The car of the future is taking shape—and it will know how we feel about it

Love it or hate it, CES is where you see the future of the automobile.

Read the whole story

 

[NotSoPro]

2030 is the year for Linux...I'm super cereal this time guys!

 

[ProfessorGuy]

Arsians bay for blood when someone puts a door lock onto the internet: only an idiot would think the device wouldn't be taken over immediately. Look how dangerous that is!

But put your car on the internet? Sure! Why not? Oh, and also have it accept input from other cars so its maps will stay up to date. What could possibly go wrong?

 

[Dr Gitlin]

Arsians bay for blood when someone puts a door lock onto the internet: only an idiot would think the device wouldn't be taken over immediately. Look how dangerous that is!

But put your car on the internet? Sure! Why not? Oh, and also have it accept input from other cars so its maps will stay up to date. What could possibly go wrong?

Oh, the idea is distinctly unpopular among our audience, which is why I hardly ever write about connected cars, and when I do it’s focused on the privacy or security aspects. But whether you think it’s a stupid idea or not, you won’t be able to buy a new car next year that doesn’t have an embedded LTE modem, and there’s absolutely no chance a self-driving car will be unconnected from the Internet.

 

[ProfessorGuy]

you won’t be able to buy a new car next year that doesn’t have an embedded LTE modem, and there’s absolutely no chance a self-driving car will be unconnected from the Internet.

So we need this connectivity for self-driving. So you're saying that every car next year will self-drive. Awesome!

Oh, wait, you're saying we get the insecurity and surveillance of connectivity, but don't get the self-driving capabilities. Sounds great, sign me up!

 

[Dr Gitlin]

you won’t be able to buy a new car next year that doesn’t have an embedded LTE modem, and there’s absolutely no chance a self-driving car will be unconnected from the Internet.

So we need this connectivity for self-driving. So you're saying that every car next year will self-drive. Awesome!

Oh, wait, you're saying we get the insecurity and surveillance of connectivity, but don't get the self-driving capabilities. Sounds great, sign me up!

All self-driving cars will be connected. Not all connected cars will be self-driving.

 

[ColdWetDog]

Arsians bay for blood when someone puts a door lock onto the internet: only an idiot would think the device wouldn't be taken over immediately. Look how dangerous that is!

But put your car on the internet? Sure! Why not? Oh, and also have it accept input from other cars so its maps will stay up to date. What could possibly go wrong?

Oh, the idea is distinctly unpopular among our audience, which is why I hardly ever write about connected cars, and when I do it’s focused on the privacy or security aspects. But whether you think it’s a stupid idea or not, you won’t be able to buy a new car next year that doesn’t have an embedded LTE modem, and there’s absolutely no chance a self-driving car will be unconnected from the Internet.

Which is why you can pull the steering wheel out of my cold, dead hands.

Which is exactly what will happen. Old codgers like me, who grew up with manual transmissions, carburetors and AM radios will die off to be replaced by kids who have been connected to the Internet for the entire lives and will think it insane that their car (if it actually is theirs, most likely leased / Ubered or otherwise shared) ISN'T connected to the rest of the world.

 

[redtomato]

That wireless keyboard on the second page, the one with the integrated touchpad, if you are thinking of getting one for your own self-driving project, is the Microsoft All-in-One Media Keyboard with Integrated Track Pad:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/B00K2SY902/

I know because I’m trying to decide between getting that one or the Logitech K830 (at 3x the price) for my living room.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/B00J22RU5A/

 

[thzero]

Easy solution. Do not buy a new car.

Arsians bay for blood when someone puts a door lock onto the internet: only an idiot would think the device wouldn't be taken over immediately. Look how dangerous that is!

But put your car on the internet? Sure! Why not? Oh, and also have it accept input from other cars so its maps will stay up to date. What could possibly go wrong?

Oh, the idea is distinctly unpopular among our audience, which is why I hardly ever write about connected cars, and when I do it’s focused on the privacy or security aspects. But whether you think it’s a stupid idea or not, you won’t be able to buy a new car next year that doesn’t have an embedded LTE modem, and there’s absolutely no chance a self-driving car will be unconnected from the Internet.

 

[contrahead]

Another old codger here I guess. If I had money to invest, I'd buy a big barn in the mid-west and fill it with the best classic and semi-classic, used autos I could find. Cars that don't have this electronic shit in them. Cars that have intrinsic value of their own. Cars and pickups that don't talk, don't think and don't have black boxes or 300 miles of wiring in them. In 20-30 years they'll be worth twice their weight in $100.00 bills.

