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the death of 'third place' locations has had a brutal impact on society
There are still a ton of "third places" – restaurants, bars, and coffee shops are everywhere. They just cost too much money for a lot of people.
Restaurants, bars are part of number first one. Coffee shops to me close early. Never seen one open at 10pm+
The library having games and such would be nice. They likely would run into the issue that thoae unfortunate would turn up and try to stay all night every time to get out of the cold/rain/heat.
Bars usually manage to bounce them without issue due to them not being paying customers. Getting bounced by a librarian does sound kind of cool though.
Homelessness is a problem everywhere. Libraries already struggle with it being a public place, so it would just extend into the night.
Would love something like this!
Cafes near me don't open late a lot of the time. They close at about 5pm. So if you want some place to hang out after work? You have no choice other than a bar.
I hate it.
In the UK they defunded youth centres. Whatever shady shit we used to get up to at those, it was in a safe-ish place which at least one responsible person not far away in the worst case. Our behaviour/activities outside of those places once they were gone, as bored youths in a town of middle age to old people, was much worse.
A lot of us don't even have a second location anymore.
I have a second location. Workplace and my car. Welcome to hell.
discord is the de facto their place for people my age these days. sad there isn’t a better alternative
After a short while, the library owners would realize that they could make a lot more money if they served alcohol in the evenings.
That's called a community centre and used to be pretty common. Growing up we had multiple that were run by the local Catholic organizations, and I think there were also some that were run by the youth branch of the various political parties.
But a key component of such a place being success is having a certain kind of open culture. There's countries where if you throw 10 strangers in a room and return an hour later, you'll find 10 strangers on their phone, having not uttered a single word to each other.
People also have a tendency to divide into subgroups and isolate from each other. It's a step in the right direction and better than no community at all. But it can breed resentment and even violence. That's a common problem of community centres here.
If we constantly tell people that their primary defining characteristic is their race, or their sexuality, or their nationality, and we tell them that those people are the only ones who can truly get them, then it’s no surprise this results in a culture of isolating into little demographic groups.
Heck, or political beliefs. People should agree to disagree more nowadays.
Our library hosts lounge night and a game night. Lounge night is lofi music and people enjoying themselves with games, movies, books, larping, and writers sharing. Poetry night and writers block aren't personally my favorite but there's those as well.
Oh wow a poetry night sounds fun. I could share my mediocre poetry.
I host late night D&D. Or play team sports. Life is what you make it folks.
Yup, even though I'm pretty new to D&D I'm hosting a game with a few people from the us (I'm from Europe), nearly every weekend I'm chuckling because of the things they come up with, some of the best fun from the entire week, even though it's literally 1 am for me at that time
Yes I get a little bit sleep deprived, but I fix it by oversleeping till 10 AM
Life sucks but this is some of the few things keeping me here
I refuse to play D&D online. It is my "real people time", an irony considering we're all playing imaginary characters.
About five years ago I started hosting D&D 9pm (21:00) Friday evenings. There was a restaurant in town that was open late, largely serving takeout orders. So we requested a regular table in the back corner and they offered us a free plate of nachos every Friday. We usually played for three or four hours, and a few people ordered drinks or finger food – enough for the restaurant to break even on the nachos at a minimum. It was our "bar replacement" activity. I immediately had buy in from the players, and had to turn people away.
I moved a few years later, and my new house had a large-group friendly basement suitable for D&D. In my new city, I posted looking for players for the same time slot: 9pm Fridays. I was oversubscribed within a few hours. We had a few pauses during COVID, but are still playing at the same timeslot.
I still use the "in person only" rule at my table. During COVID, a bunch we're proposing we play online. I don't want to play online. I can do that with innumerable games that already fill that niche. I want pencil and paper and friends.
Yeah, I mentioned us playing online since I can't exactly fly every weekend to the US just to play dnd
D&D at the latest night libraries!
Here in Finland a lot of libraries are open pretty late (scan card and PIN to access, free of charge). Some close because of vandals, but it mostly works.
Not much socializing, though. Mostly people choose the drinking in domestic isolation.
That is why our local libraries started hosting board game nights. Mixed bag because there are already a bunch of successful board game clubs attracting the more experienced crowd.
I just have people come to my house and we stay up late and play board games
I just have people come to my house
This step is pretty difficult. (1) You know people, (2) they would agree to come to your house, and (3) you have enough room to have guests.
Still working on Step 1 over here :/
I myself am failing all 3 atm. To add on top of that, I prefer to sleep a lot and I do not own any board games.
Solution: sleepover with lots of cuddles. Solves the space issue lol
when i was a kid i would go to the library all the time until 10, which was late for me at that age. i wasn't a big reader, but it was a perfect excuse to escape family.
sell coffee etc. to pay the bills. all the cool kids are doing it. Libraries are looking for more visitors. Install a Starbucks with tables near the gaming PCs. books and chairs in the corner. Checkout counter is already done, Re: bars, Why do they all have parking lots? AA without the chanting.
I can't express enough how badly I want this.
It's really disappointing how much of our space is privatized.
I'm hoping to eventually open something like a board game cafe to help address this for my hometown. Far from a perfect solution, but I would like to get as close to a "third place" community-oriented vibe as possible without going totally broke, at least.
Apparently we're even supposed to give individuals private space now!?
It's actually pretty easy to book libraries for after hours events. There's a small cost associated because it requires staff to work outside normal hours.
I can't even afford to rent a room during normal working hours though. Plus, I'm pretty sure my local library doesn't offer evening bookings.
Asterisk: I can technically afford it, but I'm not paying like $160/mo to host a weekly club at the library. That defeats the whole point of a third space.
Paying for something doesn’t defeat the point of a third place. Enterprising and profit do. People covering just the cost of materials required for their activity is not that bad a thing.
I would rather more basic activities be covered by taxes too though.
I agree with you, but I do wish our society/culture allowed us to exist without requiring constant payment. Just exhausting after a while.
My library does sell food but only 11am -4pm, Monday - Thursday…
And domestic violence, that's how I read it the first time. Dark humor?
Won't work very well if there's someone constantly shushing.
If libraries were open late they would be filled with homeless people looking for a safe, warm place.
What I’m saying is we need safe warm places for the homeless AND libraries to be open late.
Gaming stores for some board games and DnD.
