The Nerdfighters at UMD meet every Thursday in the Stamp Student Union, mostly to bond over nerd culture and discuss planning for future events, including movie nights  and visits to bookstores such as The Book Thing in Baltimore. About 38 members regularly attend the meetings

The chairs in Stamp Student Union’s Juan Ramón Jiménez room are usually organized in several neat rows, but on Oct. 10, the Nerdfighters at UMD spread them into a lumpy circle. As people began trickling in, several girls chose to sit on one another’s laps, hugging as they talked. This was a community; the members wanted to be able to see one another and interact.

Though there was an agenda on the board, the first order of business was socializing. The next issue at hand: Should they show Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog or How to Train Your Dragon for the next movie night?

This was an ordinary meeting for the Nerdfighters. The group, which hosts events such as movie nights and outings to The Book Thing (a book co-op in Baltimore), holds weekly Thursday meetings, followed by trips to the dining halls to continue its conversations. The group is growing in popularity on the campus, but the core tenet tying the group together is sometimes unclear to outsiders. What exactly is a Nerdfighter?

President and founder Aaron Revere, a senior environmental science and policy major, explained that the Nerdfighters are a loosely organized group of fans of vlogbrothers, a popular YouTube channel started in 2007 that brothers Hank and John Green update twice a week. Many followers of the channel are also active readers of John Green’s young adult fiction novels, including Looking For Alaska and The Fault in Our Stars, which is being made into a movie.

However, at their core, the Nerdfighters are simply a group of nerdy people fighting to make the world a better place, Revere said.

Although the Nerdfighters were originally defined as the fan base for vlogbrothers and John Green’s novels, the group has grown to include any proud fans of nerd culture. Members at the meeting demonstrated a wide variety of interests through their T-shirts and hoodies, which bore logos and slogans from Harry Potter, Doctor Who and Portal.

“A Nerdfighter is anyone who wants to be a Nerdfighter,” said Ben Shaw, a sophomore history major.

Though many Nerdfighters gathered at the meeting, this physical membership is a unique element, as the group is an offshoot of a mostly online community.

The broader Nerdfighter community grew and developed in its earliest days using Facebook groups, in which fans from all over the country could bond over common interests. Revere said he started watching vlogbrothers videos on YouTube in 2009. He became interested in “Nerdfighteria” soon after watching.

During the spring of his freshman year, Revere became involved with the online community “Nerdfighters of the Greater DC Area.”In 2011, Revere went to a group gathering and quickly made many friends.

“That group of people changed my life,” he said.

Revere realized  he could easily connect with those Nerdfighters and thought it would be fun to start an on-campus Nerdfighter club.

He began the club in fall 2011. The group’s initial meeting consisted of eight people — the minimum required for a club by the Student Government Association, Revere said — in the Queen Anne’s Hall library and lasted about four-and-a-half hours as the small membership bonded over shared interests.

Today, the on-campus Nerdfighters have grown significantly: The club’s Facebook group has more than 150 members and about 38 members regularly attend meetings.

Shaw has noticed a surge in club membership since his first semester at this university. He started watching vlogbrothers videos two weeks before coming to the campus and decided to attend meetings last fall after hearing about the club at the First Look Fair. He credits the club’s growth to its continued presence at the fair.

“People see that there’s a Nerdfighter club, and they’re not expecting it. And they get really excited about it,” Shaw said.

The term “Nerdfighter” has come to carry significance, Revere said; meeting someone and knowing he or she identifies as a Nerdfighter establishes a basis for conversation.

Both Shaw and Revere note the Nerdfighters’ positive attitudes, which create a fun and welcoming community.

“Starting this group was one of the best things I’ve ever done,” Revere said.