In the early 1990s, my roommate and I used to visit his family's tiny cabin in northern Wisconsin. The place was very rustic but did have electric heat. It was very cold and snowy during the winter. He could call the cabin's phone number and press * 2-3 times and it would tell the heat system to turn on or off. The system would respond somehow with a beep or two to tell him whether it was turning on or off. Seems like Mr. Fadell could have warmed his cabin up before arriving without building the Nest.

That said, I like the Nest, though I'm partial to the Ecobee because of the remote sensor it includes.