$2/day ($0 if I don't use it on a particular day) for me in Australia (unlimited data but limited to 3g). Unfortunately, I don't think this plan is available anymore.
About to head to NZ and not looking forward to giving up this ideal (for me) prepaid plan.
As someone who moved from NZ to AU.. Oooh you're going to feel the hurt. You can still get 90GB/mo 3G plans in AU for $80/mo which I'm super happy with. Comparatively in NZ I paid $30/mo for 3GB.
The only thing I do I miss is NZ's speeds (in AKL/WEL at least). 4G there is usually 10x faster than what I get in Melbourne CBD.
0.5€ per day for unlimited data here in Europe, heck Poland has 5€ per month for unlimited everything
can't wait for end of roaming charges, even if they limit no fees for like 3 months per year abroad it's worth just switch SIM every three months only because of data, even if you will use secondary card for calls and SMS so people can reach you on same number
It really depends on how you work. I can think of a couple cases that are pretty slim.
1, ssh + tmux, or something along those lines. If your stuff is all on a remote machine, and you're proficient with the command line tools, you can do a ton of stuff over a very thin pipe. 30k would be more than enough, but latency can be frustrating because the local echo.
2, Local dev with local docs. Something like IntelliJ and all the code lookups pointed at local javadoc. With the right setup your network use is pretty much just git fetches and pushes.
When you start pulling down VMs or pushing containers, things kinda fall apart.
It's worth thinking about how to slim down that network connection. Being able to work remotely with a real thin connection like that opens up a lot of opportunities. One example might be a funeral. Going home for a couple weeks vs a day or two of bereavement can be, well, nice. Obviously that kind of thing depends on your employer.
I dunno; I think the problem is that you don't mind getting a crippled phone with your contact? Bring your own device and you'll pay less for it and be subject to less bullshit...
The phone doesn't determine if you can tether; and even if it overrides the carrier's instructions and tethers when told not to, they can (and do) still tell the difference in usage and shut you down.
I'll echo sibling comment. On the exact same device, tethering isn't related to device, but related to plan - typically tethering is an extra $50 or so.
You can often tether for a very short time using a rooted phone without explicitly paying for it, but most carriers are very hip to that traffic.
It works to reduce the number of people who stay too long without directly attacking them. WiFi access might be a motivator for using the cafe this way even if it isn't the main reason people do it.
If there is bad weather, I would rather stay at home if I can. If there is good weather, I'm pretty sure a tree won't be hard to find. I've heard they can do wonders against that brightness problem ;)
The real reason they cut it off is seating. Wifi costs practically nothing to them, so if you sit all day with their wifi, your cell plan or solving equations it's the same. Then, they'll find new ways to discourage it.
Many of the plans you see advertised on TV explicitly exclude tethering (always ask)
Some areas just have really bad speeds (in Houston and just north, I get great speeds, but when I go to the upscale city a bit further - The Woodlands - it's like I'm on a 14.4 modem)
Coffee is practically free. Staff is somewhat expensive. Rent is extremely expensive. The rental rate for fully furnished ~25 square feet (table, chair, some personal space) is higher that two lattes per day.
I ran a cafe for three years (the slashRoot tech collective in New Paltz - maybe some NYC folk here came there?), and the cost of coffee (and milk) for us was non-negligible.
We were paying $8/pound for one locally roasted variety; $9 for another.
We also served entirely local or organic milk.
Our rent was $1950 plus utilities.
High-end coffee joints pay a fair bit for ingredients.
I never saw your place when I hung out in New Paltz (almost every weekend in 2009-2010), but it would have been cool to see a tech scene get established. I miss that city.
It really depends on what drinks you're making - maybe as few as 15 (big fancy lattes with 2 huge pulls of espresso), maybe as many as 25 (weak auto drip).
I have cultivated a good relationship with the owner of my local coffee spot. I work on a laptop there after work when its not busy. I have been a daily customer there since they opened in 2012.
