Analog Directory

The yellow pages for real-world communities.

Community

Hi! I'm Chai. Nice to meet you.

I'm a resident of Greenpoint, Brooklyn. People know me around these parts for being a passionate walker, a community event organizer, and a regular at Bar Americano.

I moved to New York City four years ago. My favorite part about living here is how often I run into people I recognize on the streets in my neighborhood. I don't necessarily know all of them, but the mutual recognition of similar neighborly life experiences, along with a smile and a head nod, goes a long way in lighting up my day.

But it wasn't always like this.

When I first moved to New York, I'd left a decade's worth of friends in LA, didn't have close friends or coworkers near me, had just gone through a breakup, and was longing for my people. Luckily for me, I was able to build my community right here in my one-mile radius pretty quickly.

Part of building that community was starting Brooklyn Walk Club with my friend Emily a few years ago. We'd post our starting location on Instagram and meet for a 40-minute walk every Thursday, from McCarren Park to Domino Park.

The crazy part is how it grew: from 6 people, to 10, to 20, to 30. Our biggest walks were around 40 people. And this was even in the 10-degree, dark evenings of the winter months.

I was surprised and curious, so I asked:

It's one thing if I'm the crazy guy walking in the cold and dark. But why are you all here?

The answers were always the same.

People told me New York is an incredible city full of incredible people, but they still found it difficult to find connection in their day-to-day lives. They felt disconnected from their neighborhoods. They felt like it costs $20 just to step out of the apartment and breathe air.

People are lonely, and they are craving connection.

This was deeply personal to me. And as a builder, I wanted to figure out how I could help fix it, at least for my neighborhood.

Enter Play Fair.

Play Fair is a community festival meant to bring together hyper-local clubs, small businesses, volunteer organizations, and neighbors for discovery and play. Think college campus org fair, but for neighborhoods.

I partnered with my friend Anastasia to bring Play Fair to life. We expected a few hundred people to come, but were astonished when thousands showed up. Not only that, the entire neighborhood came together to help make it happen. I personally spoke to 200 people that day, and the response was incredibly positive and overwhelming.

So why does all of this matter?

What we learned

In the journey of building my own community in New York, I learned and experienced a few things firsthand.

1. People are craving connection IRL. No amount of social media or AI is going to replace that. In fact, it is only going to make people want human connection more.

2. There is no one place where people can find their community easily. Events are not community. There is something to be said about showing up again and again, seeing the same faces, and bonding over shared passions and emotions.

3. It is not sustainable to make community building your life's mission right now. What people do not know about really cool communities is that it takes a lot of time, money, and effort to bring people together. There is a hidden balance sheet here, one that is only spoken about in community-builder circles and that attendees never see. And it is brutal. You are trying to survive in an already unaffordable city while pouring whatever spare time, money, and energy you have into bringing people together.

What Analog is for

So now, we're building Analog to solve all of this.

Think of Analog as a yellow pages for communities: a place where local clubs, recurring gatherings, volunteer groups, creative circles, and neighborhood communities can get discovered.

But the bigger vision is about sustainability.

Community builders should not have to choose between paying rent and creating the spaces that make a city feel alive. Nor should they have to turn to taxing their members with ticketing and stifling what makes every gathering feel raw & authentic. There are so many thoughtful brands, apps, small businesses, and nonprofits that care about gathering and want to support it. The hard part is helping them find the right communities, and helping organizers receive support in a way that feels aligned, tasteful, and genuinely helpful, while making sure there is enough to go around for everyone.

That is what Analog is designed to unlock.

We want every community to be able to create a listing, tell their story, get found by people who are looking for belonging, and eventually connect with sponsors they actually feel good about. Sponsors who understand the room they are entering. Sponsors who help gatherings grow without making them feel like ads.

We are starting simple. For organizers, Analog is a place to set up your community listing, get discovered, and put yourself in a better position to receive support later. And from day zero, we are offering grants funded by us and by generous sponsors who believe in this work.

For anyone looking for meaningful groups and communities to join, you are in the perfect place. Search around, show up, and leave a review for any community you love.

Happy gathering!

• Chai, Co-founder of Analog