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Public domain patent information

Some text taken from public domain USPTO source at http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/com/speeches/01-46.htm — Preceding unsigned comment added by The Anome (talk • contribs) 12:41, 15 January 2004‎

History

Copeman invented the electric stove before the toaster; I fixed that and included a reference to the information. I don't know that he invented the first flexible ice cube tray, thus I think using the phrase "invented THE flexible ice cube tray" would be better as "invented a flexible ice cube tray".Benthatsme 22:29, 15 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

UHH

any idea why we even MADE an article on toasters? just asking. — Preceding unsigned comment added by SmartyPantsKid (talk • contribs) 22:15, 30 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Because Wikipedia. Or, more truthfully, encyclopaedia. The concept is right there in the name. And if you think this is bad, you might want to run before I introduce you to the list of numbered minor planets (never mind those which still only have a provisional designation, but often rate a page to themselves), and invite you to count backwards from the current high-water mark...146.199.60.36 (talk) 20:16, 30 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Vandalism

This article has been vandalized, but I don't know what the original text was to fix it. Someone please revert. AeoniosHaplo 10:34, 18 March 2007 (UTC) OMGGGGGGGGGGGG! UGLY PEOPLE! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.172.70.180 (talk) 23:59, 7 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

more recent additions ?

More recent additions to toaster technology include the ability to toast frozen bread, automatic toast lowering with no lever to push, a mode to toast the cut side of a bagel only, separate operation levers to allow users to toast either two or four slices, and reheating functions which allow toast to be warmed without being burned.

this sounds like a refererence to the sunbeam toastamatic ..it does all this but it also automatically lowered bread when first released in the 1960s...todays unit is a reproduction of their origional 1960's unit. not a recent addition!


13 Minutes?

A typical modern 2-slice toaster uses about 900w power and makes toast in 13 minutes.

Does anyone else find the idea that toast takes 13 minutes to make a bit strange?

MSTCrow 22:51, Jan 24, 2005 (UTC)

No. toast is my life, I would never, and I repeat, NEVER, find it strange. -User: All toasters toast toast

Insignifiant consumption ?

Well,
I assume a 1000W toaster - 2min - each morning as sugested this gives 33 W.h for only one use. Maybe used twice or more each morning, so, well, let's say 100 W.h each morning

Let's say... well, 20 million people each morning for the example (will be more for real). This gives 2 billion W.h

or a mean-power of 1000 MW while 2 hours (if this country take the breakfast during this range) every day

Well, this insignifiant energy need about 2 hours of a full-powered small nuclear station's power each morning ! And maybe more because there are much more toasters in the world. Only for having the bread toasted: well, I suggest to delete the insignificant word. 

A sweet candy's packaging is nothing. Collected it needs a city dump.

Toasters in fiction

Why was this section removed?

I'm restoring this section to is prior state; it seems that the section may have been removed by a typo, witness the odd placement of "==See Also==", this section running into the previous like the edit was done carelessly or accidentally. oneismany 12:21, 22 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

energy calculation

I don't think the energy calculation is right. Toasters probably don't heat the bread to 100 C. On the other hand, reducing the water content from 35% to 10% means vaporizing 25% (8g reduction, if the starting point is 32g). The energy needed is the heat of vaporization of 8g of water, 2260 J/g or about 18 kJ. The bread does get heated as well, but I don't know to what typical temperature.

Probably to substantially higher than 100 degrees. The browning effect is caused by a Maillard reaction, which typically occur at around 120-130 degrees. But obviously that's only the surface of the bread reaching that temperature. JulesH 20:10, 11 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Electric shock?

If toast is stuck in a toaster [...] it is highly recommended that one does not attempt to free it by inserting metal objects such as knives, due to the risk of electric shock. The toasters I know use calrods and shouldn't give me an electric shock when putting an conductor on this heating element. I can't say for sure, but I guess all toasters nowadays make it impossible to be confronted to such risk. --Abdull 22:52, 7 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"Toaster-ovens" use calrods, but most ordinary toasters still use open nichrome heaters. Because they occupy a lot of surface area, these open-wire heaters are noticeably better at making toast, but they'll definitely give you a shock if you make electrical contact with them.
Atlant 23:15, 7 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The Breakfast Food Cooker

This toaster-related joke is always popular in the software engineering community.