 

[co-lee]

Arsians bay for blood when someone puts a door lock onto the internet: only an idiot would think the device wouldn't be taken over immediately. Look how dangerous that is!

But put your car on the internet? Sure! Why not? Oh, and also have it accept input from other cars so its maps will stay up to date. What could possibly go wrong?

Oh, the idea is distinctly unpopular among our audience, which is why I hardly ever write about connected cars, and when I do it’s focused on the privacy or security aspects. But whether you think it’s a stupid idea or not, you won’t be able to buy a new car next year that doesn’t have an embedded LTE modem, and there’s absolutely no chance a self-driving car will be unconnected from the Internet.

Which is why you can pull the steering wheel out of my cold, dead hands.

Which is exactly what will happen. Old codgers like me, who grew up with manual transmissions, carburetors and AM radios will die off to be replaced by kids who have been connected to the Internet for the entire lives and will think it insane that their car (if it actually is theirs, most likely leased / Ubered or otherwise shared) ISN'T connected to the rest of the world.

I just hope that when we take the steering wheel away from you, it's only your hands that are cold and dead.

Reducing auto deaths, currently at the rate of over 3000 a day, is something we should all be applauding. Coddling paranoia and get-off-my-lawn codgerism is not something that we should be supporting.

cold dead hands is the reality. And I have friends I'll never see again because of someone else's cold dead hands.

 

[ColdWetDog]

Arsians bay for blood when someone puts a door lock onto the internet: only an idiot would think the device wouldn't be taken over immediately. Look how dangerous that is!

But put your car on the internet? Sure! Why not? Oh, and also have it accept input from other cars so its maps will stay up to date. What could possibly go wrong?

Oh, the idea is distinctly unpopular among our audience, which is why I hardly ever write about connected cars, and when I do it’s focused on the privacy or security aspects. But whether you think it’s a stupid idea or not, you won’t be able to buy a new car next year that doesn’t have an embedded LTE modem, and there’s absolutely no chance a self-driving car will be unconnected from the Internet.

Which is why you can pull the steering wheel out of my cold, dead hands.

Which is exactly what will happen. Old codgers like me, who grew up with manual transmissions, carburetors and AM radios will die off to be replaced by kids who have been connected to the Internet for the entire lives and will think it insane that their car (if it actually is theirs, most likely leased / Ubered or otherwise shared) ISN'T connected to the rest of the world.

I just hope that when we take the steering wheel away from you, it's only your hands that are cold and dead.

Reducing auto deaths, currently at the rate of over 3000 a day, is something we should all be applauding. Coddling paranoia and get-off-my-lawn codgerism is not something that we should be supporting.

cold dead hands is the reality. And I have friends I'll never see again because of someone else's cold dead hands.

Well, these old warm, not dead yet hands have driven well over a quarter million miles without a single accident. So I feel fairly comfortable that I'm still safe enough. As to that large number of folks who probably should never have received a drivers license - if you think that technology will fix stupid then you haven't been paying attention.

Those who do not understand history are doomed to repeat it.

 

[co-lee]

Arsians bay for blood when someone puts a door lock onto the internet: only an idiot would think the device wouldn't be taken over immediately. Look how dangerous that is!

But put your car on the internet? Sure! Why not? Oh, and also have it accept input from other cars so its maps will stay up to date. What could possibly go wrong?

Oh, the idea is distinctly unpopular among our audience, which is why I hardly ever write about connected cars, and when I do it’s focused on the privacy or security aspects. But whether you think it’s a stupid idea or not, you won’t be able to buy a new car next year that doesn’t have an embedded LTE modem, and there’s absolutely no chance a self-driving car will be unconnected from the Internet.

Which is why you can pull the steering wheel out of my cold, dead hands.

Which is exactly what will happen. Old codgers like me, who grew up with manual transmissions, carburetors and AM radios will die off to be replaced by kids who have been connected to the Internet for the entire lives and will think it insane that their car (if it actually is theirs, most likely leased / Ubered or otherwise shared) ISN'T connected to the rest of the world.

I just hope that when we take the steering wheel away from you, it's only your hands that are cold and dead.

Reducing auto deaths, currently at the rate of over 3000 a day, is something we should all be applauding. Coddling paranoia and get-off-my-lawn codgerism is not something that we should be supporting.

cold dead hands is the reality. And I have friends I'll never see again because of someone else's cold dead hands.

Well, these old warm, not dead yet hands have driven well over a quarter million miles without a single accident. So I feel fairly comfortable that I'm still safe enough. As to that large number of folks who probably should never have received a drivers license - if you think that technology will fix stupid then you haven't been paying attention.

Those who do not understand history are doomed to repeat it.

