Gift ideas for online friends
Hello there!
A friend of mine has their birthday coming up, me being me, I actually don't care for birthdays much (especially mine) and gifts, in fact, I don't remember the last time I bought anything for anyone, myself included.
But lately, I have the desire to change that. I made a friend through a game and we're really close. I'd like to do something for them. Although my choices are limited and I want it to be a surprise, meaning, I don't want to give them hints that I'm doing anything, like asking for their address. This got me thinking of creating this thread here, if that's alright.
So far, here's what I have in mind:
- Hiring a digital artist to create an artwork about them
- Naming a star after them
- Curating a playlist for them
- Coding a temporary celebratory website they can visit with cheesy stuff that reminds me of them
With that said... Have you ever done this type of thing before? What would you do for a friend you've met online, knowing your choices are virtual and limited? Have you ever received gifts from online friends? What were they?
Your ideas are already really lovely!
My favourite would probably either be an artwork or the playlist! :D
If you like the website idea, something like a little project in Godot might be something more "permanent".
Also if you play an instrument, maybe you can record something for them?
Thank you, I appreciate these responses. I actually do play an instrument and somehow didn't think of it. Maybe I'll record a stupid, silly song. I'm not really serious about it and I play only for myself.
Most of the gifts I've exchanged with online friends over the years have been gifted Steam games. If you met in a game, odds are you have them added as a friend on Steam and can view their wishlist. You could even consider if there's a co-op game you both might enjoy to give you something new to play together.
The only problem with this is that you can't always gift Steam games to someone from another country -- it depends on the specific two countries you're from and how close the game prices are between them iirc. My ex and I couldn't gift each other Steam games because my Steam account was US-based and theirs was Norwegian.
Damn, I get the reasoning, but that sucks.
Btw, if you're a digital artist yourself, please feel free to share your work in my private messages if you'd be up to do something like this!
How far away are you / are you from different countries? I've mailed some local goodies from my hometown to online friends over the years. These friends were mainly US-based, but I've mailed to Belgium, Japan, and Australia too. Totally understand why you would wanna stick to something digital/online in this situation though - they may not even be willing to give you a physical address anyway. I just love the idea of sharing something you can only get where I come from. Sharing the place I'm from is also sharing a piece of myself.
We're quite far from each other, even though I wouldn't mind doing this, I feel maybe it's too early for it. I'm quite uptight about privacy stuff too so I'd hesitate to ask this. On top of that, I don't want them to expect them anything at all, and I know shipments can be troubling sometimes; I'd like whatever I do to be done exactly on their day. But I completely understand you, I'd love to send them physical things, in the future!
Way back in the Livejournal days, we made a secret gift thing with songs - I still have the songs saved somewhere, along with the couple voice records that were included. It felt really nice!
It was a fairly eclectic mix of around 6-7 songs, all with a note about the songs and why they thought I'd like them