I’m very fortunate to know and participate in the HN community, and I’m looking for ways to increase my immersion.
Even when I visit cities, venue layouts are designed in a way that discourages collaborative discussion. And few and far between are places which promote civil discussion of progressive ideas.
VR isn’t to the point where is HNers could just immerse themselves into a medium such as a digital cafe or book shop.
Is there another medium you view a community such as HN existing in? Perhaps a 3D world where users upload their custom .obj character model and physically congregate at different areas in the world. Not so different from an MMO, but with the sole purpose of civil discussion and collaboration.
Living remotely, I feel at a disadvantage, and would love a more immersive, socially nourishing version of HN.
It sounds like you are looking for something more like a club or at least an informal social group. The online equivalent to these are web forums and chat rooms. There are loads of these and they tend to fly under the radar. I have handful of hobbies and the best communities for these are _well_ outside the borders of the mainstream social media sites. They're frequented (mostly) by people who are friendly, knowledgeable, and generous with their time and advice, which is not something you typically see on facebook, twitter, reddit, etc. They're not secret or hidden, but you do have to go out of your way to find them.
"Civil discussion of progressive ideas" sounds like you want to discuss politics, which I can assure you never ends civilly! But if that's really what you're after, you should not have to go very far to find plenty or venues for that online.