I also have personally caused no accidents. Luckily you and I are the only ones on the road.

edit: and this is another place where I'm happy to see generationally changing attitudes. It'll be good when there are ubiquitous transportation options that don't involve driving. And it's good to see people growing up for whom driving is not a major part of their identity. There will always be hobbiests, just like there are many horse enthusiasts in my neighborhood.

 

[photochemsyn]

Another old codger here I guess. If I had money to invest, I'd buy a big barn in the mid-west and fill it with the best classic and semi-classic, used autos I could find. Cars that don't have this electronic shit in them. Cars that have intrinsic value of their own. Cars and pickups that don't talk, don't think and don't have black boxes or 300 miles of wiring in them. In 20-30 years they'll be worth twice their weight in $100.00 bills.

I’d like to see the electric vehicle industry take some of those classic models and replace the internal combustion drivetrain with electric motor / battery pack drivetrain - with no other changes. Just a stripped-down model - no AC (too much drain on power), no LTE modem, no bells and whistles of any kind. I think there’d be a market for them.

 

[w00fy]

Autonomous/self driving cars will be more than saving lives. Beyond human error being the major contributor to accidents, humans are also the major factor behind traffic and poor utilization of finite resources. Based on traffic studies I have read, it takes just one driver tapping on their brakes during rush hour to cause a complete standstill 1/4 mile behind. Impatient drivers that weave in and out of lanes, failure to properly yield, slowing to half the speed of traffic to cut over three lanes to make an exit, and misexecution of simple concepts like zipper merges all cause traffic hell on the highways. On local roads, how many times have we all see people zone out or are too busy on their phones to notice traffic has started moving? The light cycle that could allow 30 cars through now only allows 20 cars through.

With autonomous cars, actions will be coordinated. Cars will automatically be in the correct lanes with proper spacing. Like Next Gen air traffic control, cars will probably be able to drive closer to each other because computers are coordinating braking and acceleration. On local roads, all cars in line will accelerate at the same time permitting more cars through each light cycle. Capacity will be better managed because no one is leave 2 cars lengths of empty space in front of them. The 20 cars that need to be in a turn lane will not be impeded by the clueless drive that only needs to move forward 2 feet to make enough room for cars to get by.

 

[I am not your friend]

Arsians bay for blood when someone puts a door lock onto the internet: only an idiot would think the device wouldn't be taken over immediately. Look how dangerous that is!

But put your car on the internet? Sure! Why not? Oh, and also have it accept input from other cars so its maps will stay up to date. What could possibly go wrong?

Oh, the idea is distinctly unpopular among our audience, which is why I hardly ever write about connected cars, and when I do it’s focused on the privacy or security aspects. But whether you think it’s a stupid idea or not, you won’t be able to buy a new car next year that doesn’t have an embedded LTE modem, and there’s absolutely no chance a self-driving car will be unconnected from the Internet.

But can I selectively yank a fuse or two?

 

[arcite]

To the automated car-phobic, realize we're basically just going back to how things USED to be, ...circa about 100 years ago, when city transport resembled this:

One thing this article didn't cover, which will be a major paradigm shift, we'll no longer own the vehicles we drive. Increasingly, they'll be rented, per use, like a taxi, uber, ect... This will force cities to reorganize spaces - no longer will massive parking lots be required. Zoning in suburbia will jettison massive driveways and garages. Density and green spaces will increase.

 

[MHStrawn]

I stopped reading after the first couple of paragraphs. Partly because a story about a CES car show doesn't sound that interesting to begin with. But mostly because there's nothing worse than starting a review by complaining about having to go to Vegas and actually WORKING and oh shit it rained!

Seriously, is there ANYTHING in the first two paragraphs the help the reader in any way?

"Few people want to go to Las Vegas immediately after the New Year. Never a fan of the place at the best of times, I dutifully boarded the plane anyway. Like it or not, if one wants to see everyone's ideas for the car of the near future, there's no better time and place to do that than CES.

There's an irony to hearing about smart mobility at CES considering all the dumb reality outside. The show has grown so much that getting from the convention center to anything off-site now takes an hour if you're unlucky. Figure in a lot of needed—but unwanted—rain that caused havoc with self-driving demos and electrical transformers and the whole thing became an ordeal."

 

[MHStrawn]

Autonomous/self driving cars will be more than saving lives. Beyond human error being the major contributor to accidents, humans are also the major factor behind traffic and poor utilization of finite resources. Based on traffic studies I have read, it takes just one driver tapping on their brakes during rush hour to cause a complete standstill 1/4 mile behind. Impatient drivers that weave in and out of lanes, failure to properly yield, slowing to half the speed of traffic to cut over three lanes to make an exit, and misexecution of simple concepts like zipper merges all cause traffic hell on the highways. On local roads, how many times have we all see people zone out or are too busy on their phones to notice traffic has started moving? The light cycle that could allow 30 cars through now only allows 20 cars through.

