Crux of Article:

But it would be a shame to see you blow hundreds of dollars on a “vintage” point-and-shoot (a phrase I cannot believe I’m actually typing) or the reanimated corpse of a long-dead pocket camera under the mistaken impression that it’s anything more than a toy destined for the junk drawer once the novelty wears off after a few weeks.

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So I have to chuckle when I hear anyone waxing romantic about the vibe of those old pocket-cam photos, because their grainy, blurry, flat shots were a serious source of discontent back in the day. The search for the least-worst image quality was the entire reason I had a job.