The caffeine curse: why coffee shops have always signalled urban change • Hacker News Board

Re: The caffeine curse: why coffee shops have always signalled urban change

#121

Post by maxsilver » Fri, Apr 15, 2016, 2:08 PM UTC

golergka wrote: post #58

austinjp wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's a binary either-or. People obviously want safety and opportunity. They also tend to want to preserve the micro-culture of their neighbourhood. "Globalisation" (whatever that is) feels homogenous and corporate. Some people don't want that, they don't want to live in a place that could be anywhere else. They want to own the land and property, not be priced out. I'm quite surprised at people here sugg…

About "displacing" people, honest question: why people who already live somewhere (but rent and don't own) should be privileged compared to people who have the same financial ability, but didn't live at said place before? Why is being "priced out" of same place you already live at perceived as something worse than not being able to afford to move into some neighborhood to begin with? BTW, apartment that I live in rig…

> Why is being "priced out" of same place you already live at perceived as something worse than not being able to afford to move into some neighborhood to begin with?

1) The people being priced out are often the people that made the neighborhood nicer to live in. Developers don't improve neighborhoods, people do. And these people are usually the first to go when developments move in and drive up the cost, because they are often the most vulnerable to the price increases. (Your artists, musicians, students, young families, folks on shoestring budgets opening hipster coffee shops and restaurants, etc)

2) It's not so much that all these people feel like they deserve to live in this one particular nice place. You don't see people complaining that they can't live in gated communities or mansions. It's that nearly every lower-class or middle-class urban place that was even slightly nice to live in is rapidly becoming "rich-people-only". Where does that end?

Are middle class people eventually going to economically banned from all urban environments nationwide? Because that's the trajectory we're currently headed in, unless some massive correction happens.

> why people who already live somewhere (but rent and don't own)

Renters are highest risk, but it's not just renters who get displaced. Property owners can also get displaced through gentrification -- owning property does not make someone immune to this problem

Re: The caffeine curse: why coffee shops have always signalled urban change

#122

Post by forgetsusername » Fri, Apr 15, 2016, 2:16 PM UTC

nefitty wrote: post #20

omonra wrote: post #14

"what everyone hates about urban change and gentrification – first come the creatives and their coffee shops, then the young professionals, then the luxury high-rises and corporate chains that push out original residents" I personally have no problem with it. And if we're talking about crappy and dangerous neighborhoods that are becoming upscale - I love it. If anything I think it's the sort of process that benefits…

I can't help interpreting your opinion as, "it's ok to kick the poor people out, as long as the upper classes, government and businesses prosper." People aren't numbers to throw into a mean function. That "net positive" argument is what has been used to excuse globalization's "there have to be some losers" philosophy, which disproportionately affects those already in poverty. A sense of community is one of the few th…

>I can't help interpreting your opinion as, "it's ok to kick the poor people out, as long as the upper classes, government and businesses prosper.

I can't help interpreting the original argument as "we're fine with our people here (the artists), but we don't want those other people in our community".

Re: The caffeine curse: why coffee shops have always signalled urban change

#123

Post by forgetsusername » Fri, Apr 15, 2016, 2:20 PM UTC

alanwatts wrote: post #117

kdamken wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what's the solution here? How else would you improve those kinds of neighborhoods? Do you expect the poor people are going to suddenly all get better jobs and simultaneously decide to make their neighborhood nicer?

Define the problem first, then we can talk about a solution. The problem (as I see it) is artificial scarcity of housing which creates artificially inflated and unaffordable housing costs. Depending on what sources you look at, there are around 4-6 empty houses in the US for every homeless person. The solution to that would be to cease the state-sponsoring of fraudulent and dishonest sub-prime mortgage shell games li…

>let simply the market normalize.

Who's to say what that "normal" market looks like, and what it means for housing affordability?

Re: The caffeine curse: why coffee shops have always signalled urban change

#124

Post by forgetsusername » Fri, Apr 15, 2016, 2:23 PM UTC

Zelmor wrote: post #105

I love myself some fine light roasted filter coffee as much as the next person. My biggest concern with these places, however is IT security. Anyone who hasn't played around with their laptops once receiving the wifi password, running their chosen network analysis tools/penetration suite and messing with people whose screen you might even see from two tables away, hands up in the air. I will not be first in line, min…

>Anyone who hasn't played around with their laptops once receiving the wifi password, running their chosen network analysis tools/penetration suite and messing with people

I don't "mess with people" going about their business for fun.

