TITLE: How do mathematicians find coauthors?
QUESTION [17 upvotes]: I am totally new to academia so I am really not sure how mathematicians works together, can more experienced mathematicians here shed some light on how you find coauthors? I guess one way to do this is to attend conference. But if one doesn't have the chance to do so, are there other options?

REPLY [13 votes]: If you want to find a coauthor, go to a pub or a conference dinner, find a nice person, use a pick up line, something like"Do you know that the derived category of  an abelian category is also abelian?", After you find common interests,
you propose " Would you be my coauthor?". If the answer is "yes"  you are done. If the answer is"no way" or "I already have a coauthor", find some other person or go to another conference dinner.