One day, in a distant utopian future, a journalist writing an article like this will actually have to get, you know, data showing that anything is changing, and "I interviewed a few people" won't cut it.
This is a legit issue. In L.A. here you see it all over. Like 1 in 4 coffeeshops has removed plugs and wifi.
It's especially pertinent here because homeless people will buy a coffee for a couple bucks and stay all day on their phone or cheap tablet just watching movies and surfing the web.
I don't know if this is a trend. The major coffee shop in my small college hometown has mandated for as long as I can remember that the seating upfront be used for only conversation or newspaper-reading. In New York, it seems about as common to find coffee shops without WiFi and with it. Think Coffee only has it in some of their locations. In fact, I believe the Think Coffee in which the first scene of "Mr. Robot's" first episode was shot (12st, East Village) does not have wi-fi, in contrast to its fictional portrayal.
"By not offering WiFi, they're hoping to create more of a community atmosphere where people talk to each other instead of silently typing on their computers."
I see as many singles as pairs or groups at coffee shops. It's not always a social exercise for people.
If the habit is going to a coffee shop solo, they may swap books for computers, or just tether. Can't ban everything.
Charging for wifi by the hour would be a good alternative. Give 30 minutes free with every coffee purchase, possibly dependent on price of beverage. The outlying issues are other open wifi spots that are close to the shop and people tethering their phones and just using the cafe for a spot to do work. Both of those will happen even if they "pull the plug".
Their purpose isn't to stop people mooching their wifi though. Their purpose is to have a totally different atmosphere by discouraging people from using their cafe as an office.
Well I guess it depends on how valuable your seating is.
If you are in a dense area or your cafe is particularly busy, than having people sit around all day and only order a couple of drinks is costing you money.
If the seating never fills up, then it is probably worth while, I feel that people are more likely to enter a store that already has customers in it than one without any.
Sure, if you literally NEVER fill up. But that's a pretty iffy metric, because people will not cram themselves into every available seat; a party of 4 can come on, see no totally open tables, and bail, even if you have a few seats here and there.
Most of the country is not as expensive as San Francisco, and expenses are driven by labor and electricity. You can afford a few extra square feet to have enough seating when at peak capacity.
Not necessarily, depends on the rent. However, there may be better things to do with the space. Take a look at Japan and their highly successful 7-11s. Don't confuse them with 7-11s in the US, they are quite a different league. Basically it's a question of "how many goods and services that cover people's everyday needs can I put per square meter". Banking, post office, travel agency, adapters, amenities, underwear, ready made food, food to be cooked, drinks, alcohol, movies, holiday gifts, nowadays even seating - it's all there, even in the smallest ones measuring 20m2.
Now, they have a similar problem to WiFi: People coming in and reading Manga or the occasional Soft porn magazine without buying anything. Why even sell that stuff - hardly anyone buys is anymore nowadays is my guess. However, they studied the effects and found that it's still worth it to have them there in the grad scheme of things: It reduces theft significantly, because robbers typically won't go in when the place isn't deserted. They then even started offering free parking spaces for taxi drivers so they can rest there, which again curbed theft.
In a cafe, there's even more reason why you want tables to be occupied even if people don't spend money: An almost full coffee shop with a handful of tables free is more attractive to potential customers than an empty one.
So yea, it really depends on the property - in very frequented city centers on the first floor WiFi doesn't make sense. But even there, have a look what Japan does on third or fourth floors and up - Net/Manga/Theme cafes where you pay per hour, offering infinite entertainment, computers, fast internet, sleeping compartments and even showers.
I often wonder what makes Japanese so much more innovative in those areas compared to Westerners, but I think it has to do with Japan having a comparatively very deregulated zoning and licensing system for these sorts of venues.
Maybe they mean that the area would be designated for people who intend to sit and use the wifi for a long period, whereas the other area would be for shorter sits.
Call it "laptop-section" and "no-laptop-section" and enforce that? (since it seems to be the goal in the end anyways) I've been to places like that and it works.