With autonomous cars, actions will be coordinated. Cars will automatically be in the correct lanes with proper spacing. Like Next Gen air traffic control, cars will probably be able to drive closer to each other because computers are coordinating braking and acceleration. On local roads, all cars in line will accelerate at the same time permitting more cars through each light cycle. Capacity will be better managed because no one is leave 2 cars lengths of empty space in front of them. The 20 cars that need to be in a turn lane will not be impeded by the clueless drive that only needs to move forward 2 feet to make enough room for cars to get by.

This is certainly all feasible and realistic...but only if EVERY car on the road is self-driving. That seems unlikely in any near-to-mid future.

 

[TFXR]

I stopped reading after the first couple of paragraphs. Partly because a story about a CES car show doesn't sound that interesting to begin with. But mostly because there's nothing worse than starting a review by complaining about having to go to Vegas and actually WORKING and oh shit it rained!

Seriously, is there ANYTHING in the first two paragraphs the help the reader in any way?

"Few people want to go to Las Vegas immediately after the New Year. Never a fan of the place at the best of times, I dutifully boarded the plane anyway. Like it or not, if one wants to see everyone's ideas for the car of the near future, there's no better time and place to do that than CES.

There's an irony to hearing about smart mobility at CES considering all the dumb reality outside. The show has grown so much that getting from the convention center to anything off-site now takes an hour if you're unlucky. Figure in a lot of needed—but unwanted—rain that caused havoc with self-driving demos and electrical transformers and the whole thing became an ordeal."

The article is definitely overwritten and melodramatic, but I love it when he gets to the good techy stuff. It's so interesting how CES has shifted from the spot where Microsoft would give "smart living room" presentations to autonomous vehicles for days.

 

[I am not your friend]

To the automated car-phobic, realize we're basically just going back to how things USED to be, ...circa about 100 years ago, when city transport resembled this:

One thing this article didn't cover, which will be a major paradigm shift, we'll no longer own the vehicles we drive. Increasingly, they'll be rented, per use, like a taxi, uber, ect... This will force cities to reorganize spaces - no longer will massive parking lots be required. Zoning in suburbia will jettison massive driveways and garages. Density and green spaces will increase.

A great many cities in places like the USA are too sparse and too separated from their "bedroom communities" to make that realistic in our lifetimes.

 

[Lily Liliaceae]

Even if somehow all cars in America became connected and possibly self driving, all you would need to do is import the models sold in third world countries which lag in features between 10 to 15 years. Infrastructure on those places makes it dumb to put that kind of feature on cars.

 

[reckless76]

That wireless keyboard on the second page, the one with the integrated touchpad, if you are thinking of getting one for your own self-driving project, is the Microsoft All-in-One Media Keyboard with Integrated Track Pad:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/B00K2SY902/

I know because I’m trying to decide between getting that one or the Logitech K830 (at 3x the price) for my living room.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/B00J22RU5A/

I have the K830 for my living room. (Fortunately, I didn't have to pay for it.) It replaced a Logitech K400. I can tell you the K830 feels much nicer in the hands, they keys are much better, and the trackpad is a tiny bit improved. But if none of that matters to you, then there's no reason to spend the extra money. The K400, and probably that Microsoft one, work just fine.

 

[reckless76]

The BMW—with its Intel silicon brain, nine lidars, 10 radars, two GPS antennas, and the rest of it—isn't you or me. As if to confirm the superior accuracy possible with the latest in sensor fusion and high-accuracy localization, it knew exactly how much free space there was between its right-most extremity and the corner of the bus, and it didn't see fit to slow or alter our line.

I suppose that's a good explanation.. But isn't it also possible the car just didn't notice, hence the lack of reaction?

 

[J4yDubs]

My Wife's car has some driving automation features. While very cool, I personally have a hard time using them. I know it's a control problem on my end and I'm sure with time I'll get used to it, but right now I get more stressed letting the car take over.

Yeah, I've become an old geezer that still loves taking my 6-speed manual out for a drive. Now get off my lawn!

John

 

[toasterwaffle86]

Arsians bay for blood when someone puts a door lock onto the internet: only an idiot would think the device wouldn't be taken over immediately. Look how dangerous that is!

But put your car on the internet? Sure! Why not? Oh, and also have it accept input from other cars so its maps will stay up to date. What could possibly go wrong?