Atlant 14:56, 26 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Once upon a time, in a kingdom not far from here, a king summoned two of his advisors to test them. He showed them both a shiny metal box, with two slots in the top, a control knob, and a lever. He asked his advisors, "What do you think this is?"

One advisor, who happened to be an engineer, answered first. "It is a toaster," he said.

The king asked, "How would you design an embedded computer for it?"

The engineer replied,

I would use a 4-bit microcontroller to do the job. I would write a simple program that reads the darkness knob and quantizes its position to one of sixteen shades of darkness ranging from snow white to coal black. The program would then use that darkness level as the index into a sixteen-element lookup table of initial timer values. Then it would turn on the heating elements and start the timer with the initial value selected from the table. At the end of the time delay, it would turn off the heat and pop the toast.
Come back next week and I'll show you a working prototype.

The second advisor, a computer scientist, immediately recognized the danger of such short-sighted thinking. He said,

Toasters don't just turn bread into toast, they are also used to warm frozen waffles and pop-tarts. What you see before you is really a Breakfast Food Cooker. As the subjects of your kingdom become more sophisticated, they will demand more capability. They will need a Breakfast Food Cooker that can also cook sausage, fry bacon, and make scrambled eggs. A toaster that only makes toast will soon be obsolete. If we don't look to the future, we will have to completely redesign it in just a few years.
With this in mind, we can formulate a more intelligent solution to the problem. First, create a class of Breakfast Foods. Specialize this class into subclasses called Grain Breakfast Foods, Pork Breakfast Foods, and Poultry Breakfast Foods. Each of these classes should inherit properties from the Breakfast Foods class. The specialization process should be repeated with Grain Breakfast Foods divided into Toast, Muffins, Pancakes, and Waffles; Pork Breakfast Foods divided into Sausage, Links, and Bacon; Poultry Breakfast Foods divided into Scrambled Eggs, Hard-Boiled Eggs, Poached Eggs, Fried Eggs, and various Omelet classes.
The Ham and Cheese Omelet class is worth special attention because it must inherit characteristics from Pork Breakfast Foods and Dairy Foods, as well as Poultry Breakfast Foods. Thus we see that the problem cannot be properly solved without multiple inheritance.
At run time the program must create objects of the proper type and send a message to the object that says, 'Cook yourself.' The semantics of this message depends, of course, on the kind of object, so it has a different meaning to a piece of toast than it does to scrambled eggs.
Reviewing the process so far, we see that the Analysis Phase has revealed that the primary requirement is to cook any kind of Breakfast Food. In the Design Phase, we have discovered some derived requirements. Specifically, we need an object-oriented language with multiple inheritance. Of course the user doesn't want the eggs to get cold while the bacon is frying, so concurrent processing is required, too.
We must also not forget the user interface. The lever that lowers the food lacks versatility, and the darkness knob is confusing. Users won't buy the product unless it has a user-friendly, graphical interface. When the Breakfast Food Cooker is plugged in, the user should see a cowboy boot on the screen. The user clicks on it, and the message 'Booting Windows Vista' appears on the screen. (Windows Vista should be out by the time the product gets to the market.) The user can pull down a menu and click on the foods he wants to cook.
Having made the wise decision of specifying the software first in the Design Phase, now all that remains is to pick an adequate hardware platform for the Implementation Phase. An Intel Itanium with 512 Megabytes of memory, a 64 Gigabyte hard disk, and an LCD monitor should be sufficient. Select a multi-tasking, object-oriented language that supports multiple inheritance and has a built in GUI, and writing the program will be a snap. (Imagine the difficulty we would have had if we had foolishly allowed a hardware-first design strategy to lock us into a 4-bit microcontroller!)

The king wisely had the computer scientist thrown in the moat.

This is not the software engineering community. Lupine Proletariat 12:49, 26 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Toasters in computing

"Toasters are very common sample peripherals for device drivers" - is this nonsense that has avoided deletion? It's confusing. If it's not a hoax, it needs more explanation, or a citation or something. How does the toaster connect to the computer? Can we have a picture of this? Lupine Proletariat 12:49, 26 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It's not a literal thing; toasters are occasionally used as (fictitious) example hardware devices in sample code or tutorials for writing device drivers. Added a link to the Toaster sample in the Windows Driver Development Kit and some clearer text. -- Dsandler 06:15, 5 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Electrical use

Shouldn't there be something about how even in modern kitchens a toaster is a common culprit for tripping the circuit breaker?

