Group behavior

THE WEBSITE Meetup.commight also be called "when centuries collide," for it marries the human impulse to gather in convivial groups -- which is as old as the quilting bee, the hoedown, and the Grange -- to the eye-blink speed and efficiency of technology.

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The site, known for driving former Vermont governor Howard Dean's run for the presidency, has expanded into a compendium of interests as eclectic as the yellow pages. Politics is still there in all stripes, Marxists to Libertarians, but so are chocolate-lovers, pizza delivery drivers, lawyers who want to leave the law, and just about everybody else with an interest, however narrowly defined.

So if a person wants to get into an actual room with one's fellow beekeepers, Elvis fans, or night-shift workers, one can click the mouse to learn where they're meeting and show up for a face-to-face chat just the way Rotarians do, except the Rotarians probably have broader conversations.

Although it's great to have a tool to pinpoint exactly where the Bull Moose Republicans are or who wants to "Fight Big Media," the strati fication is troubling in a culture that often drills narrow and deep rather than focusing on national and global landscapes.

Reading the long lists of niches available for encampment on Meetup.com -- or similar websites, such as MySpace.com, or Tribe.net -- a person can envision a lot of people talking to their reflections in the mirror instead of challenging, and perhaps strengthening, their beliefs with counterarguments.

They could also be missing the fun of walking into a room and being surprised by coincidence.

"So, you're into Parcheesi, too!" a person might say at the Rotary, neighborhood party, alumni gathering, or other loosely themed event. Learning of that shared interest at a carefully culled confab of board game enthusiasts would probably get a less spontaneous high-five.

One wonders what would happen if a computer glitch mixed membership lists the way the "shuffle" function on an iPod mixes songs.

The results might make for some unforgettable evenings as boomerang fanatics tried to make conversation with accountants, the ferret people exchanged grooming tips with the iguana crowd, and Zippy the Pinhead fans broke bread with fashion moguls.

Studying the splintering of interests and the clubs within clubs can make a person want to stretch the opposite way, seeking the broadest possible definition of one's being: member of the human race, affiliate of the world order of mammals, inhabitant of the planet Earth, energy cluster in the Milky Way, or dot in the cosmos.

If there's a Starbucks out there, let's meet up.