Best microwave I've ever used was made in, I think, the late 70s. Didn't even have a turntable, and worked just fine without it, somehow. No clock at all. The "UI" was two heavy-feeling knobs, one for power and one for time. Turn the time knob, and it starts cooking at your selected power until the time runs down, with the knob itself tick-tocking down to zero and setting off a physical(!) buzzer. Want to add more time? Turn the knob while it's still running, no problem. Realize you added too much time? Ditto, but in reverse. Exactly as you'd expect. Simply pull the door open, no button for that, even.

Intuitive, simple, felt great to use, and did 100% of what I want out of a microwave.

Basically anything that used to have real buttons and knobs that have been replaced by shitty-feeling rubber-covered buttons and knobs that merely communicate suggestions, hooked up to an embedded computer, has a worse UI than what it replaced. And don't get me started on touch-sensitive buttons. At least touch screens have some excuse, some purpose. Dedicated touch-sensitive buttons are like some kind of practical joke, and have been central to several of my worst experiences with products.

Luckily I've found a workaround - I turn on the child lock once I've set up the wash program, so these accidental touches are ignored.

It probably had a microwave "stirrer" -- basically just a rotating metal-bladed fan that the microwaves bounce off and get reflected to all parts of the oven cavity.

I believe large commercial microwaves may still use these. Residential models tend to use turntables because they're somewhat more compact.

I didn't realise it was old technology being remarketed.

The minimalist smartphone market is developing but still rather anemic in its offering. I continue to watch companies like humane and blloc to see if they can ultimately produce something that is more compelling. Time will tell, but I feel like this is a market we really need more investment in.

I used to dream about getting rid of both completely when I retire, but the way society and tech are going I expect that means I'd almost never see or hear from my kids or future grandkids or whoever. So, stuck with the crap still, I guess.

It may be an unpopular opinion on HN but I don't enjoy learning new syntaxes every year for relatively few benefits in new concepts or paradigms.

In my ideal world everyone would be using Lisp (my username checks out!) but so much power. It has a simple syntax (some say it has no syntax but I think that is a little hyperbole). In my ideal world new concepts and paradigms are implemented in Lisp using Lisp. I'd much rather spend time solving real problems that real human beings care about. I'd much rather learning new ways of solving problems with new paradigms. I don't want to waste hours learning new syntaxes and their gotchas and edge-cases!

I'm convinced that Clojure will be the lisp-uber-language.

EDIT: I shouldn't have said "simple"; nothing ever is. I was being arrogant.

The best one I’ve used so far is Kotlin, which is a pleasure to use in comparison to Java, but this might be because I used it in an IDE written by the language designers themselves.

I don't understand why you need to pick up every new language that comes out. Can't you just hold down one job for longer than a year?

That was always my impression, you're writing the AST directly, then manipulating it with fancy macros.

people can't stop reinventing the wheel. everyone thinks they know better.

At least in Tesla's, it seems like a win for safety. No switching channels, no loading CDs/switching stations (just say "play pink floyd"), no playing with volume (it's on the steering wheel), automatic wipers, (with manual do it now on the stalk), automatic temp control, voice based nav that works well. Seat adjustments are on the seat. Cruise control following distances are on the steering wheel. Pause music is on the steering wheel (or automatic when you receive a call or ask for voice control).

Car's without touchscreens still often require looking, can you change your channel to preset #3 without looking? Switch from heat to AC mode? Defrost your front/rear windshield? Seems about the same as a touch screen, and relatively infrequent.

Not sure what people are doing on their touch screens, but I rarely touch mine, and when I look it's for more info about my environment, not less.

The Tesla does have a touch screen, but you don't need them to change the volume, the cruise control follow distance, play a new song, pause a song, make a phone call, use voice nav, manually overwrite the wipers (wipe now), etc.