Watt Seconds

I removed the line in the second paragraph about watt-seconds. Please don't randomly use Google Calculator to look smart. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 64.131.4.91 (talk • contribs).

picture

I think that the pic where you can see the photographer taking the photo in the nude reflected on the toaster should be in this article. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Notsharon (talk • contribs) 04:07, 7 May 2007 (UTC).[reply]

why? just why? Patchiman (talk) 01:36, 1 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

"Doneness"?

Why was this word used? is it even a word? Can someone change it? Eonut 00:12, 30 July 2007 (UTC) Eonut[reply]

Toaster oven photo needed

Toaster oven redirects here, but there's no photo of a toaster oven. We need one. Badagnani (talk) 21:21, 22 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Done. Badagnani (talk) 21:32, 22 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Personally, I think that Toaster oven should be it's own article. While one can be used simply to make toast, it's so much more versatile... Madlobster (talk) 05:54, 27 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
indeed, a toaster oven is really a small electric oven. you can toast bread in a full sized oven if you were so inclined. i came here because i was curious about the history of toaster ovens, and this article is just about toasters! BBnet3000 (talk) 00:34, 21 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Cost to toast 2 slices of bread

What would be an estimated cost to toast two slices of bread? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.127.23.22 (talk) 01:00, 11 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Depends how brown you want it, how efficient your toaster is, and, most importantly, the local cost of electricity. However, we can make a ballpark stab at it; Tom Scott's youtube channel once did a rundown to see if toaster settings dials actually corresponded to some kind of calibrated length of time, and concluded that, whilst there is a wide degree of variation, the average happened to equate to a dial set to "2" producing a toasting time of almost exactly two minutes; my own toaster needs to be set in-between "2" and "3" to brown to a generally acceptable level; I seem to recall its power rating being about 900 watts; and last time I checked my electricity bill, it cost essentially £0.13 per kilowatt-hour. So, 2.5 minutes x 900 W = 0.0375 kWh, x 13 = 0.4875 pence.
Thus, the electricity drawn to toast a two-slice round of bread in a generic example toaster at a low to average unit price is approximately one ha'penny; at the current terrible sterling exchange rates, just a little less than half a US or Euro cent. If you're buying your bread and spreads on the cheap (as I do), it costs roughly about as much as for each other component of a round of topped toast. If you buy it at regular retail price and buy more expensive spreads, the power cost fades into insignificance, unless you're paying a huge amount per kWh (...and it's a similar story with boiling water for tea or coffee, though the individual component and all-up cost is, unexpectedly, actually more than the toast you eat with it at breakfast).146.199.60.36 (talk) 17:55, 30 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

yeah i think toaster oven should have it's own article ...it's completely different than a toaster and has much different uses than it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.107.206.38 (talk) 04:12, 10 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Reverted vandalism.

I reverted obvious vandalism. Britbrat0325 (talk) 17:01, 18 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've also edited what I think may have been vandalism. Mongoosander (talk) 02:05, 4 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Toaster Review

The Wikipedia page on toasters is adequate. Given the topic, I think there is enough information for the average reader to gain as much knowledge as he or she would want to know about toasters. The article is well written and thoroughly describes the evolution of the toaster as a modern appliance.

The article begins with a very brief and uninformative introduction. “The toaster is typically a small electric kitchen appliance designed to toast multiple types of bread products.” Although Wikipedia provides a link to “toast,” and most people know the basic principle of the toaster, this is not a very good opening sentence. Perhaps substitute this opening for, “the toaster is a kitchen appliance designed to brown and crisp multiple types of bread products”. Though I am being very critical, it is elementary to define a word with itself.

After the introduction, the article progresses into the history of the toaster. The history was broken up into three sections: before the pop-up toaster, advent of the pop-up toaster, and later 20th century and beyond. I found this to be both an accurate and amusing way of defining the “eras” of the toaster. The article does a good job providing specific dates and inventors for each modification. In some cases, this information is supported by patents or scholarly journals. Other times however, the article cites websites like the “cyber toast museum” and blogs. That is not to say that this information is incorrect, it is simply lacking an authoritative source.

