Cybercafe Society

Howard Rheingold’s latest in The Feature… An interesting thought, though I think Kinkos has a long way to go to enable a more hospitable location. I could see Starbucks extending their larger locations with additional services though. It’s quite nice to sit down in the nicer ones, when there’s space to have for yourself. I guess a package dropbox would be a pretty easy addition — remember Kozmo and Urban Fetch…

Now that Fedex owns Kinko’s, I really think they ought to consider buying Starbucks to constitute the ultimate 21st century cybernomadic infrastructure: 24X7 coffee, wireless broadband, and handy global shipping for roving mobs of socio-knowledge workers.

Starbucks is trying to be a “third place” for untethered informationistas by furnishing couches, caffeine, and WiFi. Kinko’s pitches toward the independent operators who don’t have offices full of copiers, or for the traveling infoworkers who want the hardcopy ready for their meetings when they arrive. What if Starbucks starts providing printers, scanners, and copiers? Or Kinko’s starts serving good coffee and puts in a few couches? [TheFeature]