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UK to Put Monitors in Every Car?
wackoman2112 writes "The Sun is reporting that the UK government has plans to put a computerised spy in every car. This "spy" will record every single time a motorist goes slightly over the speed limit, into a bus lane, or stops on a yellow line! It will report this information to roadside sensors and you will soon receive a fine in the mail."
People will routinely drive at dangerous rates of speed and will perform high-speed sudden manoeuvers that leave virtually no margin for error.
Such behaviour has to be eradicated.
The installation of constant-monitoring tele-downloadable event recorders is most certainly a nice step in this direction, the goal being to eliminate the bad drivers from the road.
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Some years ago, in a project management class, the teacher's day job was project manager for a prestigious law enforcement agency. Our teams had to prepare a project description for law-enforcement purposes. My idea was to have such a system implemented.
Needless to say, it didn't fly high with my team-mates, but the professor's reaction was quite interesting:
Well, it's about time!!!How do we stop urban sprawl?
I thought it would be democracy in the middle east that would lead to $5/gal. gas that would send us back to the urban centers.
Looks like it will be our refusual to drive that will lead us to mass transit, that will lead to tracking public transit, that will lead us to walking.
In the U.S, it will be a John Ashcroft, not a Spencer Abrahams that will cut down on global warming.
Seems rather backwards to go to the trouble of all this sensor/ID crap in order to get people to drive slower -- why not just stop manufacturing cars that go FASTER THAN THE SPEED LIMIT!
I don't agree with the ideas behind these potential laws mind you...However I have always wondered why we manufacture cars that can go over the maximum speed limit -- where can you drive over 75MPH (besides the autobahn, and besides, what justification is that for other countries?) legally?
We apologise for the fault in this post. Those responsible have been sacked. -- Signed RICHARD M. NIXON
So instead of having a sizeable percentage of our population stuck in jail, we should throw everyone in jail?
Sure, that would be the Bush way to alleviate unemployment!
Will it work technologically? I don't know.
Having data and using data are two different things.
Having data is good. What you do with it, how you penalize people, how much slack you allow on different violations, that's a judgement call.
If you consider yourself any kind of scientist, you have to support data collection - the alternative is to be blind to reality.
I love driving but cars and roads are literally destroying the planet anyway... the legal regime in which these machines of destruction are operated can hardly be too tight.
It's about time that we used technology to reduce the amount of bad drivers out there...it would also force car manufacturers to change the advertising for cars (no more fast/dangerous driving by "cool" owners), it would save humanity lives, gross use of gas, promote indirectly more efficent, practical, (read: slower vehicles)...an end to the fast car culture (at least in street use, sure go ahead, race on tracks instead.). It would also promote better driving habits...a real plus...too bad it would take a long time to implement here in north america...
> I'd say at least half the people on the road are below average drivers.
Parse error. That's an interesting use of the word average. If you are an (exactly) average driver, exactly half of the people drive worse than you.
(I'm just being a smart-ass, not pedantic -- it's a fine line)