[archangel_one]

Lost world? Not so. Look a little harder. Try visiting the Department of Coffee and Social Affairs, Fernandez and Wells, Speakeasy, or one of many other boutique coffee shops serving excellent coffee. Okay, they're outnumbered by Starbucks, Nero and Costa, but that doesn't mean they're not there.

There is even an app for this, in case you're out and need to know which is the nearest to you: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=lbc.app.com

[chippy]

Modern day coffee shops are not really the same though.

Apparently there was a parallel to the whole "people sitting on their laptops" issue way back in those days. Originally, there were long benches and people would be forced to sit together and drink and chat, but there was a pressure for the more snobby patrons to sit alone or apart and later individual tables were added.

[michaelochurch]

The issue isn't the coffee shops. It's people. After college, it becomes socially unacceptable to initiate conversation with a person you don't know. People are not only stratified vertically by socioeconomic status, but horizontally by industry- and subculture-specific senses of superiority (academics vs. "techies" vs. bankers).

A coffee house would have to work at it to recreate the old dynamic: hold board game tournaments, have common viewing of intelligent television (when it's on, which is rarely). But that would conflict with the business goal (except in college towns) of getting people in and out reasonably quickly so you can afford rent on the space. The truth is that most people don't want to meet new people. They want to work on their laptops and talk to people they already know.