Oh, the idea is distinctly unpopular among our audience, which is why I hardly ever write about connected cars, and when I do it’s focused on the privacy or security aspects. But whether you think it’s a stupid idea or not, you won’t be able to buy a new car next year that doesn’t have an embedded LTE modem, and there’s absolutely no chance a self-driving car will be unconnected from the Internet.

Eh, you're always going to have security implications if you connect to the internet - but what do you gain? With a smartphone, that's a well worthwhile tradeoff. With a fridge, by and large, it's stupid and used as a gimmick. Cars fall somewhere in between, depending on how well they thought it through.

 

[Dr Gitlin]

The BMW—with its Intel silicon brain, nine lidars, 10 radars, two GPS antennas, and the rest of it—isn't you or me. As if to confirm the superior accuracy possible with the latest in sensor fusion and high-accuracy localization, it knew exactly how much free space there was between its right-most extremity and the corner of the bus, and it didn't see fit to slow or alter our line.

I suppose that's a good explanation.. But isn't it also possible the car just didn't notice, hence the lack of reaction?

No, it’s not possible it didn’t notice the giant bus in the next lane over.

 

[DeltaIO]

Arsians bay for blood when someone puts a door lock onto the internet: only an idiot would think the device wouldn't be taken over immediately. Look how dangerous that is!

But put your car on the internet? Sure! Why not? Oh, and also have it accept input from other cars so its maps will stay up to date. What could possibly go wrong?

Oh, the idea is distinctly unpopular among our audience, which is why I hardly ever write about connected cars, and when I do it’s focused on the privacy or security aspects. But whether you think it’s a stupid idea or not, you won’t be able to buy a new car next year that doesn’t have an embedded LTE modem, and there’s absolutely no chance a self-driving car will be unconnected from the Internet.

Which is why you can pull the steering wheel out of my cold, dead hands.

Which is exactly what will happen. Old codgers like me, who grew up with manual transmissions, carburetors and AM radios will die off to be replaced by kids who have been connected to the Internet for the entire lives and will think it insane that their car (if it actually is theirs, most likely leased / Ubered or otherwise shared) ISN'T connected to the rest of the world.

I just hope that when we take the steering wheel away from you, it's only your hands that are cold and dead.

Reducing auto deaths, currently at the rate of over 3000 a day, is something we should all be applauding. Coddling paranoia and get-off-my-lawn codgerism is not something that we should be supporting.

cold dead hands is the reality. And I have friends I'll never see again because of someone else's cold dead hands.

While I agree reducing road deaths is a definite plus point to self-driving automobiles, as well as should be applauded...

....I do wonder what would happen if compulsory retests at given yearly intervals, as well as compulsory retests for any traffic violations would help reduce a certain amount of traffic deaths?

There are plenty of options available, however even with self driving cars, the system is only going to be as good as the people programming those systems. It isn't so much the lack of trust in the machine to do what it has been programmed to do for some of us, it's the lack of trust in the humans programming the systems used to drive cars.

I mean would you REALLY trust any self-driving tech coming from Uber?

 

[groovestar]

Another old codger here I guess. If I had money to invest, I'd buy a big barn in the mid-west and fill it with the best classic and semi-classic, used autos I could find. Cars that don't have this electronic shit in them. Cars that have intrinsic value of their own. Cars and pickups that don't talk, don't think and don't have black boxes or 300 miles of wiring in them. In 20-30 years they'll be worth twice their weight in $100.00 bills.

I’d like to see the electric vehicle industry take some of those classic models and replace the internal combustion drivetrain with electric motor / battery pack drivetrain - with no other changes. Just a stripped-down model - no AC (too much drain on power), no LTE modem, no bells and whistles of any kind. I think there’d be a market for them.

That's really not something that should/is going to happen. After-market conversion kits, maybe, but they'll be flawed enough that you might not want one.

The last 30-40 years of car design have added all kinds of "electronic shit", but they've also included a change to lighter-weight materials (essential if you want range on a battery-powered vehicle) and huge advances in safety systems (airbags, rear 3-point belts, head rests, better crumple zones, ABS, etc.), and no sane regulator would allow a newly manufactured classic car on the market.

 

[co-lee]

Arsians bay for blood when someone puts a door lock onto the internet: only an idiot would think the device wouldn't be taken over immediately. Look how dangerous that is!

But put your car on the internet? Sure! Why not? Oh, and also have it accept input from other cars so its maps will stay up to date. What could possibly go wrong?

