[dirtybirdnj]

It provides me with a sense of community that I lack in my life. I am driven by technology but not a lot of other people in my life are interested in these things.

It's often providing me with "restore faith in humanity" experiences when I see exchanges in the comments where the worst impulses of humanity are expressed, and someone will respond with an eloquent and well articulated rebuttal to the insanity that society has normalized.

There are also lots of smart people saying really dumb shit on here as other comments have alluded to.

But overall, this is one place that consistently restores my hope that there are other people out there who think like I do and share even a few of my values.

[monnow]

I second this. Being a farmer with a huge interest in electronics and programming, I don't get to hang around like-minded people (generally, I barely to get to hang with people that have a decent grasp of their mother tongue, thus I just work and listen to podcasts and some audiobooks). The hn comment section and some of the blogs I read here make the tech world something tangible, rather than something only happening in some far away land.

[solardev]

As a programmer interested in (mechanized) farming, how does one get started? Are there crossover interest groups where people discuss automated farming?

[TacticalCoder]

> It provides me with a sense of community that I lack in my life. I am driven by technology but not a lot of other people in my life are interested in these things.

You should try to find meet ups and/or hacker spaces if you live near an actual city. I've been to several countries and have always been able to find those (well, ok, except when I was in rural France with the closest real city a 1h30+ min drive or so).