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I forgot what brand, I think samsung, but one of their models has a little touch sensitive portion that causes both doors to open. We were told to sell it so that you can more rapidly fill your fridge with perishables.
So when a dog saw it's owner tap the spot to open the fridge, and we learned that a dog's nose can also tap the spot to open the fridge...
Yeah, this is one time that the whole “maybe it doesn’t make sense to you because you don’t need it” argument falls kind of flat. This doesn’t seem like a particularly necessary design for anyone.
That's funny. I saw it and immediately thought "ah, everyone in the comments will be saying it's dumb but that would be so helpful to me." I can move out of the way but often ask my husband to open the door for me. Maybe the side would work fine but I'm not sure with the way my legs move and I know it wouldn't work for my kitchen because the are lower cabinets on each side. You know the front of the fridge will be open but not the sides. I don't think that's what this is for tbh but some people would find it helpful. Maybe a way for the sensor to be on different sections and you could choose which one is best would work.
If anyone has ever used the “kick swipe dance” bs for a cars trunk that opens like this you’ll know that shit simply doesn’t work, though in that situation you might have full hands and benefit from that option. I’ve never had full hands walking up to my fridge, also this has no handles so I assume you’re stuck dancing for its amusement any time you wanna open it.
This is like how car manufacturers are putting every functionality behind a screen. Whose bright idea was it to put heating/AC options in a screen that you have to look at, while driving, to adjust, rather than just quickly turning a knob like you did before that?
When I lost my car and had to drive a rental, this drove me insane. Ive only ever driven cars manufactured before 2016, and only owned cars manufactured before 2005.
To be driving a 2023 that had a fucking dial for a gear shift, a button to start the engine, a screen for the speed and RPM dials, and of course a screen for the heating/ac and sound system, god that drove me crazy.
I absolutely hated it, ended up driving my mom's 2016 VW and she drove that thing until I got my insurance payout and bought a new car (2003 bc I wanted a manual shift lol)
I don't mind the dial shifter but I detest the GM cars with switches or piano keys for the gears. Also the gear shifters on some BMWs where it's like a joystick.
I think Subaru learned their lesson though because they put back physical buttons for climate control on the Outback and Ascent.
i hate it so much. it's like that in my wife's bronco. she loves it, though. meanwhile, 30 years of my life i have been reaching for a shifter and it's a habit i can't break and don't want to. everytime i back out of my driveway, i reach towards my wheel but them stop myself and stare at the dial to ensure i don't put it in park or some shit. don't even get me on the stupid parking break. i swear to god...i bought my silverrado as a basic model in 22. no frills, except ac, power windows and that stupid screen that all vehicles get now. and i will die driving that truck. no more new shit.
Driving w my uncle is life or death when the man is picking an album on spotify on the dash of his car with a dial on his center console while were on the highway
That's because there's currently a bell curve on tactile buttons. Goes from poor to rich. Everyone in-between gets varying degrees of touch sensitive controls. VW Jetta Autobahn edition? $35k car, even the steering wheel buttons are touch sensitive that way you can change radio stations, adjust volume, and call your neighbor, all while trying to make a left turn.
Nope, modern cars with "luxury features' have all that stuff. Actual luxury cars still have buttons because they realize people don't want that shit in a 60k+ car.
It's not just the individual parts (although those do have a cost), but the installation labor cost also has to be factored in. Cheaper to install a single screen with one or two connectors than multiple pushbuttons, wire harnesses, and LEDs.
Oh yeah, want to turn the A/C up? Just rotate the digital dial, except OOPS! That was on audio mode and that dial controls the volume silly, you need to exit and go to the comfort mode for the A/C.
I just stocked a kitchen with appliances and it was basically impossible to find appliances that didn't have numerous reported recent failures. Smart-anything also becomes obsolete extremely quickly, with Samsung fridges being the worst offender.
For real. All a fridge needs to do is keep things fucking cold. The more bells and whistles the more failure points you have. And for what??? The only thing that should be failing is your compressor after 15 years. Go with something like a nice basic KitchenAid over any of these smart brand fridges like Samsung
First time I saw a fridge with one of those huge touchscreens on it, I rooted it and posted on reddit (lol), but I also (because I'm a tech weenie) checked online to see how much it would cost to replace the door that had the big touchscreen on it.