Oh, the idea is distinctly unpopular among our audience, which is why I hardly ever write about connected cars, and when I do it’s focused on the privacy or security aspects. But whether you think it’s a stupid idea or not, you won’t be able to buy a new car next year that doesn’t have an embedded LTE modem, and there’s absolutely no chance a self-driving car will be unconnected from the Internet.

Which is why you can pull the steering wheel out of my cold, dead hands.

Which is exactly what will happen. Old codgers like me, who grew up with manual transmissions, carburetors and AM radios will die off to be replaced by kids who have been connected to the Internet for the entire lives and will think it insane that their car (if it actually is theirs, most likely leased / Ubered or otherwise shared) ISN'T connected to the rest of the world.

I just hope that when we take the steering wheel away from you, it's only your hands that are cold and dead.

Reducing auto deaths, currently at the rate of over 3000 a day, is something we should all be applauding. Coddling paranoia and get-off-my-lawn codgerism is not something that we should be supporting.

cold dead hands is the reality. And I have friends I'll never see again because of someone else's cold dead hands.

While I agree reducing road deaths is a definite plus point to self-driving automobiles, as well as should be applauded...

....I do wonder what would happen if compulsory retests at given yearly intervals, as well as compulsory retests for any traffic violations would help reduce a certain amount of traffic deaths?

There are plenty of options available, however even with self driving cars, the system is only going to be as good as the people programming those systems. It isn't so much the lack of trust in the machine to do what it has been programmed to do for some of us, it's the lack of trust in the humans programming the systems used to drive cars.

I mean would you REALLY trust any self-driving tech coming from Uber?

As a stopgap, finding a way to improve the stock of human drivers would be a good thing.

I doubt that retests would do much: the problem isn't that some people get licenses who are incapable of driving adequately in a test situation.

Instead, the problem is that too many people don't drive safely under the stress of their lives: the person who is running late for work and runs a light, killing an elderly pedestrian (recent local news); the guy who worked a double shift and falls asleep driving home, only to run head-on into my friend; the guy who got in an argument with his partner and then drives super aggressively, weaving in and out of traffic; the guy who is a "good driver, unlike all these other people" and tailgates everyone which is totally safe cause he's got "superior reflexes and contextual awareness"; and of course, the people who "didn't have that much to drink" and still get into the car.

I suspect all those people would pass a second driving test just fine.

I think the idea of having my car monitor my emotional state or level of intoxication much creepier than summoning a robot taxi. I'd way rather have the robot overlords understand my travel patterns than my stress-response patterns ...

 

[Flailsafe]

Arsians bay for blood when someone puts a door lock onto the internet: only an idiot would think the device wouldn't be taken over immediately. Look how dangerous that is!

But put your car on the internet? Sure! Why not? Oh, and also have it accept input from other cars so its maps will stay up to date. What could possibly go wrong?

Oh, the idea is distinctly unpopular among our audience, which is why I hardly ever write about connected cars, and when I do it’s focused on the privacy or security aspects. But whether you think it’s a stupid idea or not, you won’t be able to buy a new car next year that doesn’t have an embedded LTE modem, and there’s absolutely no chance a self-driving car will be unconnected from the Internet.

Which is why you can pull the steering wheel out of my cold, dead hands.

Which is exactly what will happen. Old codgers like me, who grew up with manual transmissions, carburetors and AM radios will die off to be replaced by kids who have been connected to the Internet for the entire lives and will think it insane that their car (if it actually is theirs, most likely leased / Ubered or otherwise shared) ISN'T connected to the rest of the world.

I just hope that when we take the steering wheel away from you, it's only your hands that are cold and dead.

Reducing auto deaths, currently at the rate of over 3000 a day, is something we should all be applauding. Coddling paranoia and get-off-my-lawn codgerism is not something that we should be supporting.

cold dead hands is the reality. And I have friends I'll never see again because of someone else's cold dead hands.

While I agree reducing road deaths is a definite plus point to self-driving automobiles, as well as should be applauded...

....I do wonder what would happen if compulsory retests at given yearly intervals, as well as compulsory retests for any traffic violations would help reduce a certain amount of traffic deaths?

There are plenty of options available, however even with self driving cars, the system is only going to be as good as the people programming those systems. It isn't so much the lack of trust in the machine to do what it has been programmed to do for some of us, it's the lack of trust in the humans programming the systems used to drive cars.

I mean would you REALLY trust any self-driving tech coming from Uber?

I think the largest factor of auto accidents and death is inattention/distraction, regardless of age or demographic. So unless a retest included the physical road test and evaluation of the driver's habits, it would be largely worthless. Even still, the cost would be enormous and would only weed out those with degraded driving abilities, from aging, medical conditions, etc.

