What do coffee houses and the Internet have in common? Today we might think of Internet cafes, but three centuries ago coffee houses where a primitive version of the cultural mechanisms that are so pervasive in the Internet today:

WHERE do you go when you want to know the latest business news, follow commodity prices, keep up with political gossip, find out what others think of a new book, or stay abreast of the latest scientific and technological developments? Today, the answer is obvious: you log on to the internet. Three centuries ago, the answer was just as easy: you went to a coffee-house. There, for the price of a cup of coffee, you could read the latest pamphlets, catch up on news and gossip, attend scientific lectures, strike business deals, or chat with like-minded people about literature or politics.

The rest in this great article from this week's Economist.

Categories: technology
Posted by diego on December 23 2003 at 8:09 PM