The future is here, but is it a bright one with Google's autonomous ride? These are the fears of an autonomous future that are keeping you awake at night.
10.) Hardcore fans
We don't need another Prius moment.
The smugness of Prius drivers, the entitlement of techies and the general apathy of millennials all in one convenient little autonomous package.
Could you imagine having a friend, or worse a family member who is an early adopter? They would insist that they should 'drive' everywhere and would get all defensive if you suggested going anywhere in a traditional car.
Suggested By: Forgetful, Photo Credit: Hooniverse
9.) Google Ads
We don't need product placement on our dashboards, and Google is no charity.
I fear that damn ads. Let's say I tell the Google car that I want to to to the store...Google will know my shopping patterns and incessantly ask me if I am "interested" in going to other places that relate to my purchases. Or worse, it will just take me there... GET OUT OF MY HEAD GOOGLE CAR!
Not to mention Google sending your daily driving habits to the NSA.
Suggested By: Automatch Tom, Photo Credit: Flyinace2000
8.) Lack of ownership
In this brave new world, there is a solid chance that you won't even own a car at all, just getting into one when you need them. That doesn't sit right. At all.
The idea of car ownership will become a thing of the past, you only rent a car for the time it takes you to go from home to work, once you're done the car drives to the next person in queue.
Suggested By: Green Pig, Photo Credit: Gran Torino
7.) Mediocre design
If you think about it, car design could take a bigger hit than from all the regulations of the last twenty years put together.
Suggested By: Hermann - Fantasy WRC Champion, Photo Credit: StewMM
6.) Alternative Beta testing
Who said only Google will play this game? Competition from a "Bing" or "Lycos" car might make for an autonomous future that isn't as safe as we're led to believe.
Suggested By: burglar can't heart click anything, Photo Credit: Cy K
5.) Breakdowns
Electric cars have less moving parts, but more software and wiring. Will you be able to push a pod, or will you get locked down in the middle of the road? A good question from RazoE:
Imagine traveling down a lonely road in your autonomous car and all of a sudden everything shuts off. How the hell do you fix that? You can't hit it with a hammer like a starter, or push-start it like a manual car. No sir-ee. You're stranded.
Suggested By: RazoE, Photo Credit: Justin Marty
4.) Lack of control
What if K.I.T.T. goes crazy? Mailbox Cancer has trust issues:
It's the same reason why I hate roller coasters. The biggest hurdle to get over– besides going a million miles an hour, death-defying plummets, and inverting the entire car train on occasion –is the necessity to surrender everything to the machine's ability to perform as designed. In other words, "trust".
It's much easier to trust a motor vehicle, free of any track, easily capable of flying off of a freeway overpass at 90mph and meeting a certain, fiery doom – not to mention everyone else's complete incompetence around you. Why trust that? Because you're in complete control of the situation. Your speed, trajectory, route, awareness of other objects, and other factors are uniquely and discernibly dictated by your inputs using a steering wheel, accelerator, brake, and observation equipment.
Google X has created the concept of a personal vehicle that forgoes all of those things. Now, if this little experiment leads to an awesome and capable "autopilot" mode in my next BMW/Lexus/Mazda/Etc., then awesome. But fear holds no bounds for when stepping into a motor vehicle that has no redundancy controls.
That makes my stomach flip like a labrador retriever just thinking about it.
Suggested By: Mailbox Cancer, Photo Credit: GM
3.) Boredom
Check your phone. Right. Now check it again, because nothing just happened during your trip. Congratulations.
Suggested By: willkinton247, Photo Credit: Shutter Stock
2.) The end of motor racing
Automakers invest in racing for development purposes. No driver, no excitement, no racing.
Driverless cars become the norm -> Auto racing becomes defunct because no auto manufacturer makes anything halfway sporting because no one cares about performance in a car they don't drive.
Driverless cars = No more auto racing
Suggested By: JayBe_III, Photo Credit: y.becart
1.) Mandatory autonomous cars
Don't forget: Most politicians are either insane or shockingly stupid. It could only be a matter of time before autonomy is the only choice we have.
DRIVE FREE OR DIE.
Suggested By: Diesel, Photo Credit: loop_oh
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