Memo To Every Cafe Owner. Everywhere.
Posted on June 17th, 2008 by Simon ChenIt’s called wireless. Ask your teenage child to install it for you. Apple - that’s the iPod people, make it even easier with a gadget called an Airport. See photo.
Apart from the fact that you’ll have to go through some initial pain talking to someone called Suresh or Mahit or something like this in India when ordering, the whole ordeal can probably be done in a week.
All those people with laptops will thank you for it.
They might even sit in your cafe for a bit longer, drinking their chai lattes or double decaf whatever you call those over-priced coffee substitute drinks.
If you ask me, you should only be allowed to serve espresso, double-espresso or if you must, long blacks. All the other coffee drinks are for homosexuals. Or people who still live with their parents.
Anyway.
This wireless thing. It’s important. Pull your fingers out and install it. It’s good for business. Trust me.
And if you really have to - you can charge for it. It will piss a few people off, but having the service there is better than none at all, even if you want to be a cheap arse and make people pay.
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June 22nd, 2008 at 4:51 pm
True, especially as how the Internet cafes never really took off in my area. I would certainly frequent a decent cafe with Internet access. It would beat the hell out of going to McDonalds to get it.
June 24th, 2008 at 11:21 am
I the past, Simon, I have mostly agreed with your regular ravings and I suspect I will continue to do so in the future. But not so today. Coffee goes with cacophony. Cafes are social spots and coffee drinking–in cafes–is best done in conversation with others. If not with them then at least within eaves-dropping proximity at a nearby table. To me there is nothing sadder (except perhaps fondue-for-one) than those lonely email-obsessed PC hermits peering myopically into cyberia while their java is left out in the cold.
No, if you have to gurgle coffee with your gigabytes then go to Starbucks. And, contrary to what ‘Simon says’, you’re more likely to be accosted by a christian than a closet queen.
June 24th, 2008 at 1:10 pm
Michael’s parody of people who use their PCs in coffee shops - in other countries - that are smart enough to have free wireless misses the point of what we do. Email-obsessed? Hello, it’s 2008 Michael! We are more likely to be on Twitter or FriendFeed or some other site conversing with a much wider, often more interesting mob than you might find on a typical wet and windy day that Simon has to cope with in Melbourne, and almost certainly more interesting than the sun-soakers (people escaping Melbourne, maybe Sydney, and a couple of locals) in a “coffee” place (one or two are ok) up here on the Gold Coast. I’ve been in coffee shops in the US with wireless access where the fact that people can access the web does not seem to at all inhibit their capacity to converse with others around them.
In Beijing last year I found a place that served coffee that would pass the taste test in Lygon Street or Norton Street and they had wireless, at no extra charge. Did I go back, and more than once? You betcha.
Simon, we need to start a campaign to promote any coffee shops we find in this country that offer wireless, whether free or paid. My preference would be that they also make good coffee, but can we be choosy at this point in time?
June 24th, 2008 at 4:25 pm
Des - yeah for you. Michael. No more soup for you. Off you go now.
July 24th, 2008 at 6:06 pm
Hear hear Des. I finally got back to North America after 2 years living in Sydney and am loving the free Wifi on my phone and free internet cafes everywhere. Although missing the real coffee to accompany my web access, Michael I have to say people do still converse in free wireless cafes.
In face, the cafes here are even more so social spots being open all hours, always filled with people, conversing or surfing. Wireless allows students an escape from the library, business people a respite from the office and writers a spot to think. Hardly a sad bunch of lonely PC hermits.
The only thing left out in the cold is the weather while wireless cafes all over offer a haven to all on a cold or rainy day. Australia is in DIRE need for wireless web access everywhere, despite its beautiful relentless sunny skies, and I was shocked at the lack thereof.
July 24th, 2008 at 6:07 pm
ooops meant to write ” In fact”