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I'll go a bit further... Do we really need computers on four wheels? Can't we just have simple electric vehicles without all the high-tech? No distracting scree

I'll go a bit further... Do we really need computers on four wheels? Can't we just have simple electric vehicles without all the high-tech? No distracting screens, no computer for other than just governing the electric engine, no fancy car locks, and so on. I don't understand why we need to put so much technology in a vehicle. Honestly, it seems to me that is absolutely unnecessary tech, ridiculous. I'd like to have a vehicle like the ones 15 or 20 years ago but electric: analog indicators, physical buttons, etc. And a car that you can actually REPAIR by yourself without having to be an electronic engineer or something alike. There was a post about someone that owned a Tesla car and managed to repair it (if I recall it correctly) for under 500 bucks when Tesla was trying to charge above 10000 USD. All this high-tech also means that we're doomed and at the mercy of car companies for any kind of maintenance. It seems that we're heading to the same dead end as with mobile phone industry: zero control over them. If that's the bright future that awaits us, I'll take public transport as much as I can.

vinyl7 3y ago
Its not good enough to just sell a product. You have to sell a life style, an ecosystem, subscriptions and upgrades. Selling a simple product was a pre-WEF phenomenon
inconceivable 3y ago
you could buy a used car and convert it to EV. that 1. removes an ICE off the road 2. saves on new mfr costs and 3. is a worthy hacker endeavour and/or 4. supports a local business of course if you simply hate cars and want everyone to ride the train or bikes you'll find a million reasons to not do this. good luck with that.
- carstenhag 3y ago
  Not really. It's a very manual task. Can only be scaled if you ship thousand units of the same model to a single factory. Compatibility has to be evaluated per model. Structural integrity has to be preserved, batteries are usually located at different spots than motors are. Of course you can say "here are 4 pros - if you say anything bad you want the world to suffer from cars" but you know that this is not how we can get to a solution.
- Spooky23 3y ago
  Environmental action is based on who’s paying the bills. It often doesn’t make sense. Case in point: At a time where Manhattan commercial real estate is about to implode and traffic is at a nadir, there’s a major push to kill driving in NYC to pay for overpriced mass transit. Instead of investing in electric vehicle infrastructure, we’re investing in destruction of lots of businesses (like nationally prominent hospitals).
  - ClumsyPilot 3y ago
    > At a time where Manhattan commercial real estate is about to implode Maybe it should implode? The prices for real estate are so high, you have to sell drugs on the side to pay rents. Many businesses just aren't viable becaus of it. Growth in real estate is not real economic growth, it's more of tumour.
the_pwner224 3y ago
> Can't we just have simple electric vehicles without all the high-tech? No, because ~nobody would buy them. > I don't understand why we need to put so much technology in a vehicle. Because 99% of people want it. Not everyone wants everything, buy each group of people wants some features and the end result is that you have to stuff your car full of tech to be competitive in the modern car market. And this isn't an EV thing. The tech is going into all the ICE vehicles too. Tesla is the exception, they put huge screens into cars well before everyone else and they happen to be an EV company. But normal manufacturers are mostly putting similar tech in their ICEs and EVs.
- bombolo 3y ago
  People don't care. We have them because they cost less to build than having buttons.
  - stubish 3y ago
    Not touch screens, which have been rejected by most of the market. Tech like adaptive cruise control, collision warnings & automatic breaking, reversing cameras, lane assist, automatic parking, blindspot detection, spotify playlists. I've got a 25 year fully manual tin can with an engine just perfect for puttering around the local area at the 50km/h speed limit. I'm looking for another car with modern safety features for regular distance driving, and most of that requires computers (and buttons!).
    - DangitBobby 3y ago
      You put out a low tech EV that does basically nothing but accelerate for 200k miles for 15k and you bet your ass people would buy it in droves.
      - fragmede 3y ago
        Would they? Or is it like the small phone segment, where the a very vocal group of hardcore enthusiasts, but when it comes to market size, it turns out theres just not really enough of us out there to sustain the segment. Cars aren't phones, and maybe a $15k car would sell well in this economy, but with way higher margins on a slightly better car at $40k, why would any automaker willingly give up a big pile of profit?
micromacrofoot 3y ago
I’ll do one further: most of us shouldn’t have to drive cars at all every day, we’re just enabling dependency on the robber-barrons that create them - our entire country has been built to be reliant on the auto industry, it’s practically a hostage situation and most of us have stockholm syndrome
- ilyt 3y ago
  In cities for sure but even if you make cities be pedestrian friendly anyone outside of them still needs them
  - LetsGetTechnicl 3y ago
    That's exactly the problem. Suburban sprawl is entirely car-focused because you can't get out to the boonies without one.
    - ilyt 3y ago
      Not talking about suburban sprawl, just living next small city over. But "tons of houses and not a shop or anything else in sight" is of course a problem on its own. Thankfully not really in my country, there is usually some local shops nearby everywhere
  - micromacrofoot 3y ago
    what if I told you that even the smallest town could be pedestrian friendly, and before the advent of cars they were this way for thousands of years
carstenhag 3y ago
Yes, it is necessary. People want it. I want to be able to connect my phone to the car. To be able to use a navigation app. I'm not going back to reading maps (also, I never started).
