Life is cruel...
For this reason of "disappearing", both real life and virtual friends, we should constantly make new friends, expand the circle of people we know, and at every opportunity, make a virtual friend a real life friend.
Here at Hive, there is an event that enables such a transformation, the Hive meetup 🙂
I haven't had a chance to devirtualize a friend, but I've only been here for a year... So in the coming years I'll probably have such a chance.