When I was in Berlin last winter, I noticed a few coffee shops that had strict no-laptop policies at the front but often allowed laptops in back rooms or further away from the entrance. Seemed like a win-win.
Four Barrel in San Francisco did this explicitly at their founding (no outlets either). Unfortunately, the rise of tethering and incredible battery life means it's completely defeated and you often see every table occupied with a person on a laptop.
I wonder if people would get the message if a "xx minute maximum time" not was posted. If one person does that, the store can absorb it, but not if 50% do. That $2 they made on the coffee doesn't go far enough.
Or have a section with mini-cubicles, like they have internet access by the minute in third world countries.
Disturbingly, the cafeteria in my office has this problem. Despite signs saying "please don't camp here during service hours", you often find a person happily taking up a booth for four or table for six with their laptop.
Biggest issue with libraries that you cannot hear people talking. This might be a good or a bad thing depending on you. I really like working from coffee shops especially because of the noise (and random eavesdropping).
That's the biggest reason I don't like working at coffee shops. I almost always work from home, but sometimes I realize I haven't left the house in days and need a change of scenery.
We actually worked out of our public library every day as a small (4 person) company, and it was wonderful - they're usually in great locations downtown near good restaurants, they have really nice peaceful quiet atmospheres, and when you need a break, you can wander through the stacks and see what catches your eye for after-hours reading. When you need to take a call or have a non-compete discussion, you can just step outside. I highly recommend it.
Bad trend for international travellers subject to data roaming fees that still cost dollars per megabyte (megabyte not gigabyte because it's 1995 once you cross a border).
PSA: Google Fi works transparently in almost every country (Tahiti/French Polynesia is the only exception I've experienced so far), and charges the same $10/gig everywhere I've been. If you travel a lot, it's a godsend. Also apparently gets around the great firewall in China, so I usually tethered even when wifi was available. Wonderful service overall, I highly recommend it.
Fi is a nice option for for US residents. Beyond the roaming benefit, I don't think it achieves much in most of Europe and Asia anyway. That, combined with the history of Google Voice, means I don't see Fi going global anytime soon.)
I have Three in UK and it does have decent free internet roaming in a lot of countries. The roaming is slow with not a hope of streaming media, but seems to have certain types of content like maps and mail whitelisted for fast access. It's useful but still requires getting a local sim for anything serious.
I think the wireless carriers may have just won, with 4G unlimited plans, who needs in-secure wide open wifi. Over the years in tech, I look for certain inflection points, and I think this could be one. Only time will tell, but it has that look to it for me.
I've always daydreamed about a cafe big enough to have two viable areas: one quiet and businesslike, where working on laptops is OK, and one buzzy and social, where working on laptops is forbidden. The idea that somehow it's completely wrong to do business in a cafe would come as a surprise to the coffeehouses that ultimately turned into Lloyd's of London and the London Stock Exchange, to name a couple.
In my daydream, there is somehow a way to make people pay for the space they are taking up, too. Perhaps what I'm thinking of is a co-working space with a cafe next door?
> Use your public library; the staff actually want you to be there.
Unfortunately for a public library more footfall doesn't equal more revenue. In fact it can increase running costs, which results in opening hours like my local library:
Mon: 13:00 - 20:00
Tue: 10:00 - 17:00
Wed: 10:00 - 17:00
Thu: 10:00 - 17:00
Fri: 10:00 - 16:00
Sat: 10:00 - 16:00
Sun: Closed
And that's regardless of the lack of amenities: my library has one table and no toilets.
> Unfortunately for a public library more footfall doesn't equal more revenue
That seems...backward. It would seem that with more footfall and circulation, the library should be able to justify a larger budget from the city. And unless the city is struggling financially, they should get it. Are there some other issues also?
Shh... Every now and again, I browse books in my city centre public library and it's almost impossible to sit down to read due to the number of people with laptops using the free Wi-Fi and electrical sockets. There's actually an interesting mix of native and foreign students and the odd homeless person reading the free newspaper.
