What is Coffee Bitch?

definition:

coffee bitch


the person who is sent to get coffee for the whole office or group of friends, usually when they really don't want to.

* definition kindly borrowed from urbandictionary.com

In our office (and I presume many others around the world), our group of colleagues has an unwritten agreement where we would take it in turns to make brews for everyone.

It's nice to have a coffee or tea whilst you're working, especially so if someone else made it!

However, as always in cases like this, arguments arose over who's turn it was to get the kettle on, and accusations of workers not making their fair share of coffees culminated in the idea of some kind of system to definitively choose who made the brews, and so Coffee Bitch was born!

The system uses sophisticated statistical tracking to keep a close eye on how many brews you've made, and how many you've drank. This is used to weight the random number generator to keep things fair. Of course there is also a liberal sprinkling of randomness built in so that it's just possible that the person who thought they were 'safe' will be coffee bitched, just to keep things fun!

Brace yourself here comes the science
The system chooses based on your ratio of drinks made to drinks drank - that way if you have drank 10 coffees, but only made 2, there's a higher chance of you getting picked than someone who's drank 2 coffees but made 10. Using a ratio such as this makes the office politics of who makes the coffees fair in the long run even when considering the additional randomness factor built in. It also accounts for those who only partake in having drinks occasionally - their ratio will still be accurate based on their figures.




Who made this?

My name is Neil and I've been programming for over 30 years, since I was a kid - first on a ZX-81 then ZX-Spectrums, C-64's etc etc.


Me programming in 1982.

I started off working in a photo lab developing and printing customer's films, so I can tell if a picture has too much cyan at first glance (a useful skill!?) I then worked for a local ISP where the first incarnation of coffee bitch was born. When that was sold by it's greedy owners to a company that were determined to ruin it, I found my current employment where I still program computers, with a bit of system administration thrown in. It's then that the need for a new generation of coffee bitch arose as we needed something to choose who's turn it was to get the kettle on!




The History of Coffee Bitch

Whilst this Coffee Bitch website is relatively new, I actually wrote version 1 of the Coffee Bitch beverage selector in the mid 90's - it was whilst I was working for a local Internet Service Provider. We were situated on an upper floor of an old mill building in Bradford, and the kitchen was down a flight of stairs so obviously nobody wanted to have to make coffees for everyone, and so the idea of coffee bitch was born! It started life back then as a private system with just our team on it, but it proved a big success (well, it made sure I didn't have to make the drinks each time so it was worth it!)

Back to the present day, once again the need for a 'fair' way to decide who makes the drinks arose; our team of six people always moaned over who's turn it was, so I mentioned coffee bitch and the itch to re-create it started.

Now it's back and better than ever, and it's even open to anyone to set up their own groups and use!



Other Stuff

Why not visit our sister site, www.hencam.co.uk where you can watch chickens whilst you enjoy your coffee break?

Or are you looking for coffee makers or even fresh coffee with free delivery?


Coffee of the Week

Signature Blend Award Winning Fresh Roasted Ground Coffee for Filter / Cafetiere illy Classic Roast Ground Coffee Lavazza Tierra Coffee