PlaceSite: Reinventing Wi-Fi Community

PlaceSite introduces a new way of using wireless networks -- to create a digital community service by, for and about people who are in the same cafe together. PlaceSite is a web application that people see when they open their web browsers in a wireless Internet cafe. It allows people to create and share personal profiles, post messages in a digital bulletin board and see who else is (and was) in the cafe. We launched PlaceSite in a Berkeley cafe and explored two questions through surveys, observations and interviews: 1) What information, if any, would people like to share digitally with others in the same cafe? 2) How will this digital information service affect social interactions in a cafe?