I think that's a fair choice for a number of reasons. The problem is, the need for an external workspace still isn't going away. This is a /huge/ market opportunity, and anybody who has gone to Workshop Cafe in San Francisco knows it. (Just try to find a seat there during business hours; it's impossible.)
The problem with the coffee shop is that the value they provide and their financial model are not aligned. Coffee shops make money by selling coffee. Workers go to coffee shops for the workspace, location, and ambiance of not working from home. Yes, people also go to coffee shops to buy coffee, but I'm not talking about those people. There is a class of person (freelancers, artists, even people just taking the day off from their normal office) who want a non-lonely place to work around people.
The only business I've seen who "gets it" is Workshop Cafe -- a coffee shop that makes its money by selling the workspace, not the coffee (but yes they do also serve coffee). They have power outlets at every seat, incredible Wi-Fi, and charge $2 / hour (at least last time I was there) for a seat, and even have phone booths for calls.
There should be a Workshop Cafe in every major city on Earth. There's already a WeWork for the more permanent class of co-working; why is there not a "coffee shop" that focuses its business catering toward laptop hobos, and actually provides amenities for that use -- no more scrounging for power outlets, crappy Wi-Fi, nowhere to take a call, et cetera. Workshop Cafe in SF will even deliver food from local restaurants to your table!
Then, finally, we will have two types of businesses for these two completely separate use cases: coffee shop-style drop-in co-working spaces, for people who want to get work done in a productive environment, and coffee shops. For you know, people who just want to drink a cup of coffee.
I think initially when a coffee shop starts out they want those who stick around for a long time in order to show they are a busy place and attract more customers. But once they grow to be busy enough they longer care about those customers who stick around for a long time.
Also how would the economics of a Workshop Cafe work? How much would the hourly cost be to get a table?
They've been growing with their current model ($2/hr/seat). I was in SF recently (used to live there, don't anymore..) but whenever I am in town I go there even when having a nice office to go to. Granted - I don't know all of their economics but they definitely charge a bit for food but I find the atmosphere great enough to pay for that.
I wonder how well that would work here in Japan. You don't see as many people working on laptops in a coffee shop here, but you do see an awful lot of English teaching and students studying
That sounds awesome, and too bad there's not more of these around. Though I can see how it requires certain density of potential clients to work, may not be that workable outside of dense cities (so OK in San Francisco, iffy in San Jose). But I'd use such service, provided I can get comfortable seating, good Wifi and some tea, etc. and booths for calls. If one was near me, I'd seriously think about a monthly subscription (provided it's suitably discounted from the hourly rate).
OTOH, when I am using coffee shop for its intended purpose, I also like to browse the internet. So of two coffeeshops one of which offers wifi and another doesn't, I'd probably go to the former even if I don't plan to work there.
This is actually something I'm super conscious about. I travel to visit my parents somewhat often, and I work a few days remotely when I do. I've had a bit of luck rotating through a few spots. If I feel like I've exhausted those, I'll post up in a larger chain like a Starbucks — I feel somewhat less guilty when I know I'm not taking up a seat in a locally owned business. Most places will pull decaf espresso shots or have pastries of some sort, so I'm not just drinking coffee all day.
Aside: If anyone wants to swap coffee shop recommendations in Pittsburgh, feel free to send me a message.
It's partly because those can be hard to find (less so now that a lot of the campuses nearby are wrapping up their semesters), but it's mostly me being overly self-conscious. I don't really want to be known as that guy who posts up on his laptop all day, but I should probably get over that.
This is a legit issue. In L.A. here you see it all over. Like 1 in 4 coffeeshops has removed plugs and wifi.
It's especially pertinent here because homeless people will buy a coffee for a couple bucks and stay all day on their phone or cheap tablet just watching movies and surfing the web.
It's like what's the contract between the purchaser and the business owner.
If I bought a coffee for 2 bucks am I entitled to take up a table all day?
