My July 2006 wake up call about this alarming topic was documented at:
http://blog.360.yahoo.com/nomodes
Here's the text:
The devolution of a clock
Some time during the 1990's, I purchased a Braun travel alarm
that was a delight to own until it eventually died last year. I
replaced it by a similar-looking Braun travel alarm that I found on
the web site of a Canadian retailer. (Braun no longer sells clocks in
the United States.)
The new model (which is now out of the lineup) has a face light
controlled by a single easy-to-reach bar. The old model had no light.
Advantage new model.
The new model features radio control. If you are lucky, it will
receive a radio signal occasionally that automatically sets the time
accurately, taking seasonal time adjustments into account. More
likely, in my experience, you will have to set it manually by holding
down the Light Bar for about 10 seconds, then keeping it down for up
to a minute until it reaches the current time. If you overshoot, you
need to do it again. On the old model, you simply opened the back and
turned a small wheel in either direction. Advantage old model.
On the new model, when the alarm sounds, you can hit the Light
Bar to "snooze," i.e., to silence the alarm for a few minutes. On the
old model, a proximity sensor allowed you to simply wave your hand
near the clock to make it snooze. The coupling of snooze and light is
clever and useful, but if you'd rather keep your eyes shut when you
need more sleep, you'd prefer the old model.
Both the old and the new models have a knurled wheel on the right
side that is easy to reach when you want to change the alarm time.
On the old model, you could turn the alarm-set wheel either way
to adjust the wake-up time. On the new model, you can turn it only one
way. To wake up ten minutes earlier, you have to nudge it more than
twenty times. If you turn it too far (an easy mistake to make when
you're sleepy), you have to do that again. Major advantage old model.
On the old model, the alarm-set wheel turned silently. On the new
model, it clicks 300 times as you go through the process just
described. Someone at Braun forgot that roommates don't always retire
at the same time. An alarm clock should be perfectly quiet, or at
least emit a soft, constant sound, except at the time you wanted to
wake up. Major advantage old model.
I can't understand why companies that have mastered the art of
friendly design often remove the most user-friendly features of their
products in later models. I can only guess that they aren't conducting
customer research or that they are ignoring the results.
Braun is a great product company but the devolution of their
alarm clock series is a disappointment.
Larry
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