Just days after Barnes & Noble delighted us with free WI-FI for everyone, the Wall Street Journal reports that small coffee shops in New York and San Francisco are putting strict time restrictions on patrons with laptops. I actually understand the owners’ dilemma and here’s why…
Naider’s Coffee Shop offers free internet. In these tough economic times, folks in the neighborhood, unemployed and looking for work, have cut out their own in-house internet and are seeking out free WI-FI – and mooch wherever they can. The newly unemployed may find themselves lonely sitting at home surfing the web for employment opportunities, and would rather venture out with their laptops to do more of the same. They enter the local coffee shop and pay a couple bucks for a cup of hot java, but proceed to nurse it for hours as they surf the net. One coffee shop owner complains he’s seen folks bring their own sandwiches and tea bags and have the nerve to ask for a free cup of hot water! The regular lunch crowd has nowhere to sit and thus small coffee shops are losing business. Previously it wasn’t a problem because "the usual" crowd of laptop users were writers and the alike. But now that the unemployed have joined in and the recession crowds are pinching pennies, it’s proving to be too much for small coffee shops to handle. Some shops have covered up the electrical outlets, and others have placed limits on laptop usage. Naider’s has specific "rules of no geekd’m" between the hours of 11:00 A.M. and 2:00 P.M. weekdays.
