
Do you have a hobby, Tom?

Does that "とか" add a connotation of "kind of" or "something like"?

Good question, Dima. The とか here literally means "or something similar". The same kind of とか as in:
#2960824 間食はしないって決めてるんだけど、ついつい誘惑に負けてアイスとか食べちゃうんだよね。 (tommy_san)
#3006495 日本で買った家具とかさ、ドイツ帰るときどうするの? (tommy_san)
#3096743 ねえマリー、フランス人はみんなエルメスとかルイ・ヴィトンとか持ってるの? (tommy_san)
#3255973 音大生はみんな初見とか即興とか得意なの? (tommy_san)
Maybe you can interepret this as 趣味とか特技とかはまっていることとか. However, this is the sentence I'd use to ask "Do you have a hobby?". I'd use とか because I can't think of another better way to say it. I'm sure some people consider it better to avoid とか and say トムさんは趣味はありますか?, but this sounds to me somewhat too sharp and even impolite. Google shows that people actually prefer to use とか. A good point of it is that the person wouldn't feel less uncomfortable when s/he doesn't really have a hobby.
「トムさんは趣味とかありますか?」「趣味っていうのとはちょっと違うかもしれませんけど、家でクラゲを飼ってるんです」
Here some more sentences that use とか for the same reason:
#1031910 ゆで卵の殻をむくのって、どうやったらきれいにできるの?何かコツとかあるの? (bunbuku)
#1619851 明日の夜とかどう? (mookeee)
#3137108 突っ込んだこと聞くけど、トムとは結婚とかまで考えてるの? (tommy_san)
#3308990 「トムは彼女とかいないの?」「今はいないよ。10月に別れたんだ」 (tommy_san)
#3316779 「彼氏とかいる?」「いないよ」「好きな人は?」「いない。3次元には興味ないんだ」 (tommy_san)

Thanks for the clarification, Tommy!
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added by tommy_san, October 12, 2014
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