The internet is unrecognisable when you remove talking to strangers from it. It feels suddenly less useful. You probably don't know most of the people you follow on Twitter, but you might have discussed each other's mental health. You're never going to meet everyone you upvote on Reddit, but you've shared in their best moments and eavesdropped on their worst.

Thanks to this ability to connect with people, we don’t have to physically isolate ourselves to be part of a community anymore. The internet means we can expose ourselves to ideas that would have usually never entered our lives.

This podcast is about groups of people on the internet and why they connect with each other. It’s about forums, niche conversations, moderators, and new languages. It’s also about how these groups could sometimes, even just a little bit, be compared to cults. 

All episodes written and edited by: Helen McCarthy (@helenlmccarthy)Music by: Antti Luode (http://anttismusic.blogspot.co.uk)