Oh. This problem is not strang for me. Thats is why I am working on Codemates.io. The first location we plan to open in Sacramento, CA. And move further.
120 comments
[ 2.9 ms ] story [ 170 ms ] threadAbout to head to NZ and not looking forward to giving up this ideal (for me) prepaid plan.
The only thing I do I miss is NZ's speeds (in AKL/WEL at least). 4G there is usually 10x faster than what I get in Melbourne CBD.
can't wait for end of roaming charges, even if they limit no fees for like 3 months per year abroad it's worth just switch SIM every three months only because of data, even if you will use secondary card for calls and SMS so people can reach you on same number
1, ssh + tmux, or something along those lines. If your stuff is all on a remote machine, and you're proficient with the command line tools, you can do a ton of stuff over a very thin pipe. 30k would be more than enough, but latency can be frustrating because the local echo.
2, Local dev with local docs. Something like IntelliJ and all the code lookups pointed at local javadoc. With the right setup your network use is pretty much just git fetches and pushes.
When you start pulling down VMs or pushing containers, things kinda fall apart.
It's worth thinking about how to slim down that network connection. Being able to work remotely with a real thin connection like that opens up a lot of opportunities. One example might be a funeral. Going home for a couple weeks vs a day or two of bereavement can be, well, nice. Obviously that kind of thing depends on your employer.
The phone doesn't determine if you can tether; and even if it overrides the carrier's instructions and tethers when told not to, they can (and do) still tell the difference in usage and shut you down.
You can often tether for a very short time using a rooted phone without explicitly paying for it, but most carriers are very hip to that traffic.
You can also find specific tethering plans, sometimes with 4G modems offered by the seller.
Some areas just have really bad speeds (in Houston and just north, I get great speeds, but when I go to the upscale city a bit further - The Woodlands - it's like I'm on a 14.4 modem)
I ran a cafe for three years (the slashRoot tech collective in New Paltz - maybe some NYC folk here came there?), and the cost of coffee (and milk) for us was non-negligible.
We were paying $8/pound for one locally roasted variety; $9 for another.
We also served entirely local or organic milk.
Our rent was $1950 plus utilities.
High-end coffee joints pay a fair bit for ingredients.
We were open from 2010-2012.
I'm not sure what you're actually trying to imply.
You can see it as a problem, or you could also see it as a potential opportunity.
If you gave me an alternative way to pay for it, I'd be more than happy to oblige.
In fact, paying for the space exacerbates the problem, as only people using it as an office would be willing to pay.
Wonderful vibes - busy and friendly.
No great loss. Those kinds of people are self-entitled bad customers. Let someone else cater to them.
I'd say this was true for in Toronto and NYC for most of the past decade. How do we know anything is changing?
I see as many singles as pairs or groups at coffee shops. It's not always a social exercise for people.
If the habit is going to a coffee shop solo, they may swap books for computers, or just tether. Can't ban everything.
Most of the country is not as expensive as San Francisco, and expenses are driven by labor and electricity. You can afford a few extra square feet to have enough seating when at peak capacity.
Now, they have a similar problem to WiFi: People coming in and reading Manga or the occasional Soft porn magazine without buying anything. Why even sell that stuff - hardly anyone buys is anymore nowadays is my guess. However, they studied the effects and found that it's still worth it to have them there in the grad scheme of things: It reduces theft significantly, because robbers typically won't go in when the place isn't deserted. They then even started offering free parking spaces for taxi drivers so they can rest there, which again curbed theft.
In a cafe, there's even more reason why you want tables to be occupied even if people don't spend money: An almost full coffee shop with a handful of tables free is more attractive to potential customers than an empty one.
So yea, it really depends on the property - in very frequented city centers on the first floor WiFi doesn't make sense. But even there, have a look what Japan does on third or fourth floors and up - Net/Manga/Theme cafes where you pay per hour, offering infinite entertainment, computers, fast internet, sleeping compartments and even showers.
