I have a dream… of doing email on a toaster

I have this pet idea that I’ve been tossing around in my head. There are basically two types of computer users: people who think computers should be like computers, and people who think computers should be like toasters. Computer people actually appreciate what the device is capable of, understand how to maintain the thing without becoming a Typhoid Mary, and may even actually enjoy tinkering with it in their spare time. Toaster people, on the other hand, can be defined by their total and absolute unwillingness to engage their brain when using their computer. They only use it for one or two things, they never read instructions or dialog boxes, and expect to be able to push a button (any button) and have the computer do exactly what they wanted it to do.

Honestly, toaster people really shouldn’t be using computers. They don’t want to use computers. They want to use toasters. Problem is, no one makes a toaster that does email. So instead, they drop a couple thou on a big, fancy, powerful computer (running Windows, of course) and make themselves and everyone else miserable by repeatedly breaking the thing, becoming a spam and virus vector, and just generally being a drain on society.

So, why doesn’t somebody make a toaster that does email?

This is what I’m thinking: A *nix-based gizmo that comes with a few programs and runs only those programs. Say, an email program, a bare-bones browser, a multi-protocol IM program, maybe a few games, and an anti-malware scanner. Not so much to protect the toaster, because it should be designed to absolutely not let unauthorized crap run under any circumstances, but to keep the toaster from passing crap on to other computers. The interface should be brain-dead simple: Press this button for email, this button for IM, this button for internet, this button for solitaire. There should be a maximum of one or two button presses to do anything.

Doesn’t this kind of sound like WebTV? I hear some of you ask. Well, WebTV sucked, and this won’t. If we can get all of the toaster people using toasters like they really want to, then the rest of us who actually like and want to use computers don’t have to deal with (as many) botnets, spammers, etc., and those of us who want to use a grown-up OS can do so without every third thread on the support forum being, “This OS is too complicated for my grandmother to use! You need to remove all of these features and dumb it down for her, otherwise no one will ever use it!”

Because, really, I’m gonna say it again, Grandma shouldn’t be messing around with her OS or even using a computer (as opposed to a toaster) when she has no desire or need for it. I get really tired of people demanding that everything be designed for Grandma, and everyone else be damned. I don’t want to use Grandma’s computer. I want to use my computer, and if Grandma has hers, and I have mine, then we can each use our own and we can all go on with our lives.

Tags: Geeky, The Interweb