Smooth surfaces such as polished metal have fewer areas to harbor bacteria compared to the fibers of a wooden door, for instance. In addition, a flat surface is easier to clean than a round knob.

Another benefit is that some metals have a natural antibacterial property toward bacteria organisms on their surfaces.

Going to pop in with a vote for Kagi. They are paid, but they also run their own index so they don’t use Google at all. Well worth it.

QFT right here. I just started using Kagi this month after being very impressed by the trial period. The $5/month starter plan gives an average of 10 searches per day. It doesnt seem like much but that’s a decent amount of searching for my personal use case. Truth be told I’ll probably end up going for the family plan at $20/month. Up to six users with unlimited search for less than a Netflix subscription.

They definitely subsidized them. It’s part of their business model.

I just got a Kobo Libre Color and I’m blown away by the quality. For the general crowd it has the same “it just works” appeal as Kindles, but for the tech crowd it’s an open book. You can even ssh into it without the need for jailbreaking.