Technology needs more buttons — and that’s why we love the Stream Deck
The Stream Deck doesn't do anything new, but it does a lot of it better. | Photo by David Pierce / The Verge I initially bought a Stream Deck for one purpose: to control the lights in my home office. There's just one light switch in there, and that switch controls the light... and also every outlet in the room. Lights off, everything off. So that switch now has a piece of tape on it, and I bought a smart bulb and a Stream Deck so I could still control the lamp in the corner.
The Stream Deck isn't a smart home controller device, at least not the way its creators at Elgato originally conceived it. (It's also not a Steam Deck, the game console from Valve.) They built and marketed the $150 device toward streamers (hence the name) who need to be constantly switching scenes and camera inputs, moderating a fast-moving chat, and grabbing clips to use for...