collaborating, sharing and making interesting art on Hubski. That is by far my favorite aspect of the site. When strangers who have never met in person can collaborate and create something bigger than themselves, that's just amazing. We have poets, authors about to release novels, musicians of all genres, entrepreneurs and great conversationalist. We have a #hubskidrinkclub too. We just need the inexpensive living part…
I'd say it really is just the internet is general. We millenials have already been referred to as a lost generation for a few years now, and so say we feel disenfranchised and with little place in the current world is a massive understatement. Meanwhile, literally every idea and person and connection is well heard across the internet, and it's something that people outside our generation don't really have a grasp on. Sure, there are some, and others that use it, but not to the degree of our persona of an online entity and the fading delineation of meatspace and cyberspace. That's really visible on Hubski especially, because we actually have deeply personal relationships with each other. As for physical space, I think our generation (broader than millenials) of thinkers and brilliance veer more towards isolation. In the 1920's, it was obviously much more difficult to hear the thoughts of others. You already had your own thoughts and identity and creative tendencies, but accessing others was difficult. Nowadays we have everyone else's voice, but we have to get away from it all to find our own.
Hubki's collaborative feel (and that beautiful picture of the Croatian coast) is what got me on this train of thought. For the first time in a long time, I'm cautiously optimistic about participating in an online community. From what I've seen, the peeps participating are wicked smart and mostly respectful. It would be awesome to have that community in real life--to just take over an entire block in some out-of-the-way coastal town with a great library and fast internet. A man can dream...
I love the collaborative feel on this site as well. Unlike Reddit, which is designed as a bunch of mini-feifdoms in which one can isolate themselves, the Hubski design is better at getting people with various interests to talk to each other. Everything is on a single global feed, users can pick out parts of the feed they find interesting by following people, domains and topics, and content propagates through sharing rather than a battle for up votes.