Re: The caffeine curse: why coffee shops have always signalled urban change

#125

Post by cafard » Fri, Apr 15, 2016, 2:28 PM UTC

matwood wrote: post #120

dkopi wrote: post #59

Commenting on this post while I'm at a coffee shop myself. If I had to pick one city for having the best coffee shops, it would probably be Tel Aviv. The coffee is great, all coffee shops are laptop friendly (and gladly provide you with the wifi password), and people are very open to social interaction with strangers. At any given moment you'll find a designer working on a logo, an architecture student reading a post…

> A coffee shop provides with just enough distraction and people watching when you need to take a break, but not enough that you completely lose concentration and focus. This right here is why I get so much done in coffee shops. It's almost like white noise that keeps you focused without day dreaming. When I lived in Denver I was 100% remote worker and would work every afternoon in one of three coffee shops. One shop…

Do you mind telling a long-ago Coloradan the neighborhoods? Forty years ago I used to go to Muddy Waters of the Platte, which was 15th St. across the Platte & train yards from downtown. Apart from that, I remember one around Larimer & Speer, but not much else.

Re: The caffeine curse: why coffee shops have always signalled urban change

#126

Post by nicelynicely » Fri, Apr 15, 2016, 2:36 PM UTC

golergka wrote: post #58

austinjp wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's a binary either-or. People obviously want safety and opportunity. They also tend to want to preserve the micro-culture of their neighbourhood. "Globalisation" (whatever that is) feels homogenous and corporate. Some people don't want that, they don't want to live in a place that could be anywhere else. They want to own the land and property, not be priced out. I'm quite surprised at people here sugg…

About "displacing" people, honest question: why people who already live somewhere (but rent and don't own) should be privileged compared to people who have the same financial ability, but didn't live at said place before? Why is being "priced out" of same place you already live at perceived as something worse than not being able to afford to move into some neighborhood to begin with? BTW, apartment that I live in rig…

Community. I guess there is huge cultural differences in this regard.

Some people live in tight knit communities. If they are forced out then they lose a massive piece of their life that is not easily replaced.

Different cultures will obviously have different views regarding communities and societies at large.

Re: The caffeine curse: why coffee shops have always signalled urban change

#127

Post by Aelinsaar » Fri, Apr 15, 2016, 2:37 PM UTC

TeMPOraL wrote: post #54

Aelinsaar wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh boy... it's actually not that hard to imagine a future of spambot's running on neural networks. :/

And the same networks could fuel spam filters, eventually leading to: https://xkcd.com/810/ .

God damn it, I just love XKCD.

Re: The caffeine curse: why coffee shops have always signalled urban change

#128

Post by Aelinsaar » Fri, Apr 15, 2016, 2:38 PM UTC

berntb wrote: post #28

Aelinsaar wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh boy... it's actually not that hard to imagine a future of spambot's running on neural networks. :/

Hmm... A new idea for me, which probably will make someone here on HN rich: Helpful bots that monitors your communication and suggests cultural jokes, to impress people?

Oh man, helper apps like that are going to make kids online even more difficult to detect and avoid.

Re: The caffeine curse: why coffee shops have always signalled urban change

#129

Post by Grishnakh » Fri, Apr 15, 2016, 2:38 PM UTC

abledon wrote: post #95

dkopi wrote: post #59

Commenting on this post while I'm at a coffee shop myself. If I had to pick one city for having the best coffee shops, it would probably be Tel Aviv. The coffee is great, all coffee shops are laptop friendly (and gladly provide you with the wifi password), and people are very open to social interaction with strangers. At any given moment you'll find a designer working on a logo, an architecture student reading a post…

When I'm in a coffee shop sometimes the people watching me as I code in a somewhat frenzied manner, kinda weirds me out. Do you find it easy to block out the peripheral perception that 3-4 people are just staring at you from across the room?

I've done coding and other laptop work in coffee shops many times, and I'm usually acutely aware of my surroundings and people around me. I've never noticed anyone staring at me in a coffee shop.

Are you doing something unusual to bring this attention on yourself? Or do you live in a place with jerks? Also, what ethnicity were the people staring at you? Some cultures (like Indian) don't have the cultural aversion to staring that westerners do (though usually ones who come over here figure that out pretty quickly and stop it).

Re: The caffeine curse: why coffee shops have always signalled urban change

#130

Post by mc32 » Fri, Apr 15, 2016, 2:38 PM UTC

maxsilver wrote: post #121

golergka wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

About "displacing" people, honest question: why people who already live somewhere (but rent and don't own) should be privileged compared to people who have the same financial ability, but didn't live at said place before? Why is being "priced out" of same place you already live at perceived as something worse than not being able to afford to move into some neighborhood to begin with? BTW, apartment that I live in rig…

> Why is being "priced out" of same place you already live at perceived as something worse than not being able to afford to move into some neighborhood to begin with? 1) The people being priced out are often the people that made the neighborhood nicer to live in. Developers don't improve neighborhoods, people do. And these people are usually the first to go when developments move in and drive up the cost, because the…

It's usually the people who move in (or not moving in) who change neighborhoods. It's the internal migrants, like in North Dakota, or immigrants or professional class who change neighborhoods for the better. This is why poor areas _want_ "gentrifiers" to come in to invigorate places in stagnation or decline. It's atypical for improvement to be grass roots.

Anyone who has lived in a typical urban core from the 90s knows that poor neighborhoods don't just start having cleaner streets, more shops and services out of the blue displacing liquor stores and repair shops and weeds.