Do You Want Some Distraction with that Drive Time?

Link to January 7 New York Times article, "Despite Risks, Internet Creeps Onto Car Dashboards".

Excerpt: Technology giants like Intel and Google are turning their attention from the desktop to the dashboard, hoping to bring the power of the PC to the car. They see vast opportunity for profit in working with automakers to create the next generation of irresistible devices.

This week at the Consumer Electronics Show, the neon-drenched annual trade show here, these companies are demonstrating the breadth of their ambitions, like 10-inch screens above the gearshift showing high-definition videos, 3-D maps and Web pages.

The first wave of these “infotainment systems,” as the tech and car industries call them, will hit the market this year. While built-in navigation features were once costly options, the new systems are likely to be standard equipment in a wide range of cars before long. They prevent drivers from watching video and using some other functions while the car is moving, but they can still pull up content as varied as restaurant reviews and the covers of music albums with the tap of a finger.

The Technology Liberation Front thinks it's groovy, though, and provides us with its now Pavlovian response: Education, not regulation, is the answer.

Education. As in here, here, here, here, and here.