About one in ten of my tech-industry friends (and because I edited Valleywag.com for a year I made a lot of them -- more enemies, but that's another story) have at some point told me they wanted a longterm cafe, something like a cozy shared office.

That's coworking: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coworking

San Francisco coworking spaces include Citizen Space in SOMA near South Park: http://citizenspace.us/

And the Hat Factory in Potrero: http://hatfactory.net/

But these places have their limitations, and everyone thinks they can do one better. In fact, Digg founder Kevin Rose likes to say that when he cashes out, he'll start a teashop, but he once fantasized to me about starting a tech artists collective. I even encouraged him to try it, but I have a feeling it'll never happen.

Because to be honest, running a co-working space for people too cheap to find their own offices, going full-service without the high margins of a high-volume walk-in cafe, dealing with customers with serious entitlement issues, is not nearly as fun as all the other businesses a talented tech professional could start in SF or Silicon Valley.