Hooray! It really is the 21st century (1 Viewer)

[Scott L]

http://www.engadget.com/entry/1234000137056230/

Granted it doesn't fly like those 50's B-movies promised but it's a start.

 

[Hunter P]

Better hope its not running on Windows.

I think I'm gonna wait 10 on this one. See how it goes before I put my life in the hands of some lasers and video cameras.

 

[Kevin Hewell]

I saw something about this (maybe not this particular model but the tech) on the History Channel a couple of years ago.

 

[John Nelson]

I felt like it was finally the 21st Century when I went to my brother's apartment and his little Roomba robot vacuum cleaner zoomed back and forth around the room doing its job, then parked itself back into its recharging dock. Very Jetsons-ish. Who would have thought that vacuuming would become a spectator sport?

 

[Chris Lockwood]

I would think the liability issue alone would keep that car off the market for a long time.

 

[Tim Hoover]

Great...now all we have to look forward to are rayguns and sex robots.

 

[MarkHastings]

I once saw a special where they had a radar laser on the front of a car that sensed when the car (in front of you) would slow up. The radar (which is MUCH quicker than human reaction time) determined if you had enough time to stop and applied the brakes if not.

It was a neat idea, but there are probably a lot of bad things that could happen as well. What if an object rolled across the highway and your car automatically slammed on the brakes? What if it malfunctioned and locked up your brakes?

 

[ThomasC]

I'm sure they're trying to think of everything that could possibly go wrong.

 

[Hunter P]

Including if the car was struck by lightning and became evil?

 

[John Nelson]

They can't save you from bad movies, Hunter.

 

[ThomasC]

 

[Steve Schaffer]

Some cars available now have laser-regulated cruise control that instead of maintaining a single set speed will actually automatically let up on the gas and even apply the brakes if the car ahead slows to below your set speed. If the vehicle ahead slows to below your set speed, the cruise control will maintain a safe distance and speed up to your set speed if the car ahead speeds up.

The Toyota Prius is available in Japan with a system that uses similar sensing technology to automatically parallel park the car. You pull up ahead of the desired parking place and activate the system and it does the rest!

 

[Mark Shannon]

Automatic Parallel Parking? That just sounds too cool to be true. Got any videos of that?

 

[Wendy_L]

WOOHOOO...finally my dreams of being able to watch my portable DVD player while my car does the driving has come to pass.

I love technology!

 

[Paul McElligott]

Will this car automatically flip someone the bird if they cut you off?