Every day, the NMA Driving News Feed hosts a number of stories about the car of future, which is just one of the things we write about here on the Auto Tech Watch Blog. Numerous names for the car of the future are currently in use: driverless cars, autonomous cars, autonomous vehicles, autonomous-electric cars and vehicles, self-driving cars, robocars, robotaxis, robot cars, connected cars, shared autonomous cars, flying cars, flying taxis, passenger drones, etc.
In reading all of these articles, I feel that mainly all the experts are just pretty much guessing and we’re not really that close to any kind of car of the future. Widespread adoption of electric and connected cars is not that close either.
I think it is fun to dream about auto tech possibilities, but in reality the costs for these niceties is greater than what we can bear since much of the world’s population struggles financially.
Sometimes I feel, with all the world issues today, spending this much time and money on the car of the future seems rather cruel and sometimes even childish. Especially when our elected officials can’t even agree on how to fund basic infrastructure needs, which generally does not include the added connected Internet of Things infrastructure for the car of the future.
Humans like to push limits, but maybe some limits don’t need pushing so hard, so fast.
Okay, off my soapbox—just needed to get that off my chest because how much all of this technology costs and how much time and effort put into building the technology has been bothering me a bit since I started writing about the car of the future.
Here are some of the latest headlines that might be of interest to those who have an interest in the car of the future:
Autonomous Cars
- Aurora CEO Chris Urmson Says There’ll Be Hundreds Of Self-Driving Cars On The Road In Five Years (Forbes.com)
- New Study Shows Enthusiasm For Robocars, But Unwillingness To Give Up Control (Forbes.com)
- Robot Cars of the Future Can’t Fix Traffic, Pollution, Sprawl (USA Streetsblog)
- On Frankenstein Results When Self-Driving Cars Go Rogue (Forbes.com)
- Why Are Parking Lots So Tricky for Self-Driving Cars? (Wired.com)
- 42 Primers On Driverless Car Innovation And Disruption (Forbes.com)
- What Autonomous Cars Can’t See Can Hurt You (OntheRoadtoAutonomy.com)
- Waymo wants to offer robotaxis in California. But the state insists they be free (Los Angeles Times)
- Viewpoint: Tech takes over the car, but where’s my driverless vehicle? (BizJournals.com)
- Will We Have Self-Flying Cars Before Self-Driving Cars? (Forbes.com)
Electric Cars
- Electric cars may be powering ahead, but it will be a long way before they go mainstream (video report) (CNBC.com)
- Letters in Response: Are Electric Cars the Wheels of the Future? (New York Times)
- The electric vehicle industry needs to figure out its battery problem (TheVerge.com)
- New Battery Could Charge an Electric Car in 10 Minutes (Discover Magazine Blog)
Connected Cars
- The rise of the connected car – and what it knows about you (MotoringResearch.com)
- Safer roads or faster movie downloads? Let’s choose wisely (AutoNews.com)
- 10 Most Demanded Connected Car Features (InnotechToday.com)
- What Are the Benefits of Driving a Connected Car? (IotForAll.com)
- Should all connected cars have a physical network kill switch? (ArsTechnica.com)
That‘s this week’s Auto Tech Watch Blog. If you would like to add your two cents, please write your comments below.
If you find an auto tech type story, send the URL link to nma@motorists.org for inclusion in our Driving News Feed and as one of the stories for our 5x/week email, Driving News Daily. If you would like to subscribe to DND, please click HERE.
Thank you for reading the Auto Tech Watch Blog and please be safe out there!
Shelia Dunn
NMA Communications Director
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