By the time autonomous driving is required and compulsory in new/all cars (in the far future from now) it should be well scrutinized, studied and researched to satisfy any concern for public trust. Until then, it will be developed and adopted by those who choose so - reputation of the companies will be vital to earn the trust of early adopters.

I would trust Mercedes-Benz, BMW, and Tesla over Uber. But even if I could be an early adopter, I would still wait years to see how it pans out. Only until a sizable demographic adopts and uses such tech will we be able to quantify whether or not autonomous driving is safer, and I would say these early days are pointing to 'yes'.

Edit: a point regarding the problem of inattention and distraction... I really dislike the 'infotainment' way of screens and HUD, though its probably because I can only picture such things being used by an actual driver, as a source of distraction and drain of attention. Obviously if the car is automated and doesn't require attention of an operator, then it doesn't matter. But until it gets to that point, it feels like such incorporation of one's phone into the cars screen, and things such as 'driver assist', will breed worse driving habits overall. A bit irrational I know, but the picture of a car full of people dicking with their phones and talking and looking around is, uh, scary and weird.

 

[Flailsafe]

I stopped reading after the first couple of paragraphs. Partly because a story about a CES car show doesn't sound that interesting to begin with. But mostly because there's nothing worse than starting a review by complaining about having to go to Vegas and actually WORKING and oh shit it rained!

Seriously, is there ANYTHING in the first two paragraphs the help the reader in any way?

"Few people want to go to Las Vegas immediately after the New Year. Never a fan of the place at the best of times, I dutifully boarded the plane anyway. Like it or not, if one wants to see everyone's ideas for the car of the near future, there's no better time and place to do that than CES.

There's an irony to hearing about smart mobility at CES considering all the dumb reality outside. The show has grown so much that getting from the convention center to anything off-site now takes an hour if you're unlucky. Figure in a lot of needed—but unwanted—rain that caused havoc with self-driving demos and electrical transformers and the whole thing became an ordeal."

The article is definitely overwritten and melodramatic, but I love it when he gets to the good techy stuff. It's so interesting how CES has shifted from the spot where Microsoft would give "smart living room" presentations to autonomous vehicles for days.

I disagree with both of these assessments. The greatly enjoyed personal touch as it gave a broader and more accessible 'feel' and understanding - this also made was easier to picture the real experience and implications of such tech. A simple objective report of autonomous technology and critical analysis can be very dry and dull at times, helpful in others.

Also, going to Vegas for conventions and work isn't a complete joyride (at best) and can be hot soul-draining nightmare spent in a shallow and vapid hell, even without the clusterfuck of transportation problems Vegas always has. So his bad mood helped contrast the seemingly pleasant, unremarkable, and surreal qualities of these demos.

Also the rain specifically screwed and delayed many demos, except for one. So it was worth mentioning in the beginning for that reason alone, though it also added to the frustration and mood of the author, which I think helped.

P.S. Anyone wanna help me make a site for reviewing reviews? /s

 

[jimithing]

To the automated car-phobic, realize we're basically just going back to how things USED to be, ...circa about 100 years ago, when city transport resembled this:

One thing this article didn't cover, which will be a major paradigm shift, we'll no longer own the vehicles we drive. Increasingly, they'll be rented, per use, like a taxi, uber, ect... This will force cities to reorganize spaces - no longer will massive parking lots be required. Zoning in suburbia will jettison massive driveways and garages. Density and green spaces will increase.

If your timeline is >50 years your may be right, but this isn't happening anytime soon.

It's going to take a LOT to get Americans to give up car ownership. I wouldn't go too far extrapolating the behavior of urban millennials to all of society. Even their behavior will change once they have kids. Ever tried to put a car seat in a taxi?

 

[Statistical]

Autonomous/self driving cars will be more than saving lives. Beyond human error being the major contributor to accidents, humans are also the major factor behind traffic and poor utilization of finite resources. Based on traffic studies I have read, it takes just one driver tapping on their brakes during rush hour to cause a complete standstill 1/4 mile behind. Impatient drivers that weave in and out of lanes, failure to properly yield, slowing to half the speed of traffic to cut over three lanes to make an exit, and misexecution of simple concepts like zipper merges all cause traffic hell on the highways. On local roads, how many times have we all see people zone out or are too busy on their phones to notice traffic has started moving? The light cycle that could allow 30 cars through now only allows 20 cars through.

With autonomous cars, actions will be coordinated. Cars will automatically be in the correct lanes with proper spacing. Like Next Gen air traffic control, cars will probably be able to drive closer to each other because computers are coordinating braking and acceleration. On local roads, all cars in line will accelerate at the same time permitting more cars through each light cycle. Capacity will be better managed because no one is leave 2 cars lengths of empty space in front of them. The 20 cars that need to be in a turn lane will not be impeded by the clueless drive that only needs to move forward 2 feet to make enough room for cars to get by.

