Getting Cars to Talk
by sam on May.17, 2009, under Good Idea, Robotics, Sensors, hardware, software
Cohda Wireless, an Australian company, has been awarded a huge contract with several European countries to begin testing their automobile to automobile communication system. This isn’t some new technology that will let you send threatening text messages to that jerk behind you, this will actually be your car talking to other cars. And what will your car be saying? Things like, “I’m going really, really, fast and I’m coming right for you”, or “I’ve just run a red light”, or “the guy behind my wheel is a crazy person, perhaps you should take a side street”. Now your car, equipped with a similar device will let you know that something’s coming up and to be aware of it. At least for now, that’s all it’s going to do. Future versions, they claim, will include things like helping you to brake, if you’re too slow, or swerving around things in the road. One thing they metioned was the having the car drop a curtain over the windshield so you won’t freak out and do something rash (really?).
A nice idea. The technology behind the autonomous car stuff, I think is the most interesting part, although they’re not testing that. Another thing they should do, for every vehicle not using this device is in high traffic areas and build (or in most cases just repurpose) stationary radar detection/camera systems and give access to that data.
Here’s the article:http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article6294866.ece
May 18th, 2009 on 12:47 pm
So, does this mean that police won’t need radar guns, and your car will rat you out to any cop in the vicinity? Perhaps we can also eliminate the need for the cops to be present at all by installing robot speed traps all up and down the highway.
More positively, maybe this sort of technology would allow smart (Well, relatively smart) stop signs at intersections. The smart sign would allow you to safely not stop if there’s no conflicting traffic entering the intersection. Speed detection would force you to stop at every such intersection (or risk a robo-ticket) if you significantly exceed speed restrictions. Of course, the need for such a thing is predicated on people actually stopping for stop signs now. A five-minute sample of the cars blowing through the stop sign in front of my house would convince you otherwise. Maybe it’s just that Orwell was correct about the outcome, and wrong about the year.
January 25th, 2010 on 1:04 am
Love the post.