I often wonder what makes Japanese so much more innovative in those areas compared to Westerners, but I think it has to do with Japan having a comparatively very deregulated zoning and licensing system for these sorts of venues.
However, if you build a RF blocking wall, then it is legal.
Or have a section with mini-cubicles, like they have internet access by the minute in third world countries.
I have Three in UK and it does have decent free internet roaming in a lot of countries. The roaming is slow with not a hope of streaming media, but seems to have certain types of content like maps and mail whitelisted for fast access. It's useful but still requires getting a local sim for anything serious.
In my daydream, there is somehow a way to make people pay for the space they are taking up, too. Perhaps what I'm thinking of is a co-working space with a cafe next door?
It's an interesting mix between cafe and working space as it has a pay-per-hour model with tea/coffee and snacks available at no further charge.
Although there's no partition between "quiet" and "loud" area, it's a big enough space to support both (in London at least).
The Dock and Dock St Café & Bar in London is exactly this.
[1] http://www.thedocklondon.com/
[2] http://www.thedocklondon.com/the-dock-club-affiliate-members...
[3] https://officesnapshots.com/2015/12/03/dock-london-coworking...
[4] https://hubblehq.com/office-space/1313/the-dock
Credit to 'tptacek for originally reminding me of that fact: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=758722
Unfortunately for a public library more footfall doesn't equal more revenue. In fact it can increase running costs, which results in opening hours like my local library:
Mon: 13:00 - 20:00
Tue: 10:00 - 17:00
Wed: 10:00 - 17:00
Thu: 10:00 - 17:00
Fri: 10:00 - 16:00
Sat: 10:00 - 16:00
Sun: Closed
And that's regardless of the lack of amenities: my library has one table and no toilets.
That seems...backward. It would seem that with more footfall and circulation, the library should be able to justify a larger budget from the city. And unless the city is struggling financially, they should get it. Are there some other issues also?
The problem with the coffee shop is that the value they provide and their financial model are not aligned. Coffee shops make money by selling coffee. Workers go to coffee shops for the workspace, location, and ambiance of not working from home. Yes, people also go to coffee shops to buy coffee, but I'm not talking about those people. There is a class of person (freelancers, artists, even people just taking the day off from their normal office) who want a non-lonely place to work around people.
The only business I've seen who "gets it" is Workshop Cafe -- a coffee shop that makes its money by selling the workspace, not the coffee (but yes they do also serve coffee). They have power outlets at every seat, incredible Wi-Fi, and charge $2 / hour (at least last time I was there) for a seat, and even have phone booths for calls.
There should be a Workshop Cafe in every major city on Earth. There's already a WeWork for the more permanent class of co-working; why is there not a "coffee shop" that focuses its business catering toward laptop hobos, and actually provides amenities for that use -- no more scrounging for power outlets, crappy Wi-Fi, nowhere to take a call, et cetera. Workshop Cafe in SF will even deliver food from local restaurants to your table!
Then, finally, we will have two types of businesses for these two completely separate use cases: coffee shop-style drop-in co-working spaces, for people who want to get work done in a productive environment, and coffee shops. For you know, people who just want to drink a cup of coffee.
Also how would the economics of a Workshop Cafe work? How much would the hourly cost be to get a table?
Granted, there are folks who do the "talk to your friend" thing but I don't see much of a difference between SF and Tokyo in that respect.
I usually see this in the more typical local chains like Doutour, Pronto, and even excelsior (despite them usually lacking outlets) as well.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-café
OTOH, when I am using coffee shop for its intended purpose, I also like to browse the internet. So of two coffeeshops one of which offers wifi and another doesn't, I'd probably go to the former even if I don't plan to work there.
Aside: If anyone wants to swap coffee shop recommendations in Pittsburgh, feel free to send me a message.
You need to put them in the About text box. The email box is not displayed, it's only used by HN if they need to tell you something.
It's like what's the contract between the purchaser and the business owner. If I bought a coffee for 2 bucks am I entitled to take up a table all day?