A small but growing number of founders are betting on bringing people together offline

Indeed, right now it’s unclear whether “togetherness” becomes its own sizable investment category. Getting strangers to show up for each other — as good as that may be for society — isn’t nearly as scalable as shipping software. What’s notable is who’s building these companies: Putnam, Walker, Dunn, Gelman, and Neumann have all built a real brand once before.

That makes it easier to raise capital and gives investors some confidence these are founders who know how to build something people actually buy. They’ve each guessed right about where the puck is headed once before. We’ll know more in another year or two whether enough customers follow along.