This is certainly all feasible and realistic...but only if EVERY car on the road is self-driving. That seems unlikely in any near-to-mid future.

Well it would be ideal if everything was autonomous but even a critical mass of autonomous vehicles will improve the efficiency of existing roads.

https://engineering.illinois.edu/news/article/21938

“Our experiments show that with as few as 5 percent of vehicles being automated and carefully controlled, we can eliminate stop-and-go waves caused by human driving behavior,” said Daniel B. Work, assistant professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, a lead researcher in the study.

 

[Digger]

I wonder if the knowledge of driving a car, will go the way to writing in cursive, thinking critically, knowing how to operate a manual transmission, and so forth.

Or, in more famous words:

A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.

 

[Cheesewhiz]

I'm totally ok with Johnny Cabs if they are going to be a fleet of BMW 540i. Toyota Priollrys? Not so much.

 

[contrahead]

The last 30-40 years of car design have added all kinds of "electronic shit", but they've also included a change to lighter-weight materials (essential if you want range on a battery-powered vehicle) and huge advances in safety systems (airbags, rear 3-point belts, head rests, better crumple zones, ABS, etc.), and no sane regulator would allow a newly manufactured classic car on the market.

And yet those same (sane ?) factions of Ralph Nader- wannabe type regulators would allow supremely distractive, programmable CRT / LCD/ LED video displays upon the dashboard right in front of the drivers.

 

[sadsteve]

Arsians bay for blood when someone puts a door lock onto the internet: only an idiot would think the device wouldn't be taken over immediately. Look how dangerous that is!

But put your car on the internet? Sure! Why not? Oh, and also have it accept input from other cars so its maps will stay up to date. What could possibly go wrong?

Oh, the idea is distinctly unpopular among our audience, which is why I hardly ever write about connected cars, and when I do it’s focused on the privacy or security aspects. But whether you think it’s a stupid idea or not, you won’t be able to buy a new car next year that doesn’t have an embedded LTE modem, and there’s absolutely no chance a self-driving car will be unconnected from the Internet.

So, if I'm unwilling to pay for an internet connection I won't be able to buy a car? That's just going to get me to buy a used car. For my phone, I use a pay-as-you-go plan and have my cellular data turned off. For phone calls and texting I only pay ~$70 a year for my usage.

 

[robrob]

Arsians bay for blood when someone puts a door lock onto the internet: only an idiot would think the device wouldn't be taken over immediately. Look how dangerous that is!

But put your car on the internet? Sure! Why not? Oh, and also have it accept input from other cars so its maps will stay up to date. What could possibly go wrong?

Oh, the idea is distinctly unpopular among our audience, which is why I hardly ever write about connected cars, and when I do it’s focused on the privacy or security aspects. But whether you think it’s a stupid idea or not, you won’t be able to buy a new car next year that doesn’t have an embedded LTE modem, and there’s absolutely no chance a self-driving car will be unconnected from the Internet.

Which is why you can pull the steering wheel out of my cold, dead hands.

Which is exactly what will happen. Old codgers like me, who grew up with manual transmissions, carburetors and AM radios will die off to be replaced by kids who have been connected to the Internet for the entire lives and will think it insane that their car (if it actually is theirs, most likely leased / Ubered or otherwise shared) ISN'T connected to the rest of the world.

I just hope that when we take the steering wheel away from you, it's only your hands that are cold and dead.

Reducing auto deaths, currently at the rate of over 3000 a day, is something we should all be applauding. Coddling paranoia and get-off-my-lawn codgerism is not something that we should be supporting.

cold dead hands is the reality. And I have friends I'll never see again because of someone else's cold dead hands.

Well, these old warm, not dead yet hands have driven well over a quarter million miles without a single accident. So I feel fairly comfortable that I'm still safe enough. As to that large number of folks who probably should never have received a drivers license - if you think that technology will fix stupid then you haven't been paying attention.

Those who do not understand history are doomed to repeat it.

Never been in an accident? That's just luck. I've never caused one, but I've been rear ended by a drunk and even once had someone drive into me in a parking lot while my car wasn't even turned on (and they ignored me blowing the horn. Then tried to blame me).

Technology would have fixed both of these stupids. Automated cars means taking the difficult bit out of their hands, like being permanently in a taxi that doesn't get lost (I've had that too).

And your quote is way off, what are we doomed to repeat? No one knows how to work a modem anymore, it just reduces support calls because it works without human intervention.