Things Used to Work in This Country — The New Atlantishttps://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/things-used-to-work-in-this-country
I like the way simple, sturdy machines unite generations rather than dividing them — because they are capable of being passed down, because their interfaces are built off broad intuitions about a limited range of actions (turn knob, push button), and because they can be mastered via direct experimentation that will not immediately take you down a hopeless rabbit hole of arcana and administration.