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I wonder how much worse road etiquette would be if we had no license plates? I suspect there is a reasonable argument against net anonymity hidden in the histor
by sambeau 15y ago
I wonder how much worse road etiquette would be if we had no license plates? I suspect there is a reasonable argument against net anonymity hidden in the history of the motor car.
Does anyone know what the tipping point for license plates was?
- cobrausn 15y agoLicense plates came into existence in the early 1900s in Massachusetts when they needed a way to tax people to repair and maintain their roadways, and vehicle registration was the way they decided to accomplish it. It was also proposed as a way of linking drivers with actions, as there was a rapid increase in the number of roadway accidents about that time. http://www.mass.gov/rmv/history/ http://www.mass.gov/rmv/history/
- sambeau 15y agoThe French had them long before that (in fact they had them before the automobile). But I suspect you are right: it was tax to maintain the roads that required each automobile to be numbered and registered.
- imgabe 15y agoI think license plates are roughly equivalent to an IP address. It gives you no incentive to be polite, but authorities can use it to track you down if you break the law.
- omarchowdhury 15y agoRoad etiquette would be worse if it weren't for the chance of death for messing up.
- tikhonj 15y agoI doubt it would be any different. Do you remember the license (gah, for some reason I hate spelling that word) plate of the last car that cut you off? If so, you are in the minority. Even if you knew the number, how would you correlate it with a face? I don't think the license plate number gives much in the way of identity. In fact, it gives less identity than your average username--it is usually completely random, created with no input on the part of the driver.