geeks welcome
San Antonio geeks out as 5th geekiest city in America, study says

San Antonio geeks, unite! Alamo City has been ranked the fifth-geekiest big city in the U.S.
In honor of Embrace Your Geekness Day (July 13), Lawn Love ranked the 200 largest cities in the U.S. to determine their geekiness level. It relied on factors such as number of stores selling comics and video games, number of geek Meetup groups, and number of costume shops to develop the ranking.
"Knight Watch Games is the late-night (or daytime) spot for SA geeks looking to get together over tabletop games or Magic the Gathering,” Lawn Love recommends to San Antonio geeks.
No other Texas cities surpassed San Antonio in the rankings, making Alamo City the geekiest in the state. Houston came in next at No. 6, followed by Austin at No. 9. Two other Texas mega-cities appear in the top 50: Dallas at No. 21, and Fort Worth at No. 48.
Here’s how the rest of Texas’ big cities fared in the study:
- Plano, No. 58
- Irving, No. 60
- El Paso, No. 73
- Arlington, No. 76
- Lubbock, No. 87
- Killeen, No. 108
- Corpus Christi, No. 110
- McAllen, No. 121
- Denton, No. 127
- Midland, No. 148
- Garland, No. 162
- Frisco, No. 164
- Mesquite, No. 169
- Pasadena, No. 174
- Grand Prairie, No. 177
- Laredo, No. 181
- Brownsville, No. 186 (tie)
- McKinney, No. 186 (tie)
Now, you might be wondering what the difference is between a geek and a nerd. Although the terms often are used interchangeably these days, there technically is a difference, according to Rob Weiner, popular culture and humanities librarian at Texas Tech University in Lubbock.
“A geek is one who is obsessed with collecting materials and following trends about their subject of interest, while a nerd is one who is educated and intellectual about a certain topic or subject area,” Weiner tells Lawn Love. “Nerds focus more on a wider breath of knowledge (and usually have a more technical or scientific knowledge base), while geeks focus on collecting and trends that go with pop culture.”