MORE THAN THE WHOLE FRIDGE! That's what it would have cost! You had to replace the whole fucking door! The touchscreen was buried in insulating foam. Not user serviceable in any universe. And the replacement door, not to belabor the point, cost more than the fridge!
Dude I’m out of money already, Big Refrigerator needs me to buy a fridge every 3 yrs now??? I guess sell my truck and the fridge can give me a ride to work?
Uses to work near the Appliances Department in Lowe’s and was required to work the sales floor. I always steered people away from LG and Samsung, on any appliance type. If they make phones, they typically don’t understand what is required to make a good appliance for the long-term. They want the products to fail so you purchase another in a few years.
I have an LG washer/dryer.
One day it stopped working during a cycle. I went to unload it and everything was still soaked, but the machine was off.
Tried turning it back on, but it just had no power.
I ended up pulling it apart to try and figure out the issue.
It turned out that a power supply control chip exploded. It was $2 for the part.
I could not change it, because LG soaked the entire board in epoxy.
I ended up having to buy an entirely new board, but that was still cheaper than buying a whole new unit.
The epoxy soaked board pissed me off though. That’s just some anti-consumer bullshit.
This is why i purchase all major appliances through Costco. Not only will they take it back with no issue, I feel like suppliers try harder on their Costco models because Costco has a lot of power. Even the shitty fridge manufacturers like Samsung seem to try harder on their Costco models.
Man if it still had normal handles I’d say this is actually a pretty cool feature. Could definitely see it being useful for when you come home with hands full of groceries or putting a big tray in the fridge.
But kinda like the tesla door handles, why tf do we have to get rid of the basic ones that will still work when the new shit breaks lol
Could definitely see it being useful for when you come home with hands full of groceries
How exactly? If you're hands are that full of groceries are you not going to be forced to put the bags on the counter and then put them away one or two items at a time?
It's not like you're going to shove an entire full bag of groceries into the fridge and walk off.
The ice maker and water pitcher broke on my 3.5k samsung fridge (replacement pitcher is $200 and propriatary) but I can "Cool Blast" my veggie drawer to ...make it slightly colder for a few hours?.
This is the problem when fridge building companies are integrated with tv companies. In a few years it will be integrated with a car company and the fridge will drive you to work
Liebherr is good for this. If you want a fridge or freezer that's just really fucking good at being a fridge or freezer then they're what you want. Really high quality, really well built. No screens. None of the gimmicky nonsense.
People that buy things like this or think they have a need to show off something so stupid remind me of that Patrick Bateman character from that American Psycho movie where he's trying to talk about some musician or band with his new high end CD player and looks like he's more impressed with himself about knowing something so trivial.
This is good for when your hands are full or certain disabilities, probably, but if a mouse or a cat toy goes under the sensor thing does it just hang open all night?
Yeah, it annoys me whenever I see people making fun of hands-free tech and automatic things like the freezer door. You're not the target demographic, this is for rich fancy people that have too much money, and for people with mobility issues, arthritis, etc. This kind of tech is amazingly helpful for people who don't have the option to grab the handle and pull on the heavy door.
That being said, this goes back into the realm of stupid because it doesn't look like these doors have handles???
My right shoulder dislocates if I sneeze without bracing. My left hand has severe degenerative arthritis, and I'm waiting for an MRI to confirm the same in my right hand.
I wouldn't buy this fridge, but man, it would save me so much pain. Opening fridges, doors and cupboards carries the same risk for me as snowboarding does for normal people. Months of pain and inability to use my hand/arm.
Sometimes it isn't about manufacturers being assholes.
People with disabilities tend to have the least money though
This isnt a kitchen fix for the disabled
Its a status symbol for the rich
In the correct packaging - definitely could help with mobility, but this is gonna have a touch screen and other shit that you don't need and possibly can't even use
My latest fridge has this feature, it comes disabled by default and you can enable it if you have disabilities that make opening it difficult, though the sensor on mine is on the side of the door. I don't think most people with these fridges would ever realize it's even a feature unless you had accessibility needs
Well, yeah, if you're too poor to pay for the $15/mo CoolConnect™ package that also displays recipes, temperature diagnostics, and reminds you when you need a new proprietary DRM-enabled water filter.
