Good thing to do! My tip: volunteer off-line. Help people live in the real world.
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a few hours a day when I had free time, I wanted to help people online
I have heard that many open source code maintainers are in real need recently.
(But beware: they are even prouder than that old man from your story, so check your attitude properly)
Depends on your interests:
As far as some sort of one-on-one support service, I'm not too sure of online services for that (beyond helping out in specific forums when people ask questions).
You can help out with a variety of different research projects over on the Zooniverse:
https://www.zooniverse.org/
You can help by contributing to the map around your area: https://www.openstreetmap.org/
Help out with research on wildlife in your area:
https://www.inaturalist.org/
Contribute to Wikipedia:
https://www.wikipedia.org/
If you feel passionate about consumer rights, you can contribute to the wiki here:
https://consumerrights.wiki/w/Main_Page
If you like to tinker with electronics, check out Fulu Bounties and get paid for helping to get around DRM on refrigerators or on an Xbox. This has the potential to help a lot of end users as well as prevent E-waste. https://bounties.fulu.org/
What I started last year is contributing to OpenStreetMap via StreetComplete. It makes it extremely easy to contribute. Just go on a walk and occassionally pull your phone out and wander around to find the places that need more info.
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