Cafe Culture and Fueled Entrepreneurs

I'm in the mood to write more slices of life about Silicon Valley. Dig into what makes Silicon Valley unique. (Of course now I want to delve into my homebase just as I get ready to leave for Asia for two months on the tsunami anniversary tour.)

I read the other day (god knows where) that China is like "Silicon Valley was in the '90s" which made me chuckle. If this place gets to be what it was like in the 90s, I'm outta here. It's decidedly different than 1999 - very stimulating yet grounded. One thing you can't help notice is how the café culture and fueled entrepreneurs are intertwined:

Pop into the newest hot spot of the geek set, Coupa Café just around the corner from 285 Hamilton, and you’ll overhear seed deals getting done over spiced Venezuelan hot chocolate, along with much excited talk about can’t-miss new business plans. On a recent afternoon, one nervous entrepreneur asks a harried Coupa barista for a description of Netscape founder Marc Andreessen so he won’t miss him when the big guy arrives for a meeting. - Tech's Big Comeback, Business 2.0, October 26, 2005

The last meeting at Coupa I'm told at the onset: "You can not blog this." Tomorrow I'm meeting at one of my favs in Menlo Park. I wasn't certain if it was cool to bring a dog to the place so I Googled Cafe Barrone. And voilà I find World66: The Travel Guide You Write. Cool! The First Person Revolution brings us this wikipedia inspired entry:

Near the Menlo Park train station and Kepler's Books, Barrone is one of the best cafes on the peninsula. It has a substantial crowd of regulars, and is also a gathering-place for VCs and entrepreneurs; in fact, at least one startup has used Barrone as its offices.

Not a bad choice for an office, I say.

It's no accident I chose sitting down to have coffee with someone as the closest metaphor to reading someone's blog.

p.s. Just like random serendipitious conversations at coffee shops, social media has brought me a new connection (plus the Cafe Barrone photo at top). A new (to me) blog read, Askpang contributed the World66 Cafe Barrone entry; Alex Pang is also a "research director at the Institute for the Future, a think tank in Silicon Valley." Here's just one cafe-inspired and very intriguing post:

"[H]ow religious ideas or values contribute to the moral economy of the Valley, I can't say; but sitting here, watching people at alternate tables do e-mail, read the Wall Street Journal, and talk about the Book of Matthew, I can't help but think that someone should find out." - Askpang, God and latte at the Menlo Park Starbucks*

Comments

[Alex Soojung-Kim Pang]

It would have been easier for us to have connected through Frans Johansson, with whom I shared a stage at Next2004 in Copenhagen!

I still think the role of churches in Silicon Valley networks deserves to be explored. We think of the Valley as multicultural, and it is; and as business- and technology-obsessed, and it is; but there are more churches near my house in Menlo Park than in the Bible Belt town I lived in as a child. And no small number of CEOs and VCs I've met are observant Christians, Muslims, Jews, or Hindus.