[Dylan16807]

Do you want an address book? Once you have a screen capable of displaying a couple lines of text it's basically zero cost or effort to implement mp3 playing and text messaging, so you're probably stuck with those features. Oh, and a clock too.

Also, I completely understand you not wanting most features, but why would you not want a flashlight? Flashlight mode is very convenient 1% of the time, trivially ignored the other 99%.

[pcl]

Oh, and a clock too.

This brings to mind an unrelated product design gripe of mine. Two things that I hate about my kitchen are the clock on my microwave and the clock on my stovetop. I've got a perfectly serviceable clock on the wall in my kitchen; I neither need nor want clocks on those displays.

Sadly, it seems as though every manufacturer of anything with an LCD takes this same approach: we can put a clock on our widget, so of course we should put one on it. In the case of my microwave, this leads to dedicated buttons for configuring the clock. And naturally, every time the power cuts out, these clocks end up blinking at me in anger. Naturally, neither appliance provides a means to disable the clocks. And a piece of tape doesn't do the job, since the same LCD is used for all other cooking metrics.

A plea to product designers everywhere: please don't add mandatory features just because you can.

[com2kid]

> This brings to mind an unrelated product design gripe of mine. Two things that I hate about my kitchen are the clock on my microwave and the clock on my stovetop. I've got a perfectly serviceable clock on the wall in my kitchen; I neither need nor want clocks on those displays.

I love them. Well except that they get out of sync, much to my dismay!

I haven't hung a clock on the wall in years.

Likewise I use my cellphone for time.

Why shouldn't I take advantage of the tech that is around me? Know what else I love? That microwaves have a timer feature! It is amazing, I burn so much less food now. And the granularity is second based rather than the "plus or minus a minute" of the old egg timers.

[marcosdumay]

A mobile phone is the one exception for that rule. The clock sets itself up, and it's something you carry around, sometimes to places that don't have other clocks.

But yes, to the people designing every other product: When people want clocks, they go out and buy one.

My kitchen is even worse, because every appliance there use LED displays. They don't just stay there blinking, they also shine.

[goblin89]

> The clock sets itself up

I wish I could find a dumb phone with that capability. On my old Nokia (new dumb models as well) the clock is reset each time SIM card is changed (and I think sometimes if the phone runs out of battery).