There are some benefits of working with hardware, even if it's just toys: it's far more accessible to non-geeks, & if it stops working, you can give it a smack & feel better.
But Arduino isn't hardware in that sense — it's a shitty microcontroller rebranded as a standard building block. It's software!
The thing that chaps our asses is that it's almost exclusively used where a simple circuit would have done fine, often boiling down to being just a 555 timer or a parallel port breakout box.
> The thing that chaps our asses is that it's almost exclusively used where a simple circuit would have done fine, often boiling down to being just a 555 timer or a parallel port breakout box.
So what's been lacking in the nearly 40 years since the 555 was created that it's taken until now to get some of the people who are now working with electronics to get started? (Aside from needing to be born. :) )
Your definition of "simple circuit" is probably different from the majority of the world.
And you're correct that the majority of what makes the Arduino what it is, is software. I describe it as being popular with software people because it took what used to be a 100% hardware problem (your 555 timer "simple circuit") and turned it into a 90% software/10% hardware problem.
The Arduino has got more people into creating tangible electronic devices that operate in the real world--I think that's a good thing--who cares if they don't know what Kirchhoff's circuit laws are before they get something that works.
There are some benefits of working with hardware, even if it's just toys: it's far more accessible to non-geeks, & if it stops working, you can give it a smack & feel better.