- epolanski 3y ago
  Navigators have been in cars two decades at this point.
  - bentley 3y ago
    And they are universally poorer quality than the default navigation apps on phones.
    - kalleboo 3y ago
      The software in the navigation in my car is miles ahead of Apple Maps. The problem is they charge $300 for a maps update. For that $300 I can just pay for a third party maps app that has the same features.
    - epolanski 3y ago
      They do their job just fine though. If the argument for connecting phones to cars is navigation I don't feel it is the strongest one.
ilyt 3y ago
> I'll go a bit further... Do we really need computers on four wheels? Can't we just have simple electric vehicles without all the high-tech? No distracting screens, no computer for other than just governing the electric engine, no fancy car locks, and so on. I'd love to, the problem is it would get some pitifully low NCAP rating (because lack of active securities would bring the score down and I remember it is && deal, so car can have excellent crash safety yet still get low stars coz of lack of the electronic toys), and manufacturers want to sell as much gadgets as possible, because every few bucks of extra electronics is every few dozen bucks they can charge customer for. The other problem I think is that the "fancy annoying electronics" are probably not that big part of the price of the car. Add chassis, battery, heating/cooling system for the car and all the mechanics and you already arrived at most of the car's production price. Like, even if you add $500 of the compute (amounting to mid-high range GPU) and $500 on ruggedizing it for car work... extra $1000 worth in electronics isn't all that much of car price. I for one am keeping my 8th gen Civic Type-R for as long as possible, got ABS, airbags, even some traction control but none of the annoyances of modern cars. All I want from new car is android auto...
- Fatnino 3y ago
  You can get a new head unit with android auto for like 200 bucks or there abouts.
  - ilyt 3y ago
    Well, yeah, in my current on, but if it is new car with integrated tablet style infotainment you might not have place to put it and would have to look for something specifically made to fit it. And might have A/C controls built into infotainment...
- ChatGTP 3y ago
  Same I have an old Suzuki and I wouldn't get rid of it for anything. On the other hand, I think the whole concept of cars is the actual problem, especially heavier cars. The tire dust alone is enough to think about weening ourselves off the project. Then there is strip mining the earth for cobalt and all the other nasty shit in the devices, it's pretty bad. Where I live e-bikes are really taking off, to me e-bikes and public transport seem like the ultimate way to go. It even looks futuristic. A little bit of exercise and movement, combined with fully autonomous, small electric trains would be the best of all worlds.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
Fatnino 3y ago
The flashy tech bells and whistles are there to compensate for the inherent problems with electric cars. They lag in range compared to gas cars, and get absolutely trounced when it comes to putting energy back in the car. Concrete example: this week I had to drive some people between San Jose and Hollywood. Google maps says that's 5:40 hours over 340 miles. I looked at renting a model 3 for the trip but it simply could not justify itself when compared to the minivan I ultimately rented with 500+ miles range. Not only was I not forced to stop in BFE for 20-40 minutes, I didn't have to stop at all. Arrived with plenty of gas to get to any station in LA I might want (cheapest). And I wasn't even pressed for time, but if I'm slapping an extra half hour onto the trip I'd rather spend it (and actually did) on taking the more scenic US101 route for ~400 miles instead.
- jdminhbg 3y ago
  That’s a fun niche use case but most people just drive to work and school and back every weekday. Having to stop for 20-40 minutes on the odd occasion that you need to drive 340 miles in a day is worth never having to stop for gas for your daily commute.
  - micromacrofoot 3y ago
    yeah 90% of the time range does not matter for me, 10% is slightly annoying… good enough for me
  - acyou 3y ago
    How much time does it take to plug and unplug the car every day, vs. the gas station fill time?
    - Xelynega 3y ago
      It takes about 4 seconds if the plug isn't right beside the car. It takes me at least 3 minutes one way to get to a gas station, then another few minutes to fill up.
    - jdminhbg 3y ago
medion 3y ago
You could just convert a car from 20 years ago if you are that passionate about it? Kite abound.
- medion 3y ago
  Kits abound, rather.
dmix 3y ago
It's funny how humans repeat the same patterns repeatedly in history: new technology development happens, optimist expect it to happen way faster than realistically possible, they make progress but the initial output is rocky as all new things are before they mature. Luddites/conservatives come in and point at the rocky start, the societal disruption before it normalizes, the early financial losers who bought into over optimistic projections, etc as the reasons why we shouldn't have bothered in the first place. Then it comes out, the tech matures, society adapts, new rules are made, lessons are recorded but rarely listened to, and everyone moves on to the next thing.
Prickle 3y ago
A part of me really wants those spinny window cranks back. Highly prefer those funny things over electric windows. Touchscreens on cars need to die out, preferably quickly.
- gibspaulding 3y ago
  Just bought an old truck with crank windows and manual locks. They're still as wonderful as you remember:)
  - Prickle 3y ago
    Oh how I long for the older, simpler and unobtrusive systems like that. I have so many things where I just want the old non-electric style back.
DennisP 3y ago
> a car that you can actually REPAIR by yourself If Aptera manages to scale up production, it looks like they'll deliver that part at least. They're promising to make all the manuals and parts available to anyone.

