I'm at least glad that the author describes the failings of the toaster and says it only works "most of the time".
What exactly makes it smarter and better than my modern $25 one other than the standard "everything was better back in the day" nostalgia?
It works for all bread types that fit in the toaster. I should know, I bake my own bread (and it's not all sandwich bread loaves).
It is not more likely to burn down your house. Take responsibility for your own well-being and just add a 3 prong cord (and ground it to the outer shell, there's even a screw hole for it).
I have one of these toasters and I love it. It's my favorite kitchen appliance
This exception is actually an example of how everything was better "back in the day". This toaster, which has had its controls removed, is analagous to, for example:
- a personal computer which can only browse the web, or run verified software.
- a coffee mug that keeps your coffee warm, but requires you to install an app in order to set a temperature
- any gaming console (technically the first category)
- cars which have had their buttons removed
- A tv and a roku, that have been glued together for some reason
But it does let you control that. There's a knob for it.
Granted, I still wouldn't pay $260 for this, but it's a pretty cool mechanism nonetheless.
It is an elegant design to to achieve a goal with simpler and fewer parts.
A uC and a dozen sensors and actuators and MB of code is a brute force solution. It's flexible and functional but not elegant. Instead of figuring out some way for a thing to happen by itself, you explicitly write a bunch of code to spell it all out.
Now the uC way is more flexible. You can change the code to change what happens, but that's a separate metric and a separate value. Not all tasks or products actually benefit from it, and it comes at the cost of complexity and reliability and longevity and dependence on infrastructure and supply chain. Personally, I think it's completely and utterly ridiculous that a toaster requires a chip fab.
I know why it's not really that crazy if chip fabs happen to exist anyway for other reasons but the observation of the absurdity does still stand.
This kind of mechanical engineering is really no different from software engineering. You design a series of mechanisms to make things happen, whether through levers and screws and bimetal strips or code. With code, frankly less effort is needed for such design. And yes there could be elegance in code that is not directly apparent to the consumer, much like there is elegance here.
I'm not disputing elegance. I'm decrying the lack of functionality and lack of control by the user.
It's somewhat like the difference between a mechanical interlock and a program with rules that do the same thing.
You could have two solenoids operating two relays, and two extra contacts on each relay to act as sensors, and some code that says if A is on then turn B off, if B is on then turn A off. (pretend for the moment that a single relay can't be both sides at the same time)
Or you could have no solenoids and no sensors and no computer, just a solid bar connecting the two switches with a pivot in the middle. It becomes impossible to press both switches at once, and the function, the enforcing of the desired truth table rule, very much happens "by itself".
The fact that a person designed and fashioned the mechanical interlock does not make the two systems equal, in kind not just in degree.
But all options have a cost so those I do not use have negative value.
My current toaster oven has three dials and an LCD display with a hierarchical menu, the vast majority of which I have never intentionally used, though I don't mind all the bells and whistles because I have learned how to ignore them. But for toasting slices of bread my current toaster is less useful than one in the article despite the proliferation of options because it requires that I mentally estimate the amount of time to toast depending on the bread slice's thickness, composition, and current temperature (i.e. from counter, fridge, or freezer) so I can specify an appropriate amount of time to toast. Occasionally I slightly over- or under-toast something and then deal with correcting that.
I agree that it is much more infuriating when controls I depend on are removed or shunted off into a car touchscreen menu or appliance-specific mobile app. But for the vast majority of appliances and applications I just want the thing to do the job I hired it to do with minimal questions or interruptions.
FYI, there is a darkness control knob
But that's what the iPhone did, didn't it? Before that most phones (even touch-screen ones) had physical number keys, whereas the iPhone demoted the keypad/dialpad off to a secondary screen in the Phone application. For a while the only time I ever used the keypad when navigating an automated menu, but now that Android has "Direct My Call" I don't even use it for that.
I'm glad that there are still phones with number keys for people who like them, but I'm equally glad it's not illegal to make products simpler for those who prefer that.
Either way, I remain glad that the government has not made it illegal for a company to remove functionality from a product.