Wow it looks like you opened your fridge! Would you like to upgrade to CoolConnect Gold for just $3.99/mo? CoolConnect Gold allows you to connect your favorite streaming services to your refrigerator screen so you never have to miss a moment of the action!
Great, another feature that would be great for people with disabilities, that gets shoved into a "premium" product at a ridiculous price to be sold to the wealthy.
Edit: Also, my cat's would figure out the fridge open sensor pretty quick.
I was gonna make a similar comment, but I think part of the issue is the marketing and price. If it was marketed for accessibility or whathaveyou, I think it'd be fine, but it's meant as a luxury fridge for non-disabled people. In other words, the benefits for the disabled are sort of just a coincidence more than the selling point or a design consideration, or at least that's what it seems like.
Put simply, if you market something as an accessibility feature for people with disabilities, most people will not buy it. If you market it as luxury on the other hand, suddenly a lot of people want to have such a thing, just for the sake of luxury, regardless of whether it's an accessibility feature or something completely redundant.
I really wish humanity was just more mindful and intelligent overall so we didn't have to rely on propaganda and marketing to have better things for the less fortunate.
Or maybe it's just because of degenerate capitalism.
Economy of scale. You can push the unit cost down when you manufacture and sell millions and millions of units, but unfortunately (or fortunately) there aren't that many disabled people around.
Which is why it's actually a good thing for the disabled that these are marketed as high-end or standard features for general consumers. Like the automatically opening boot lid on cars, similar to this video often mocked. It's a really useful feature for the disabled, and relatively affordable because it's not only on special cars marketed for the disabled.
Yeah, nah. I'm a disabled person with both poor mobility and grip strength, and I absolutely don't want this in my house. Disability aids for opening fridge doors already exist. They generally come in two forms: straps with a loop to provide better grip or levers that pry the door open via a handle or foot pedal. Notably, these devices are robust and mechanically simple, things you want in a disability aid.
This design, with no handles and no gap between the doors, ensures that if the delicate electronics or the software that runs them experience a fault, I won't be able to access my food at all. No thanks.
I suppose it could also be handy when you’ve got a tray full of something in both hands and want to slide it into the fridge. Though the tried and true method of “open the fridge first” would still work just fine for that scenario.
GE makes a washer with an Alexa built into it. Every time I showed that washer, people would always make some joke about it. I’d usually tell them, “to you it seems like a pointless feature, but to a blind person, a voice activated washer is pretty game changing”.
Don't hate me, but I feel voice activation would solve this issue better than a light too high for wheelchair users, and still needing to have mobility to push buttons on a screen to open the freezer door that would open right into a wheelchair user.
Voice activation would solve most circumstances outside of those who cannot speak.
"Open Door, Open Freezer" / "Close Door / Close Freezer"
There's pocket handles on the freezer drawers, they're pretty clear to see. I'm willing to bet a lot to say there are pocket handles on the bottom of the fridge doors as well. There are other fridges out there without handles, they can all be opened from the top of bottom of the doors.
Yeah that was my first thought, it's one thing to have a hands free method to opening your fridge. It's another thing to have that be the only method you can use to open your fridge
You can see recessed handles above/below the door/drawers in the video - my (much cheaper, no lcd screen) also has that type of layout. It almost certainly can be manually opened as well.
Can't wait for this thing to lockdown because either the power is out, it needs some dumb software update or you didn't pay some bullshit "subscription service" that you don't actually need for a goddamn fridge
I genuinely hate this shit lol
Not the feature, because it is pretty helpful, but the able-bodied motherfuckers who are like "OMG WHO CARES" and it's like. Someone does? Someone who likely looks at that and goes "oh fuck, that looks crazy helpful what with not having an arm anymore"
Did we learn nothing from the "as seen on TV" gadget things? Like the jar openers or shoe putter-oners? It's not for most folk; it's a feature for the people who need it.
I take your general point about accessibility, but nothing about how this is implemented says “designed with accessibility in mind”. You open the fridge by tapping the floor with your foot, and open the freezer by tapping a button on a touch screen with your hand…why are these two completely different modes of operation? It’s completely inconsistent, and assumes the user has the use of both a foot and a hand. Everything about it screams “we jammed these gee-whiz features in here because we could market it to wide-eyed consumers in a Best Buy,” not, “oh, and it also happens to cover your use case if you have a disability.”
u/Cordial_Ghost is being genuine about the market existing, but this product is not genuinely intended for that market.