Following the history, the article describes a few different types of toasters, indicating their specific designs and functions. The article does a great job describing the somewhat complex technology of toasters on a simplified level, making it easy for any reader to understand. Having said that, most the information in this section is not cited. Although most of the information sounds credible, I am not an expert on toasters and cannot confirm or deny any of the claims made. Furthermore, the article would benefit from more illustrations. Although there are pictures of different toasters through the years, most readers would appreciate a diagram depicting the inner-workings of the toaster as described in the article. The images provided, however, do give the reader an idea of how the toaster has changed cosmetically through the years.

Based on the history of this article there was a significant amount of vandalism in the past. Yet the current article has been edited and seems free of any frivolous contributions. Overall Wikipedia has done a good job in its summary of the toaster. Most encyclopedias would have simply stated the uses of the toaster and how it works. Conversely, Wikipedia describes the evolution of a pre-modern toaster to the household appliance we know today. Additionally, Wikipedia provides links to many inventors, companies, cities, and scientific terms that can provide the reader with even more information. Though a traditional encyclopedia may reference these items, the simplicity and comprehensiveness of Wikipedia makes it a valuable resource.

02:37, 4 October 2011 (UTC)HIST406-11Rgreen13 — Preceding unsigned comment added by HIST406-11Rgreen13 (talk • contribs)

First Electric Toaster

I'm not sure that the attribution or credit for the first electric toaster is accurate. Are there any sources verifying Maddy Kennedy as the inventor? LtPuppyduck (talk) 05:57, 17 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Well, [1], [2], [3]. (Also this which I can't link because of the fershluginer spam filter: (ezinearticles DOT com/?Definition-and-Historic-Timeline-of-Toaster-Oven&id=5438438).) Any or all of these could be taking their info from Wikipedia, though (although none seem to be mirrors, at least not of the article in its current form). But this seems to add info that's not in the article, so it perhaps is independently researched. None of these are reliable sources and so can't be used in the article. But it does kind of indicate (not prove) that the Kennedy attribution may be correct. Herostratus (talk) 08:13, 17 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I think the article has been vandalised?

All in capitals and dead links everywhere. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.236.221.245 (talk) 20:43, 22 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Section deletion - toasting after 1940

Toasting technology after 1940s was deleted, presumably for being entirely unsourced. The content would be great if it were paired with citations. Blue Rasberry (talk) 15:46, 6 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Dualit

I added in the "See Also" a ref to Dualit. I do not work for Dualit, I just own one, I have no commmercial interest in Dualit. I just thought it was worth a ref in the see also but no more than that. If you disagree, please take it out. Si Trew (talk) 05:47, 3 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

