This Zoom Call Has Been Going On For 18 Months And It's Perhaps The Most Wholesome Thing I've Ever Seen

    A meeting with 100 of your best friends.

    Andria Moore
    by Andria Moore

    BuzzFeed Staff

    The year is 2020. It's been two months since the World Health Organization declared COVID a global pandemic and wrecked everyone's lives.

    Luke Bryan saying his life is pretty much over
    NBC / Via giphy.com

    Gone were the days of office banter, mid-day coffee runs, and grabbing lunch with coworkers.

    Dwight from the office looking sad and sitting in a corner in the hall
    Peacock / Via giphy.com

    For many, like Cache Bunny, a video director and visual effects artist in Los Angeles, working from home started to feel super isolating.

    Cache had the wild idea to make a public Zoom — free for anyone to join — that could serve as an almost virtual coworking space for anyone else feeling the pandemic woes. She called it Edit Party — a community of creatives and others with day jobs that require lots of time staring at a computer. Members can log on at any time and feel less alone.

    Woman suggesting she create a zoom party for those who want to co-work
    Cache Bunny / Edit Party

    "Within like an hour of posting, people started joining from all over — Argentina, Canada, all over America — and immediately it was clear everyone was cool and had similar creative goals," she said.

    One of the coolest parts about Edit Party is that you can log on anytime from anywhere and there will always be someone online. "I think it was only that first day that we stopped [the call] overnight, but since then we haven’t stopped it, it’s just been going," she said.

    Lots of people on a global zoom and woman explaining it's been running for 18 months
    @monet.izabeth / Via tiktok.com

    Obviously, Zoom kicks you out after 24 hours, but since Cache first dropped the original link on May 3, 2020, the call has only stopped long enough for one of the admins to start it back up again. "We try to have admins in as many different time zones as possible," she explained. 

    "It’s nerve-racking to join a Zoom call when you don't know anyone who is in it," said Monet Izabeth, a solo traveler and documentarian based in Boston, Massachusetts. "But as soon as you log in, someone will notice and be like, 'Hey, what’s up?' Everyone is so welcoming."

    Monet first logged on to Edit Party in January, and since then she said if she's home, she'll be on: "When I’m home, I will be on Edit Party during the day. It's definitely a place for creatives to come and focus, but I will also log on in the morning and leave it on and come back."

    One rule of Edit Party — no mics can ever be on. "You can’t be talking the whole time or else you’ll never get anything done," Cache said. But that doesn't mean Edit Party is all work, work, work. The chat is almost always running, and people discuss everything from the projects they're working on to their work frustrations, or they just ask for some moral support.

    Woman showing off the chat on the global zoom
    @monet.izabeth / Via tiktok.com

    "I can hop on at like 2 in the morning because my computer crashed or I have a work thing, and I can be like, 'Guys, I need help,' and the whole chat will help," Cache said. 

    The chat has become such a community of friends from all over the world that numerous real-life meet-ups have started happening. In October, Monet helped organize an East Coast meet-up and heard some of her "internet" friends' voices for the first time.

    New friends from the zoom meeting on the east coast at a beach
    @monet.izabeth / Via tiktok.com

    For Cache, those friendships have extended so far that she now currently lives with three roommates who she met through Edit Party. "Around December of 2020, I asked a small group, like, 'We should all get a place together,' and it went from there."

    The roommates Cache met through Edit Party have been OG attendees since the beginning — "literally since day one," she said.

    Now, Edit Party has expanded to include attendees from 71 countries who speak a variety of different languages, and they even hosted their first "Edit Festival" for Edit Party's one-year anniversary back in May.

    new friends from the zoom meeting for tacos and beer
    @monet.izabeth / Via tiktok.com

    "We did 30 hours of nonstop Zoom and had sponsored content and live performers every hour," Cache explained.

    Cache said before Edit Party, she was feeling major "desk fatigue," but since that time, she's developed a more "positive association" with her work.

    Edit Party

    "Having Edit Party there just makes that [work] a lot more fun and tolerable and it gives me a positive association with sitting at my desk," she said. "Just knowing there are people that will be smiling and waving at me when I log on, and knowing I can be like, 'I'm really feeling tired today, give me some motivation,' and they'll be like, 'Let’s get a coffee together,' and then we’ll cheers over zoom."

    If this sounds like the thing for you, Cache and Monet both encourage anyone interested in Edit Party to try it out for themselves here!