vinyl7 3y ago

Its not good enough to just sell a product. You have to sell a life style, an ecosystem, subscriptions and upgrades. Selling a simple product was a pre-WEF phenomenon

inconceivable 3y ago

you could buy a used car and convert it to EV. that 1. removes an ICE off the road 2. saves on new mfr costs and 3. is a worthy hacker endeavour and/or 4. supports a local business of course if you simply hate cars and want everyone to ride the train or bikes you'll find a million reasons to not do this. good luck with that.

carstenhag 3y ago
Not really. It's a very manual task. Can only be scaled if you ship thousand units of the same model to a single factory. Compatibility has to be evaluated per model. Structural integrity has to be preserved, batteries are usually located at different spots than motors are. Of course you can say "here are 4 pros - if you say anything bad you want the world to suffer from cars" but you know that this is not how we can get to a solution.
Spooky23 3y ago
Environmental action is based on who’s paying the bills. It often doesn’t make sense. Case in point: At a time where Manhattan commercial real estate is about to implode and traffic is at a nadir, there’s a major push to kill driving in NYC to pay for overpriced mass transit. Instead of investing in electric vehicle infrastructure, we’re investing in destruction of lots of businesses (like nationally prominent hospitals).
- ClumsyPilot 3y ago
  > At a time where Manhattan commercial real estate is about to implode Maybe it should implode? The prices for real estate are so high, you have to sell drugs on the side to pay rents. Many businesses just aren't viable becaus of it. Growth in real estate is not real economic growth, it's more of tumour.

