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

theguardian.com

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

#141

Post by dvanduzer »

geebee wrote: post #131
dvanduzer wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Laptops are a fantastic way for more introverted people to meet each other. Why do you think it's all the rage to paper your Macbook like a NASCAR driver's jacket? Sure, part of it is just the pure hustle of startups, and the low cost of logo stickers as marketing. To a potential startup founders a few years out of college, the coffee shop full of laptops is going to feel just like the library during study week. (May…

I have no problem with laptop cafes, I bring mine to cafes to work all the time. I really enjoy it. But I also see merit in cafes that establish a no cell, no laptop rule (sometimes just for certain hours of the day). That would be a draw for me (honestly, the no cell phone policy tends to be more of a draw than a no laptop policy). To me, this is very much a one size doesn't fit all situation. It makes no sense to g…

My family left the east coast when I was 9, so I don't really have any experience of commuter trains, but I think of this as the moral equivalent of people who won't shut up on the Quiet Car.[0]

Public and semi-public space is important to social interactions, but the extroverts tend to get all the say in how that space is designed. Because they're the ones that speak up, well, by definition.

[0] http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/18/opinion/sunday/the-quiet-o...

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

#142

Post by matwood »

cafard wrote: post #125
matwood wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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.

None of them were downtown. One was in Parker and the other 2 were in Aurora. Aurora is so big that there are very nice parts and very not so nice parts.

40 years ago, I'm guessing both of the places were still just plains. Now they are Denver suburbs. I liked being a 1/2 hour from the city and also so close to the wilderness. Probably one of the favorite places ever to live. If Denver had an ocean it would be my version of best place to live on earth.

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

#143

Post by illumin8 »

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…

Any Macbook has a default ignore all inbound traffic setting on their firewall - provided reasonable use of SSL services (Gmail, Google Apps, Dropbox, etc) and good web hygiene you would be totally safe surfing random insecure public wifi all day long.

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

#145

Post by paublyrne »

mc32 wrote: post #25
paublyrne wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whats the point of having cake if you can't eat it?

Sure, eat it and then you won't have any left. So, you can have the cake or you can eat it, but you can't have and also eat it.

I'd rather eat the cake and be done with it.

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

#146

Post by ferentchak »

cafard wrote: post #125
matwood wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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.

That place became Paris on the Platte and was around forever. That's a rich neighborhood now and they ended up closing it for a trendy donut place :(

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

#147

Post by shanusmagnus »

geebee wrote: post #131
dvanduzer wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Laptops are a fantastic way for more introverted people to meet each other. Why do you think it's all the rage to paper your Macbook like a NASCAR driver's jacket? Sure, part of it is just the pure hustle of startups, and the low cost of logo stickers as marketing. To a potential startup founders a few years out of college, the coffee shop full of laptops is going to feel just like the library during study week. (May…

I have no problem with laptop cafes, I bring mine to cafes to work all the time. I really enjoy it. But I also see merit in cafes that establish a no cell, no laptop rule (sometimes just for certain hours of the day). That would be a draw for me (honestly, the no cell phone policy tends to be more of a draw than a no laptop policy). To me, this is very much a one size doesn't fit all situation. It makes no sense to g…

I've dreamed many times about starting a cafe with a no-cell no-laptop policy, but just assumed I was a cranky bastard and the idea was insane. Your post suggests that maybe it's a thing, though - would you mind saying where you've found such cafes?

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

#148

Post by dkopi »

ben_jones wrote: post #140
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…

So what you're saying is Tel Aviv coffee shops are ideal for tech workers? Got to remember most of the world could care less about the logo designer, the architect, the programmer, etc. It worries me that tech is becoming a social club where you're either in it it completely or out of it. What's it like to be a low-wage blue collar worker in SF outside of the tech industry? This post would make it seems like they hav…

Actually, no. Tel Aviv Coffee shops are ideal for tech workers. And being in tech and commenting on hacker news, I obviously state that first of all. But Tel Aviv coffee shops are packed with people of all types and shapes. Whether it's a social worker unwinding after a long week at work, a photographer who can't afford an office, so he meets the engaged couple to discuss terms at a coffee shop, or the Tel Aviv University student with her low-wage blue collar immigrant parents who came to visit her in the city over the weekend.

I can understand and relate to the fear of tech becoming "a social club". But that's much more of an American thing. Being a warm Mediterranean country in the middle of the Levant, Israelis don't like "closed social clubs". They have much more of a "Melting pot" mentality.

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

#149

Post by doktrin »

colanderman wrote: post #96
doktrin wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "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. "everyone" in this context meaning "everyone who holds…

I think you used "to decry" to mean exactly the opposite of its actual meaning. ("To decry" means to denounce as harmful, not to promote.)

I think you misread. Revisit my original post :

> "everyone" would mean student activists who are busy decrying the tearing down of several high rise projects

The student activists, in this case, are in fact very much against the tearing down of said highrise projects. I'm surprised that wasn't clear.

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

#150

Post by coldtea »

Merad wrote: post #110
coldtea wrote: post #62

Because they are not essential (like a bodega or gas station would be), and most are tied to a more laid-back, more bohemian lifestyle -- which means enough non-poor people are coming in the neighborhood to make them viable. Of course talking about "coffee shops" proper -- the poor just make do with Dunkin Doughnuts and the like...

> the poor just make do with Dunkin Doughnuts and the like Oh brother, HN's insulation from the real world is showing... If you can afford $2 for a cup of Dunkin Donuts coffee on a regular basis, you probably are't poor. Most of them "make do" with a cup of Folgers/Maxwell House/etc brewed at home in a Mr. Coffee.

>Oh brother, HN's insulation from the real world is showing... If you can afford $2 for a cup of Dunkin Donuts coffee on a regular basis, you probably are't poor. Most of them "make do" with a cup of Folgers/Maxwell House/etc brewed at home in a Mr. Coffee.

True, I was not talking about starting or "trailer park" poor here.

Poor as in working class/lower middle class folks -- generally the kind of people that the people at Starbucks would snub.

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