To underscore the point being made in the article, a critical part of the "VCR button" mentioned is the difference between line-level input and phono input. The article misses the difference (saying that it could accept other devices in the VCR's place if they had the same connectors). Plugging a line-level device into phono inputs can lead to massive distortion or even the damage of output devices. Plugging a phono into a line input will give audio that the system will likely be unable to amplify sufficiently. Unfortunately, these both commonly used RCA red+white(+yellow) connectors.
Certainly not intuitive, even if you're old enough to recall what a VCR is used for. Not any more intuitive if you labeled it "phono" instead of VCR.
I'm making this comment so late after the post that probably this won't be seen but I want to mention it because there's a nice corollary here about using things in the non-intuitive way:
Back in the heavily-DIY punk days, you could use a VCR as a cheap compressor -- a couple of orders of magnitude cheaper, but practically as effective.
Certainly not intuitive, even if you're old enough to recall what a VCR is used for. Not any more intuitive if you labeled it "phono" instead of VCR.
I'm making this comment so late after the post that probably this won't be seen but I want to mention it because there's a nice corollary here about using things in the non-intuitive way:
Back in the heavily-DIY punk days, you could use a VCR as a cheap compressor -- a couple of orders of magnitude cheaper, but practically as effective.