English muffins

Just real quickly here: I'm 51, which means for over 40 years I've been toasting stuff, including English muffins cut in half. The first part of the article seems to imply that only in the 2000's were toasters able to handle English muffins cut in half. They have been able to handle them all my life, so the statement should be corrected. Thanks. 71.139.161.36 (talk) 03:14, 6 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Well but we'd need a citation in print or something. Your personal recollection may be true but is not a sufficient ref for article material. As the merits, certainly "back in the day" toasters had thin slots making it somewhat difficult, although still possible, to toast english muffin halves without them getting stuck. I don't know when "back in the day" ended, it may have been around 2000 but it may have been somewhat earlier. Herostratus (talk) 12:26, 6 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Herostratus The muffin claim was made without a citation so I removed it without a citation. More generally, I advocate that information in the lead of Wikipedia articles ought to have citations because too often low-quality information sneaks into the intro. Blue Rasberry (talk) 14:59, 6 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]
OK. Information in the lede need not (some say should not) be cited there, but be cited where it comes up in the body (and it will, since the lede just summarizes the body). But the only source for the bagel statement says "If you like big, fat bagels from a bakery, look for wider slots". Leaving aside implications that only bagels of a particular size purchased at an actual bakery (rather than from a grocers) are under consideration here, there's no mention of a date. So dunno about any of this. Herostratus (talk) 16:49, 6 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]
English muffins getting stuck in the old thin-slot toasters is definitly a thing, e.g. see here, "Never put a knife into the english muffin stuck in the toaster", and so on. It's just a matter of getting a good ref for this. Herostratus (talk) 22:46, 6 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]
I think it most likely hinged more, as it still does today, on what toaster you bought. You can still buy horrible cheap PoS toasters that have tiny narrow slots no good for anything other than thinly pre-sliced small-tin loaves and that will choke even on crumpets let alone anything thicker; but the early unenclosed types showcased in the article that can plug into a lightbulb fitting clearly wouldn't have any problem toasting anything you'd want them to (similar to my own medium-large slot model with its "bun warmer" accessory, which despite the name also allows you to toast pretty much anything that can be rested on top of it, so long as you have the patience to wait out the timer set to "6" with the "defrost" button pressed... and said accessories don't appear to be in any way a modern invention... nor slots of my size, which are just about large enough for a halved muffin and take a halved bagel with ease), and Dualit has been making their hefty, large-slot, manual-lift models for a very, very long time now.
The real difference is with the commoditisation of consumer durables and "white goods", the nasty little PoS doesn't cost you a week's salary any more, but maybe two hours' work at the very most (half an hour, if you're in a good job), and almost anyone can afford a really nice toaster if they spend a little time saving up for it, rather than their being the preserve of the truly minted - there's hardly any that cost as much as a lower-midrange smartphone any more (though that might be partly because the mobile phone is one item whose typical sale price is, against all logic, steadily rising; maybe a base model laptop would be a better comparison?), even if you go for a 4-slot with a range of advanced features, huge slots, high element power, and a fashionably designed case. So whilst the basic, small slot model would have at one time been by far the most common type, and possibly even still worth repairing if it broke such was the cost of a brand new one, these days they're rarely actually seen outside of student digs and really cheap "fully furnished" rental apartments, meant for a lifespan of maybe five years of routine abuse by uncaring residents at the most, after which it'll be thrown out and replaced outright... as anyone who cares about - and cares for - what they buy will go for something just a little more expensive (1.5 to 3x the price, depending how well you time your purchase and pick your supplier, will get a pretty decent model which is much nicer to use, has bigger slots, and will last far longer... but still isn't really any kind of big expense).146.199.60.36 (talk) 19:44, 30 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

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"sing[e]"

First sentence of the artcle:

A toaster, or a toast maker, is a small electric appliance designed to brown or "sing[e]" sliced bread.

What the hell does that mean? Why the quotation marks, why the square brackets round the e, why the link to an article about slang meanings of the word toast? Shall I remove it? 86.20.66.253 (talk) 20:05, 14 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Here is the source:
  • Safire, William (20 April 1997). "History Is Toast". The New York Times. Retrieved 31 October 2016.
This source says that toasters were described as singeing toast decades ago. I see no reason to keep that in the lead. This is an interesting source with other information which could be better integrated into this article. It is used in a culture section. Blue Rasberry (talk) 16:03, 31 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Besides which, I've gone 37 years so far without ever once seeing anyone spell "singe" as "sing" (mind you, I've never seen "toast maker" used as an alternative for "toaster" either...). One means to slightly burn something, the other means to make music with your vocal tract. Keeping the word with the former spelling as a definition of what a toaster does (for the three or four people on planet Earth who have internet access and are able to read yet have never experienced toasted bread) seems fairly valid. The quotes and the alternate-spelling brackets don't, though it probably warrants being included as to toast (i.e. singe, or "brown") rather than as a straight statement. The slang meanings thing is irrelevant; it would make sense to be linked from an article about toast itself, but it's extraneous to an article about toasters. Now, a page about the slang uses of "toaster" itself, however... 146.199.60.36 (talk) 20:00, 30 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Kenwood

I obviously feel that the 1947 Kenwood A100 hinged turnover toaster, the company's first product, ought to get a mention in the history of toasters ;-) http://johnlewis.scene7.com/is/image/JohnLewis/kenwood_cat_280113_2 Johnalexwood (talk) 13:21, 10 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

It's also possibly an object lesson in how the brightest and most innovative minds can still run down the path of greatest resistance and overcomplication in a design, just from not having the necessary tiny flash of inspiration to do it a different way. IE, rather than "why don't we just put a second element in our toaster so it can brown both sides in the same time as one and produce an end result that's still warm when it reaches the table?", we end up with "let's build a Heath Robinson motorised elevator and slice-flipping device into the machine so that the single element can brown each side in turn!"...146.199.60.36 (talk) 20:14, 30 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

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Removed cultural information about toast - posted here on talk

This is the article about toasters. There was some pop culture information about toasted bread ("toast"), toasting as baking, and Toast (honor) as a ritual in this article, and I removed it from the article to this talk page until a better place can be found for it. Likely places might be those articles mentioned above or Wikiquote.

