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My thought is, what if instead of a starbucks card, Jonathan gave out a card for a little family owned coffee shop somewhere accessible? Then it's helping speci

My thought is, what if instead of a starbucks card, Jonathan gave out a card for a little family owned coffee shop somewhere accessible? Then it's helping specific people make a living rather than 'the man' making more money. Maybe starbucks is good, maybe bad. But his objection was yuppies buying yuppies coffee, not against starbucks itself, or the coffee industry. I'm definitely not a yuppie, I like starbucks coffee. Maybe I want to get a coffee every now and then. I would be interested in participating in Jonathan's experiment. But somebody like Sam would ruin it for me. It just doesn't add up to me.

lazerwalker 15y ago
What makes the experiment so interesting is the anonymity factor. Since there are a functionally-unlimited number of Starbucks locations, you have absolutely no way of knowing who else is using the card and on what. If it was for a small locally-owned coffee shop, it's a given that the folks charging/refilling the card are the same people frequenting the shop with you every day. I can't imagine this wouldn't drastically affect the way the experiment turned out; the social obligation is much stronger when you can connect anonymous people to faces or names, even if you don't know exactly who is participating.