the_pwner224 3y ago

> Can't we just have simple electric vehicles without all the high-tech? No, because ~nobody would buy them. > I don't understand why we need to put so much technology in a vehicle. Because 99% of people want it. Not everyone wants everything, buy each group of people wants some features and the end result is that you have to stuff your car full of tech to be competitive in the modern car market. And this isn't an EV thing. The tech is going into all the ICE vehicles too. Tesla is the exception, they put huge screens into cars well before everyone else and they happen to be an EV company. But normal manufacturers are mostly putting similar tech in their ICEs and EVs.

bombolo 3y ago
People don't care. We have them because they cost less to build than having buttons.
- stubish 3y ago
  Not touch screens, which have been rejected by most of the market. Tech like adaptive cruise control, collision warnings & automatic breaking, reversing cameras, lane assist, automatic parking, blindspot detection, spotify playlists. I've got a 25 year fully manual tin can with an engine just perfect for puttering around the local area at the 50km/h speed limit. I'm looking for another car with modern safety features for regular distance driving, and most of that requires computers (and buttons!).
  - DangitBobby 3y ago
    You put out a low tech EV that does basically nothing but accelerate for 200k miles for 15k and you bet your ass people would buy it in droves.
    - fragmede 3y ago
      Would they? Or is it like the small phone segment, where the a very vocal group of hardcore enthusiasts, but when it comes to market size, it turns out theres just not really enough of us out there to sustain the segment. Cars aren't phones, and maybe a $15k car would sell well in this economy, but with way higher margins on a slightly better car at $40k, why would any automaker willingly give up a big pile of profit?

micromacrofoot 3y ago

I’ll do one further: most of us shouldn’t have to drive cars at all every day, we’re just enabling dependency on the robber-barrons that create them - our entire country has been built to be reliant on the auto industry, it’s practically a hostage situation and most of us have stockholm syndrome

ilyt 3y ago
In cities for sure but even if you make cities be pedestrian friendly anyone outside of them still needs them
- LetsGetTechnicl 3y ago
  That's exactly the problem. Suburban sprawl is entirely car-focused because you can't get out to the boonies without one.
  - ilyt 3y ago
    Not talking about suburban sprawl, just living next small city over. But "tons of houses and not a shop or anything else in sight" is of course a problem on its own. Thankfully not really in my country, there is usually some local shops nearby everywhere
- micromacrofoot 3y ago
  what if I told you that even the smallest town could be pedestrian friendly, and before the advent of cars they were this way for thousands of years

carstenhag 3y ago

Yes, it is necessary. People want it. I want to be able to connect my phone to the car. To be able to use a navigation app. I'm not going back to reading maps (also, I never started).

epolanski 3y ago
Navigators have been in cars two decades at this point.
- bentley 3y ago
  And they are universally poorer quality than the default navigation apps on phones.
  - kalleboo 3y ago
    The software in the navigation in my car is miles ahead of Apple Maps. The problem is they charge $300 for a maps update. For that $300 I can just pay for a third party maps app that has the same features.
  - epolanski 3y ago
    They do their job just fine though. If the argument for connecting phones to cars is navigation I don't feel it is the strongest one.

ilyt 3y ago

> I'll go a bit further... Do we really need computers on four wheels? Can't we just have simple electric vehicles without all the high-tech? No distracting screens, no computer for other than just governing the electric engine, no fancy car locks, and so on. I'd love to, the problem is it would get some pitifully low NCAP rating (because lack of active securities would bring the score down and I remember it is && deal, so car can have excellent crash safety yet still get low stars coz of lack of the electronic toys), and manufacturers want to sell as much gadgets as possible, because every few bucks of extra electronics is every few dozen bucks they can charge customer for. The other problem I think is that the "fancy annoying electronics" are probably not that big part of the price of the car. Add chassis, battery, heating/cooling system for the car and all the mechanics and you already arrived at most of the car's production price. Like, even if you add $500 of the compute (amounting to mid-high range GPU) and $500 on ruggedizing it for car work... extra $1000 worth in electronics isn't all that much of car price. I for one am keeping my 8th gen Civic Type-R for as long as possible, got ABS, airbags, even some traction control but none of the annoyances of modern cars. All I want from new car is android auto...