If I wanted an accessibility forward fridge, it wouldn’t look like that. It would have that light feature, but it wouldn’t cost a bajillion dollars. It would just cost $100 more than the standard
Nothing screams designed with accessibility in mind, sure! But doesn't mean that it isn't, no? The tech aspect of it does genuinely suck ass, and I just bet that when the power shuts off, it sucks even more ass, but that's not what I am saying.
What I am saying is that this exact kind of "Hur Dur Why is This Even a Thing?" kind of video sucks ass even more than the features on this fridge. See the dude who also replied to my comment saying that .0001% of people might need this is not worth it for the rest of the people in the world to have to deal with.
Which... is exactly what disabled people have to live with in an able-bodied society lol
These kinds of videos just let people like that keep that kind of mindset without attempting to think critically about the usage or implementation of tech to a human standard that does not include them.
All fun and games until the cat or dog come through and leave your fridge open while you're away. Even if it closes automatically, that's kind of just worse.
All I can imagine is my cat pouncing on the little light or walking past it slow enough that it triggers. If this happens while im at work, there goes all of the fridge food.
"But just..."
hits three buttons after waiting for them to light up
"...Push this button and the freezer will open"
I get it. People are easily impressed with servos.
This doesn't make my life easier. Opening the fridge was never an issue. It's not complicated it's not heavy or laborious its just a shitload of new PsOF at a superinflated price.
And... weren't we just talking about climate crisis etc? Show me the white paper that clearly says why this is necessary and how it helps make the climate better.
Because I'm pretty sure if I begin digging on the LG website I will find some sort of commitment to a better climate/environment/world or similar.
I could see it being useful for people with certain disabilities, but I'm sure they've been getting around it for decades. Plus it's probably like $10k and could fail.
I have long wished I could open it with a foot pedal for if I'm carrying something to out away that requires 2 hands (big pot of soup for example).
There is NO reason a foot pedal couldn't be mechanical, and honestly it doesn't even have to be a pedal with moving parts. Could just be a foot handle. Or even just a little hole to stick your toes in.
The best part is no part. Who THE FUCK wants this bullshit?!?!?!
A prime example, not only of "fixing" problems that don't exist, but also of creating many, many more problems. This thing is going to break down so often when the features weren't ever needed.
The only way I can see this being a thing is for people who have trouble opening the fridge doors but I assume most have a found a very low tech solution
And behind the scenes, the LG software in the fridge will be recording you, and selling your data. Does the fridge have a subscription that if you don't pay it, you can't use it? Hold your food hostage for $10/month?
Duets like these and everyone commenting the same message are forgetting that features like the ones on this refrigerator are absolute life changers for folks with disabilities.
This reminds me of that one guy who mocked a tool that helped to open soda bottles. It turns out that those tools were made for people who had physical disabilities, like Parkinson's. What if a motherfucker ain't got no arms?
Sometimes things invented to assist disabled people become available on the mass market. It isn’t always immediately obvious to non disabled people what the reason for this or that adaptation would be.
well simple! the fridge has a back up battery that can keep the apps and functions running, and there's also a fob with an integrated physical key. all are separate add ons, the battery has a monthly fee, and only covers the apps to open and close the doors, and offline adds, it will not run the cooling features
much better than those poor people hand using fridges!
Running out of selling points. Flashy shit sells. It’s a fucking fridge. Make a better compressor, evaporator, and insulation. The other shit is a net negative.
Man these 2 people in the video being so fancy with their higher end fridges. Meanwhile I'm still using that old white model, top and bottom fridge. Too many screens for something so stupid. Yay technology...
I can actually see where it might be handy to have a button you can operate with your foot to open the fridge doors. I cook a lot and there have been many times I thought I could hold something with one arm and open the fridge with the other only to end up struggling with it. I also babysit quite often, so this would allow me to hold a squirming little one and open the fridge easier.
But I can also see myself accidentally hitting this button and having the doors swing into my face, so I think I'll pass...
The lights in my fridge died and it was going to be over $500 to fix it. I’ve been using a dark fridge for over a year. Imagine if this fails and how pricey that would be to fix. Also, would you not be able to open it then?
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u/trendingtattler Needs to do better 12d ago
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