It's a different kind of connection where a Wi-Fi signal is not needed. Members of the Offline Club check their electronics at the door, grab a coffee and a seat, and pretend like it’s the '90s.
A cafe in Amsterdam is filled with people on a Sunday afternoon, but there’s not a laptop or cellphone in sight.
Those meeting are part of the Offline Club, where members check their electronics at the door, grab a coffee and a seat, and pretend like it’s the '90s.
Each meeting starts off with quiet time for reading, crafting or just relaxing with your beverage. Then it becomes social for people who want to engage with others.
“The Offline Club is a way for people to detox from their rushed daily lives and ever connected lives with notifications. And it’s people who are unhappy with their social media usage or their phone usage and screen time and want to decrease that and get back to real connection," Ilya Kneppelhout, co-founder of the club, told CBS News.
It’s a simple concept, but participants say they really look forward to it.
“You get to be very present in a way you didn’t come in realizing,” one member said.
“It felt a bit like traveling in time and made me feel nostalgic about the way bars and cafes used to be, because nowadays, those are places we’re only going to with friends and people we already know and spend time doing digital things like work,” Kneppelhout added.
The founders say they think the concept would work well in other cities, too.
“We plan to go around the world so right now we’re getting together with a franchising concept and we hope to have offline detox events in the entire world for people to reconnect,” Kneppelhout said.
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