Fatnino 3y ago
You can get a new head unit with android auto for like 200 bucks or there abouts.
- ilyt 3y ago
  Well, yeah, in my current on, but if it is new car with integrated tablet style infotainment you might not have place to put it and would have to look for something specifically made to fit it. And might have A/C controls built into infotainment...
ChatGTP 3y ago
Same I have an old Suzuki and I wouldn't get rid of it for anything. On the other hand, I think the whole concept of cars is the actual problem, especially heavier cars. The tire dust alone is enough to think about weening ourselves off the project. Then there is strip mining the earth for cobalt and all the other nasty shit in the devices, it's pretty bad. Where I live e-bikes are really taking off, to me e-bikes and public transport seem like the ultimate way to go. It even looks futuristic. A little bit of exercise and movement, combined with fully autonomous, small electric trains would be the best of all worlds.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

Fatnino 3y ago

The flashy tech bells and whistles are there to compensate for the inherent problems with electric cars. They lag in range compared to gas cars, and get absolutely trounced when it comes to putting energy back in the car. Concrete example: this week I had to drive some people between San Jose and Hollywood. Google maps says that's 5:40 hours over 340 miles. I looked at renting a model 3 for the trip but it simply could not justify itself when compared to the minivan I ultimately rented with 500+ miles range. Not only was I not forced to stop in BFE for 20-40 minutes, I didn't have to stop at all. Arrived with plenty of gas to get to any station in LA I might want (cheapest). And I wasn't even pressed for time, but if I'm slapping an extra half hour onto the trip I'd rather spend it (and actually did) on taking the more scenic US101 route for ~400 miles instead.

jdminhbg 3y ago
That’s a fun niche use case but most people just drive to work and school and back every weekday. Having to stop for 20-40 minutes on the odd occasion that you need to drive 340 miles in a day is worth never having to stop for gas for your daily commute.
- micromacrofoot 3y ago
  yeah 90% of the time range does not matter for me, 10% is slightly annoying… good enough for me
- acyou 3y ago
  How much time does it take to plug and unplug the car every day, vs. the gas station fill time?
  - Xelynega 3y ago
    It takes about 4 seconds if the plug isn't right beside the car. It takes me at least 3 minutes one way to get to a gas station, then another few minutes to fill up.
  - jdminhbg 3y ago

medion 3y ago

You could just convert a car from 20 years ago if you are that passionate about it? Kite abound.

medion 3y ago
Kits abound, rather.

dmix 3y ago

It's funny how humans repeat the same patterns repeatedly in history: new technology development happens, optimist expect it to happen way faster than realistically possible, they make progress but the initial output is rocky as all new things are before they mature. Luddites/conservatives come in and point at the rocky start, the societal disruption before it normalizes, the early financial losers who bought into over optimistic projections, etc as the reasons why we shouldn't have bothered in the first place. Then it comes out, the tech matures, society adapts, new rules are made, lessons are recorded but rarely listened to, and everyone moves on to the next thing.

Prickle 3y ago

A part of me really wants those spinny window cranks back. Highly prefer those funny things over electric windows. Touchscreens on cars need to die out, preferably quickly.

gibspaulding 3y ago
Just bought an old truck with crank windows and manual locks. They're still as wonderful as you remember:)
- Prickle 3y ago
  Oh how I long for the older, simpler and unobtrusive systems like that. I have so many things where I just want the old non-electric style back.

DennisP 3y ago

> a car that you can actually REPAIR by yourself If Aptera manages to scale up production, it looks like they'll deliver that part at least. They're promising to make all the manuals and parts available to anyone.