Café culture simply means that you have a convenient place to meet with other people with some regularity. You really don't need to be judgemental and dismissive about it.
For me the most valuable part is the later. And interwebs do wonders in this space. Same conversions IRL may have been nicer, but there's no way I could have been part of them (or at least so many of them) otherwise. And if you're in a crowded cafe watching a famous person... It's not 1-on-1 conversation either, much closer to Reddit's AmA thread...
As for building local community... IMO Cafes are too restrictive. A decent community space wins all day any day.
> And if you're in a crowded cafe watching a famous person
You can go to another café
Another cafe wouldn’t have that famous person though. Which is fine. Just saying that many real life interactions ain’t deep 1-on-1 conversations.
I love the idea of what cafes were supposed to be a century ago. But nowadays HN or some subreddits plays the same role. Now I can live in bum-fuck-nowhere and interact with other people from wherever. While saving on exorbitant rent just to be close to meeting points.
On other other hand, this kills the romanticised idea of the cities. But are we after „city life“ as a cargo cult? Or exchange of ideas? Internet enables later from even most remote points of the world. While former feels more like roleplaying nowadays.
Community building is slightly different from cafe culture though. Cafes culture is similar to social media bubbles. Community that connects people physically living in the same people allowing to solve practical problems of the day is needed one way or another.