Patently Daft

This story from engadget.com tells us that Google has applied for a patent on gesture-based car controls.  Their proposed system relies on both a ceiling-mounted depth camera and a laser scanner to trigger actions based on an occupant's hand positions and movements.

 

Examples they cite are: Swipe near the window and you'll roll it down; point to the radio and you'll turn the volume up.

Examples they don't cite are: Wave both arms in the air and you'll crash; give a one-finger salute to a Police vehicle that is following you and you'll get arrested.

Apparently, Google has acquired a motion control company so they will be looking for uses for it.

I'm not convinced this is the best one.

Voice-activated controls are improving so that they are actually usable now, combining them with this may actually make it more dangerous to be in a car - what if a nervous passenger finds a spider in the car?

Besides, Google are also developing their driverless cars so none of this should be needed.

As ever, I do enjoy reading the comments at the bottom of online articles - this one produced some good ones:

Examples I cite are NewGawker, who states "This won't work in Italy" and my personal favourite, fsmarin who, on seeing the picture above asks, "Why is a monkey driving a bus?"

The Mayor of St.Edmundsbury is a Buffoon

Maybe it's a hacked self-driving car.

After my comment at the weekend about self-driving cars ending up in Sainsburys, we now have a car in Tescos.  It was driven there by the local mayor.  Nobody was injured.

I found this story today in The Sudbury Mercury - everyone's favourite Suffolk-newspaper-named-after-an-American-car.

So, does this Mayor's buffoonery match that of the mayors of London and Paris I have previously highlighted?

I don't know.  The story tells of a trip to hospital so it could have been a medical condition caused this.

But I suspect not.

Lots of Mercurys and other American cars end up in buildings due to clumsy or forgetful drivers forgetting how Automatics work:

Pictures like these regularly turn up on news websites.

All nations are affected but most ot these seem to be American due to the high car-ownership over there and the high proportion of those that have Auto-boxes.

I particularly like the third picture.  Claim, anyone?


Now, the mayor from our story, Terry Buckle,  may have just been unlucky.  The story says that "It is believed the car had lurched forward from a parking bay directly in front of the shop, with Mr Buckle at the wheel."

Pesky cars, eh?

Maybe it was a medical condition though - he was stopped in a disabled bay after all.

I put his registration number into mycarcheck.com and, surprise, surprise! - it's an Automatic.

So, it does look like buffoonery - or an excuse to get a mayoral car that's a bit posher than an S-Reg Vectra.



Post Script - Terry is blaming his brakes! Ha!

Getting Hacked Off

Suddenly, the ending of the brilliant video in my post from earlier this month makes more sense.

The car that fascinates the two Spocks is this self-driving Audi TT:

This car raises two important questions: 

• Do self-driving Audis tailgate other self-driving cars?
• Will a 14-year-old from Indonesia one day be able to hack into self-driving cars?

 Actually, that second question raises even more questions.

 

The question itself, was first asked by a US senator as told to us by Autoguide today.

 

It's a bit scary when you think about it - especially if you live in Indonesia where most 14-year-old Indonesians come from.

 

Imagine you're on you way home from work, reading the evening newspaper or playing Tetris or having a quiet doze while your self-driving car is doing the important stuff when you suddenly find yourself driving through your local branch of Sainsburys (or Wal-Mart or Hero).

 

Technology in lots of modern cars will make them vulnerable for hacking whether it is upgrading the e.c.u. for more power or something more sinister altogether.

 

Self-driving cars themselves have progressed in leaps and bounds in the last decade with some help from the DARPA Grand Challenge with cars like this VW Passat...

 ...through to Google's self-driving Toyota Prius...

Such cars are now legal on the roads in several US States.

I'm rather glad they aren't here in the UK yet though.

Not that we aren't working on the same thing - check this out.

But, apart from nervousness about a computer controlling a ton or two of metal on the loose, I actually enjoy driving and don't want to ever lose out on that.

Plus, what about those Indonesian kids?