Cafe Disaffecto

“Cafe Disaffecto” was the fourth episode of the first season of Daria. The title is sometimes written as "Café Disaffecto," but the accent mark over the e was not present in the episode title on the show.

Summary
This episode opens with a computer being stolen from "alt.lawndale.com," the student coffee house. Much of the episode concerns the characters attempting to raise money to open an alternative venue, an "old-school," Greenwich Village-style coffee house with acts and performers and poets and the like. (This was a "suggestion" Timothy O'Neill gathered from Daria despite the fact that Daria hadn't intended to make any such suggestion.) Daria is also forced to perform at the coffee house after her fundraising efforts are called into question (specifically a non-sale to a Mrs. Johanssen, although Quinn's sales techniques used on a boy named Danny could be considered far more questionable). In typical subversive fashion, she reads a story about a Cold War-era spy named Melody Powers, and starts a riot that causes the coffee house to be closed down.

“Cafe Disaffecto” and Fanfic
Throughout Kara Wild's Driven Wild Universe series, Cafe Lawndale undergoes several changes. In "The Tie That Chokes," it returns to being a student coffee house, with the added presence of armed security. In "Erin the Head," Cafe Lawndale has closed altogether and has been turned into a new "happening" venue called the Metreonopolis. Finally, in "Into the Fire," we learn that the Metreonopolis was shut down and turned into the more tasteful, sedate Café Brunoli, which caters to older clientèle. In each case, with the exception of the last one, disaster befell the café, just as it did in "Cafe Disaffecto."

In "Can I Just Have The Coffee?," Daria is convinced for different reasons to read a story at the coffee house, with John Lane egging on the near-rioting football players.

The original name of the student coffee house, alt.lawndale.com, was later used as the name of a Daria fandom website that claimed to be the third unofficial Daria site created. The site is no longer maintained or updated.