  • The term toast comes "...from the Latin torrere, 'to burn'".[1] The first reference to toast "...in print is in a recipe for...Oyle Soppys (flavoured onions stewed in a gallon of stale beer and a pint of oil) that dates from 1430."[2] In the 1400s and 1500s, toast "...was discarded rather than eaten after it was used as a flavouring for drinks." [2] In the 1600s, toast was still thought of as something that was "put it into drinks. Shakespeare gave this line to Falstaff in The Merry Wives of Windsor, 1616: "Go, fetch me a quart of Sacke [sherry], put a tost in 't."[2] By the 1700s, there were references to toast being a gesture that indicates respect: "Ay, Madam, it has been your Life's whole Pride of late to be the Common Toast of every Publick Table."[2]
  • The other popular idiom associated with the word "toast" is the expression "to toast someone's health", which is typically done by one or more persons at a gathering by raising a glass in salute to the individual. This meaning is derived from the early meaning of toast, which from the 1400s to the 1600s meant warmed bread that was placed in a drink. By the 1700s, there were references to the drink in which toast was dunked being used in a gesture that indicates respect: "Ay, Madam, it has been your Life's whole Pride of late to be the Common Toast of every Publick Table."[2]
  • The slang idiom "you're toast", "I'm toast" or "we're toast" is used to express a state of being "outcast", "finished", "burned, scorched, wiped out, [or] demolished" (without even the consolation of being remembered, as [with the slang term "you're] history["]...)."[1] "Hey, dude. You're toast, man", which appeared in The St. Petersburg Times of October 1, 1987, is the "...earliest citation the Oxford English Dictionary research staff has of this usage."[1]
  • Additionally, the phrase "all toasters toast toast" originated in the CD-i video game, Hotel Mario. In one cutscene, Mario discovers the source of a hotel's rolling blackouts; a room full of toasters with Bowser's Sourpuss Bread in them. To alleviate this, he had to pull the plug on the toasters, allowing the mechanisms to release and release the toast where the phrase was then spoken.[3]
  1. ^ a b c Safire, William (20 April 1997). "History Is Toast". The New York Times. Retrieved 31 October 2016.
  2. ^ a b c d e http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/the-toast-of-the-town.html
  3. ^ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hv7jvyslRek

Blue Rasberry (talk) 18:01, 17 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Rearrange sections

Hello. I rearranged sections of this article. Here is how it is after my changes -

  1. Types
  2. History
  3. Risks
  4. Society and culture
    1. Etymology
    2. In popular culture
    3. Marketing
  5. Research

Here is how it was -

  1. Etymology
  2. History
  3. Types
  4. Technological innovations
  5. In popular culture
  6. Marketing

I would appreciate any comments either here or at Wikipedia:WikiProject Home Living, where I eventually hope to develop guidance on what articles on home products should include. I work for a nonprofit organization, Consumer Reports, which has expert information on consumer products and I am interested in trying to share more information from my organization. If there were more consensus on how articles should be arranged then it would be easier for me or anyone else to develop home living articles.

In this case, here are my thoughts on ordering - This article had 140,000 pageviews last year, which makes this in Wikipedia's top third of articles by popularity. Lots of every items have articles on Wikipedia, but not all are so popular as this one, so I think the traffic to this one is partly because a steady stream of people are asking questions about toasters. My guess at the question they are asking is, "what kind of toaster should I buy?". In general, products which exist in lots of varieties tend to have more popular Wikipedia articles than products without brand differentiation. Since I think the information on types of toasters is most important, I put that first among the available information.

However, I feel that the "types" section is not the ideal first section. The first section which I would recommend would be something like a definition or a description or an explanation of why the product matters. A description for toaster might say "This is a small appliance which browns bread or cooks other food. It sits on a countertop. It weighs 3-5 pounds, is 9x9x12 inches, and uses a household electric connection." I am not sure where to get this kind of definition for household products. For familiar products, this might seem mundane. For less familiar, or specialized, or culture-specific products, for example a fondue pot or hibatchi, more people will benefit from reading a fundamental description of the thing. Following the "description/uses" section I think that a "mechanism" section would be best. Now that the use and physical description is presented, the next section should say how the item works. In the case of a toaster, that section could say that it is a small stove with a heating element and some device for accepting bread and returning toast. Finally after "mechanism" then there should be the "types" section.