Even after spending thousands of dollars on a car, I'm not allowed to install alternative privacy friendly firmware on it. It's bad enough that there are AI-powered cameras with facial recognition everywhere, but thanks to HD cameras in every $100 phone, it's hard to walk in a public place without being in the background of an Instagram story.

Everyone is spying on me and every damn "smart" device is turned against me..

It takes a lot of energy to raise children and be a good partner. The anxiety introduced by constantly getting notified of what is being taught, what the grades are, what is missing EVERYDAY is not only overkill, but I think harmful.

My philosophy is that school (elementary, middle, high school) is a time to explore, be a kid, make mistakes, and do your best to navigate puberty.

The constant reminder of grades, grades, grades puts too much emphasis on my more school-inclined child to be obsessed with their identity as an "A" student, and my art-inclined child to rebel at every turn with us constantly stressing if she's "missed" anything.

Same with daycares. It used to be that the teachers would tell us if we needed to actually do something or bring something in.

Now, our kids miss out on school events because they are buried in single lines in one of the 4+ e-mails a day from them. And the response is always "didn't you see the e-mail?"

I bought already a couple of them, and somehow none of them seems to work well, or they are too sensitive and I can't figure out where to measure my temperature and what counts as fever.

I finally found some thermometers that I used when I was younger, and now I can reliably measure my temperature and I can tell what counts as fever.

They didn't actually made my life worse, I don't want to be that dramatic, but I definitely dislike them.

In the snow I could blast the heat at full fan speed with max temp at my feet while allowing the icy air from outside to blow at my face at the same time to keep me awake.

We should have rejected it in phones. We should certainly have rejected it in laptops.

I don't have much hope for EVs. With the battery making up maybe half of the value of the vehicle, a top design priority should have been standardised 'battery modules' shared between as many vehicle models as possible, to allow for easy replacement (including swapping out just 1 of N modules after minor damage rather than writing the whole car off), upgrade, salvage, and recycling.

Xbox controllers do something similar; I love being able to just swap them out from my box of rechargeable batteries without having to worry about if I left the device plugged in to charge recently.

On relatively recent technologies, Bluetooth is unpredictable and finicky across different devices. One cannot effectively carry over one’s learning from one Bluetooth device to another. One cannot predict how a particular new Bluetooth device will work (or not) with one’s existing devices.

And then there are USB-C ports and cables. They all look alike, but you’d never easily know what it supports (which cable is the right one, power delivery, how much power can/will it handle, data transfer speed, is it Thunderbolt, etc.).

I can’t imagine how non-technical people roll the dice with all these and how much they must hate technology.

[1]: Season 5 Episode 19 (“Two Weeks”)

Seems to have eaten up all the gains from SSDs and more modern CPUs. The hardware gets better and excel stays slow

FTFY

I shouldn't have to avoid driving after sunset because 80% of the general population are idiots who put LEDs in housings where LEDs shouldn't be used.

I miss the discoverability of the old internet, and I hate having to do 90% of my searches in Incognito.

inb4 DuckDuckGo, etc.

Chatbots - as others mentioned.

Laptops - encourage bad posture, lots of PT and exercise to improve that. Self-control as well.

Smart watches - same reasons as phone. Lot of good and a lot of bad.

* Too many remote controls. One for TV, one for AppleTv, one for PS5 if I want to see a movie on bluray, one for the Denon AMP, etc... There should be a standard for that. Something with a touchscreen and an API manufacturers should support. * Touchscreens in cars (already mentioned). My Toyota is not even capacitive and it's a car from 2017. More generally... Touchscreens where they're not needed, like ATMs or vending machines: with all this covid fear, they're not hygienic. * Wireless headphones: battery, quality of sound... I fear the day there will be no wired headphones available on consumer market. I don't care about high quality wireless headphones, I don't want to charge my headphones * Messaging apps. I have to keep iMessage, Telegram, Whatsapp & Signal on my phone because I have different contacts using different apps. It was easier in the SMS era

I'll go one further and say touch controls. I hate my stove with a passion. It's absolutely horrible to use if my fingers are a tiny bit wet (I know, who has wet hands in the kitchen, right?!). Sometimes, even with dry hands, the on/off button will not register.

