"Great post. My personal favorite is the Aston Martin Lagonda. CRT TV screen in the center (probably B&W), LED segmented number readouts just like a cash register, all surrounded by hand polished walnut burl. And another single spoke steering wheel..."

"Nope- during deceleration any objects in the compartment would move forward and away from the door, which is the same thing the latch weight will do. David is right- a Civic under hard acceleration can do about 0.5g longitudinally, which is far more than you'd get in that axis on any hill. Usually things like this aren't the result of a proactive, thoughtful designer trying to imagine scenarios that will harm the user experience. They probably found that the door was popping open during preproduction  testing, went to the supplier for a fix, who found adding this was the cheapest solution."

"The pesticide issue is more than just concern with food contact- if you're sanding pallet wood, you're likely breathing some godawful stuff. You're not saving hundreds either, pallets are most often made of the worst quality softwoods money can buy. Even as a starving student (who's unlikely to have the tools anyway), you're far better off just buying cheap wood, or at least upcycling better material- alley find furniture, construction debris, etc."

"Pretty cool!"

"That $1.6 trillion number would be absurd. It would mean that every single human on earth bought over $200 worth of knockoff furniture last year. It would mean knockoff furniture was equivalent to 10% of the entire US economy. The entire global furniture market is $150 billion tops. It's reasonable to think that knockoffs represent 1% of that, if you take a broad view of what constitutes a "knockoff.""