I put "history" after types because I think more people are interested in contemporary product information than historical information. After history I think that cultural topics should go next, because while probably everything to this point applies to all cultures, what follows will be most relevant to different regions and cultures, or niche special interests. Among niche interests, many people are interested in etymology so that is first. "In popular culture" could be regional variation or any mention, and marketing could either be branding or business information. I posted "research" last because not only is that culture specific, but also it might discuss aspects which are not even in wide use.

This is just an attempt at ordering and not the last word, but I would like to seek some consensus about whatever aspects of ordering seems right. I would like to present an acceptable ordering system so that anyone might develop articles in a uniform way. Blue Rasberry (talk) 20:04, 17 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Copy of patent, use of patent information in article

United States patent #1,394,450. "Bread-Toaster" filed 22 June 1920 and patented 18 October 1921. Serial number 390,706. This copy provided by http://www.pat2pdf.org/

I was thinking about how to find a definition of a thing and an explanation of how something works.

One source of information could be a patent application. In the United States, text and images in patents filed before 1989 are public domain by default. I grabbed the patent for the "pop-up toaster" as filed in the United States and posted it into this article. The document goes into great detail describing toaster fundamentals and how the device works.

Wikipedia often tries to avoid WP:PRIMARY sources, so using patents is not appropriate for everything. In this case, the patent says, "provide an automatic electric toaster in which the heating current will be automatically cut off after the bread has been toaster for a predetermined length of time, which may be varied according to the amount of moisture in the bread and the degree of crispness desired for the toast" and "bread toaster comprising an oven, heating means associated with said over, and means for automatically moving the toasted bread from said oven when the toasting operation is completed." These are fundamental explanations in easy-to-understand language and might be considered the secondary source summary of other original data-heavy primary source information presented in the patent. When other sources are lacking and when the patent seems useful, I think that it would be fine to cite the patent for some fundamentals. This is especially so for older products which in Wikipedia have their notability established by other sources.

There are not many patents in Wikimedia Commons nor is it so common to see patents cited in Wikipedia articles. I am not sure that I have seen a patent document in any Wikipedia article, and documents in general are rare to post inside the bodies of Wikipedia articles. I did it here as an experiment and would like comments from anyone. Blue Rasberry (talk) 20:37, 17 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Patents are of limited utility to WP articles. They are "self-published" in the sense that you can pay to apply for a patent. The existence of a patent doesn't tell us if the methods described in the patent were ever put into practice; just because you can find a patent for a radio hat doesn't mean that radio hats became common items of apparel, for example. Patent citations are most useful when supporting articles about inventors; we can cite Professor Kropotkin's patent on the lemon-battery powered car and give the reader a link to the artwork depicting it there, instead of drawing the silly thing ourselves; and document the professors short and obscure career as well. But patentability is not notability and by itself isn't a criterion for inclusion. --Wtshymanski (talk) 20:52, 1 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]
But surely it could be useful as supporting material; for example if a particular office-granted patent (rather than just an application; there's a point and a meaning behind "patent" rather than just "a thing I designed then wrote on paper and sent off in the post" - before yours can be granted, an officer has to do a fair bit of research to verify that your idea has some kind of primacy to it) is associated with a particular landmark product (via the patent number that a lot of said products then sport, at least in small print on an undercarriage label if nowhere else).
For instance, we might find the original patent granted for Johnson-Random's Patent Automatic Electric Toasting Device of 1933 (actually launched in 1932 as the JR Patent-Pending AETD), which happened to be the first known model to brown on both sides and turn off the elements after an adjustable time period, thus setting the model that all future "standard" toasters would follow (...with JR Corp Inc jealously guarding their IP and demanding royalty payments on each one that worked by a demonstrably similar method, thus artificially inflating the prices of automatic electric toasters for at least the next two decades).
In that case, if the granted patent showed the mechanism by which said groundbreaking simultaneously-browning automatic-shutoff toaster worked, in a straightforward and visually obvious manner, then it would in fact be highly valuable to the article. 146.199.60.36 (talk) 20:08, 30 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Free toasters from banks

How about including info on when banks gave free toasters, why it started and why it stopped. 122.106.83.10 (talk) 04:26, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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