I need to press 3 different buttons to turn it on. I need to press two different buttons to change the power, one of which repeatedly if I want to change by more than one step – say to turn one burner off, if I want the others to stay on.

There is a standard where you can use some keys in your TV remote to control your device via HDMI, but I never had a device compatible with it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consumer_Electronics_Control

I still use their dedicated remotes though, as they have the full functionality whereas CEC only deals with some.

Totally agree, although just as an anecdotal experience: I was very surprised this weekend when I set up a soundbar with my TV, which immediately recognized it and did some configuration which allowed me to control the soundbar volume with my normal TV remote.

---

[0] They are, however, very open and publish the remote codes.

I think environment-friendly and always have bought rechargeable batteries. However since about ten years I feel that rechargeable batteries don't work well anymore. They don't keep a lot of charge and die soon, sometimes only after two or three recharges.

I gave up and don't buy rechargeable AAA and AA batteries anymore and try to avoid gadgets needing AAA and AA batteries. Most toys need them, however.

What I really would like: USB-C rechargeable AAA and AA batteries by having an USB-C plug in the battery, a way to daisy-chain them during charging, a mini-display on the battery to show the charge in mAh, and a possibility to leave the batteries in the gadget during charging. Even better, don't sell gadgets without USB-C charging.

I feel it doesn't affect me directly since I don't use it (at least, not of the Facebook/Twitter variety). But I think it definitely contributes to polarization and extremism.

- web 2.0 and later,

- widescreen ratios,

- every Google technology/product plus how Google handles them,

- the whole “smart” concept,

- x86 monopoly,

- web browser hell,

- personal systems with active cooling,

- instant messaging,

enough for a first comment.

But CRT to LCD transition was the hardest era until HiDPI + scaling comes to town (a.k.a. retina).

Remember, they want to grow their user base, just like Facebook. They will use similar tactics.

I have a mount for the phone at center dash of my car and FaceID rarely works from there. I have to lean over while trying to drive to put my face in front of the phone to get it to work … sometimes. Usually the phone insists on the passcode which is insecure when mounted on dash for passengers to easily view and provides a further distraction.

Good old TouchID worked so much better in most circumstances.

They are extremely finnicky, delicate and built with very small tolerances for something that gets rattled around for kilometers of trail in dust, mud or water.

I never, ever had one or seen one that hasn't been very very capricious with cable tension or dropout straightness or cassette tightening or barrel adjustment. And usually they drop out of shape regularly after being maintained and re-set.

I get that the industry had to sell something new at some point, but give me any "old" 10x or reliable 11x drivetrain any day. Hell, I'd pay cash for a 9x with only the largest cogs of a modern 12x.

In any case, sorry to hear it. I'm not shopping a bike replacement and leaning towards an ebike, but trying to avoid the Shimano EP8, which again has a signature noise, loud clunk/clanking on the downhills when not under power.

- Ad-trackers

- App stores/subscriptions

- Cookie banners

- Stupid "AI"

- Ridiculous customer service chatbots/IVR call-trees

- Cryptocurrency scams

when you need to get to a person and you don't fall within their voice prompt system you end up saying "operator" 7 times and then the computer is like "Did you want to talk to an operator?" and it says please enter your 10 digit phone number.. And you're stuck in hell for 10 minutes.

- need to fumble through awful apps/sites to find them and hope you have signal

- phone dead? no ticket for you

- went with other people? all the tickets are on one phone. good luck getting back to your seat without that phone

- worst of all? no ticket stub to look back at years later

things were better when we didn't have to waste time cooking our food

and don't get me started on the Wheel :P

Everything that is is even remotely a negative connotation involves Jira for me.

I do apologize for launching into a mild rant there...i guess i have deeper issues with mobile parking apps than i originally thought. ;-)