Companies have actually done that, and it's worse: They're the "homework" interviews.

I don't mind "homework" interviews, they let me collect my thoughts and put together something representative of my work. It's easy to ship a complete (toy) product for a trivial problem, show unit tests, documentation, written communication skills, etc.

Much better than a timed coding challenge in my book. It's only bad when the problem isn't you know, a toy. Sometimes you have to reply with your consulting rate.

I wouldn't mind the homework interviews if they paid me to take them. In fact, on-sites should be paid also.

I'm hiring for our team. All of the feedback I've gotten from candidate was that it's fantastic because of the take home interview. No need to sweat and tremble over whiteboard questions.

Do you prefer those?

As a practical matter, I'd probably prefer a take home assignment OVER an in person interview. However, doing both would be a non-starter, that's too much work.