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FCC Approves Highway Radiosystems
prostoalex writes "According to iWon/AP, the FCC has approved a range of radio frequencies to be used on US highways for transmitting important traffic information. The technology is still 5-10 years away from being implemented in cars and on the roads, but the FCC has set aside a special area of the spectrum instead of sharing the frequencies with other applications and devices. As for uses, there's currently a test running at an intersection in McLean, Va., where sensors can automatically warn a motorist when another car is approaching, thus helping to avoid a collision."
What the hell is to stop this from becoming as useless as the current emergancy vehicle light switching system (ala traffic lights), that used infrared frequencies? Some schmoe is going to make a device that makes your car think you're going to rear-end someone at his whim... Until finally the whole system will have to be thrown out, due to abuse.
The problem with the traffic light changers is that there aren't (or at least weren't) any laws dealing with abuse. Interfering with traffic to the degree of potentially causing an accident is already covered under any number of laws; someone stupid enough to make a device to abuse this system will get his ass sued six ways from next Wednesday, and a lengthly prison sentence to boot.
"They redundantly repeated themselves over and over again incessantly without end ad infinitum" -- ibid.
This sounds like a good tool. The only concerns I have are the following:
1) It doesn't replace the people actually DRIVING the vehicle needing to be at their utmost alert. We've all seen what cellphones and driving do to people.
2) It doesn't get used later on as a spammer's paradise. The last thing I want is that every car in the country comes standard with these alert systems only to hear, while driving down the highway, "ALERT! Your car's engine is not optimized! Go to carspeed.com to help!"
3) It doesn't get used as a monitoring network. I'd assume since it would be sending personalized messages to cars given their position in traffic, cars around them specifically, etc., that you'd need some sort of unique identifier per car. Let's not abuse this like the FastTrack crap we heard about earlier, and have a constant, rudimentary GPS system in every car that uses it.
Other than that, it seems like it'd be a great tool for informing drivers (non-invasively) on what's going on on the highways.
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