Unauthorised Bread
Technically, Cory Doctorow’s Unauthorized Bread is just barely speculative fiction:
The way Salima found out that Boulangism had gone bankrupt: her toaster wouldn’t accept her bread. She held the slice in front of it and waited for the screen to show her a thumbs-up emoji, but instead, it showed her the head-scratching face and made a soft brrt. She waved the bread again. Brrt.
“Come on.” Brrt.
She turned the toaster off and on. Then she unplugged it, counted to ten, and plugged it in. […]
The toaster wasn’t the first appliance to go (that honor went to the dishwasher, which stopped being able to validate third-party dishes the week before when Disher went under), but it was the last straw. She could wash dishes in the sink but how the hell was she supposed to make toast — over a candle? […]
“Third-party dishes.” Which brand would be least welcome combining Digital Rights Management and ovenware? Hewlett-Packard? Facebook? Amazon?1
[Via Tim Harford]
I think we all know which of those brands is most likely to go down that road. Arguing with your Amazon Echo about whether it’ll fire up the dishwasher is going to be such fun.↩︎