The article mostly made me just want to buy a BC21 (https://us.braun-clocks.com/products/bc21-braun-digital-wire...).

But I can see the advantages in making the phone still be the alarm clock, or else you'd run into problems w/ having an alarm on both the phone and on the clock. Plus it would be nice for the display to change if e.g. someone is calling me in the middle of the night. I can see why the design is the way it is, since presumably none of that would be possible if the dock is just a wireless charging cradle.

It reminds me of the cool ways the wireless charging dock for the HP Touchpad let you turn the tablet into an ambient clock or a digital photo frame, all the way back in 2011.