Click here to download the PDF of the Concept Poster

Cafe Interactive is a imaginary café. I envisioned a place where one could relax and also interact with the surroundings in ways not common in the modern day café.

Pictured above is the conceptual poster and business card for Cafe Interactive as well as a poster explaining the concept.

With the rise of smart phones everyone has the internet in their hands. Thanks to twitter and their API's, there is a surge of new possibilities that go unused. This concept uses the new technology to enhance the customers experience.

The concepts runs on the web service twitter. A café is used to illustrate the possibilities but this could be implemented anywhere.

Thanks to hash tags twitter posts can be easily found and categorized by their content. So for example a popular hash tag like #nowplaying is used to search for music that people are currently listening to.

You can use twitter to search #nowplaying and will get responses from all over the world.

Thanks to the twitter API's (application programming interface) sites like monitter.com allow one to search for a hash tag and return a real time live stream of tweets with the searched for hash tag. Imagine what that means. Its almost like you can read the minds of millions of people pertaining to a certain subject! Simply amazing!

Now to use this technology for our benefit, one simply has to create custom hash tags and then filter the information how ever we see fit. For example in cafe Interactive the following hash tags could be implemented.

#zhcafeint_order
#zhcafeint_music
#zhcafeint_random
#zhcafeint_pay

By using these hash tags, one could sit comfortably on your table and tweet your order. Because the information is filtered the tweets with the ending order are displayed at the bar. The person working sees the tweet, for example;

#cafeint_order could i have a latte machiato. mint tea. 2x pasta with meatballs. table 4.

This way, mistakes are avoided and the information could also go directly into the kitchen. The waitress has the possibility to send a quick reply for example.

@customertwittername : thank you for your order. current balance; 24.- chf

The possibilities are endless!

To make this new technology interesting for other people there is a tweet wall in cafe interactive. On it, all the tweets with the hash tags #zhcafeint_music and #zhcafeint_random are displayed. So if anyone has a random thought they would like to "post" for the other guests, they are welcome to do so. This could be used to give tips about things going on in the area. Or if a dish was particularly delicious, one could share that. And if someone is alone, there is something that somehow connects you to the other people in the café.

The best part is that this costs next to nothing. The technology is already around. All one has to do is invest in some hardware and with minimal programming the system would be up and running!

The best thing about a system like this, is it enhances the experience rather than deter from it. So sitting in a café can be as comfortable as its ever been. But could also have the possibility to be so much more.

... Anyone know any investors? :-)