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Watch TV On Your Satnav
Barence writes "Satnav firm Mio is launching a device with an integrated TV tuner. The Mio Spirit range includes a digital television tuner that is intended to be used 'during breaks in the journey or at their final destination.' However, safety campaigners fear there's little to stop the television being used at the wheel. When the system is first turned on a warning message is displayed, telling the user not to watch television while driving. If this is ignored, a secondary warning message kicks in if the GPS chip detects the vehicle is moving at more than 5mph. But that's it!"
Even the current GPS units/DVD players can easily be defeated. In most cases, all you need to do is ground one of the pins in the connector, and it always thinks you are parked. My brother has been playing Family Guy DVDs in his in-dash unit for years. The SAME Family Guy DVD.
Brett
Life is like Unix and you are the superuser. With that comes the power to 'rm -rf' the system.. intentionally or not.
--iamnotayam
Get shitty drivers and give them mobile phones to talk on so they become even shittier drivers. Now get those bastards to watch TV while talking and texting on their mobile phones and we'll have the shittiest drivers on the road. Hopefully, these bastards will kill themselves without killing others, making the road safer for everyone else.
Oh well, back to reality.
I always thought that warning messages were more likely to get you killed in the 0.05s you spend pressing "ok" when you could have done the one thing you wanted to do.
They'd be more effective to only let you use the TV in "radio mode", e.g. no video to distract you from the road.
Yes. I'm in South Korea too and it's something I see every day, in nearly every taxi I get in. Its extremely common to see someone tune the GPS screen into digital television stations while driving. The law has little affect on it.
It makes sense after you see a horrible accident on the high way, look into one of the vehicles in the collision and see their LCD screen displaying The Cooking Channel or something.
Because if only we could prevent this one particular stupid thing people can do while driving we will eliminate all driving-related injuries and deaths.
Seriously, there is an endless supply of stupid, distracting things people can do while driving, with out without GPS, a cell phone, TV, children, or any of the other things they might have in their car. If someone is stupid enough to be distracted by TV while they're driving they'll likely be able to find something similarly stupid to do even if you ban every bit of technology you can name from the dashboard. Like DRM, the only thing you'll accomplish by adding silly technologically restrictions like this is annoyance for people who have legitimate uses.
I never watch TV while driving ... however, I do frequently shower and shave while driving.
Ya, that's exactly what Dodge's in-car navigation system does. And it is annoying as hell, as I'm quite capable of driving and not getting distracted by the tv while the passengers watch it.
How we know is more important than what we know.
We have had those units in Europe for ages, and there was not a single problem. I am not sure if this is not an American problem alone...
safety campaigners fear there's little to stop the television being used at the wheel
Silly safety campaigners... don't they know we're too busy texting on our mobile phones while driving to watch TV?
Lurking at the bottom of the gravity well, getting old
My guess would be because they're fucking morons.
How we know is more important than what we know.
Those poor morons...
More distractions for drivers will eventually mean more cyclists being killed on the road. Looking on the bright side, this could accelerate the eventual transition towards having computers assume control of vehicles on the streets.
It is amazing how many drivers here in Japan (specifically near Toyota City, but I assume elsewhere in this country) are watching TV while driving. Add in texting on a cell phone, not wearing seat belts and things get more dangerous.
If I have nothing to hide, don't search me
What about ferries? A hour long ferry ride would be the perfect use for a TV, but the satnav shuts itself down when the ferry leaves the port.
Exactly what I was thinking - there's a use case where you know your route but only want to carry one device and so entertain the other passengers by using it as the TV rather than using the SatNav (which you may need later) as a navigation device.
Yeah, people watching TV while driving is a problem, but there are far more prevalent problems that'll cause just as many accidents: people doing 100Mph+ on Motorways with warnings of queuing ahead, people not indicating, people on mobile phones, etc.
wreckless driving, and it shouldn't be tolerated. Shouldn't anyone watching TV while driving lose their license?
The Japanese models turn the TV off altogether when the car starts moving but you can slip the dealer a bit of cash and he'll turn that "feature" off for you.
Presumably all the people who find this acceptable would have no problem if the surgeon putting them back together after they crash watches TV whilst doing the surgery.
"... safety campaigners fear there's little to stop the television being used at the wheel."
When the original version of The Andromeda Strain aired on TV circa 1971, I packed a 12" B&W Zenith portable with a 12 V DC car cigarette lighter adapter into a friend's car and we set out watching it. He made it 2 blocks before hitting a curb. I tried and made it 1 block before doing the same. We then parked and watched the rest.
So they're right to be alarmed. They're just several decades late. But then, we knew it was stupid to try it. I suspect far more people these days wouldn't realize that unless the TV told them, and then many would still ignore it. I'd wish for natural selection to take its course with them, except it might do so head on with someone not deserving of the same fate.
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
and begins muttering rosaries, as the unit detects I'm hitting 90 mph.
"Speaking the Truth in times of universal deceit is a revolutionary act." -- George Orwell
I've been using TV-enabled satnavs here in Japan for many years. The law forces dealers to make the TV switch off when the car is moving.
However most 3rd party fitters will bypass this restriction, and it's fairly common to see asshats driving round with the TV fully on.
j'ai découvert une démonstration vraiment admirable (de ce théorème général) que cette si
Maybe they should do it as a HUD system, prjecting on the windscreen of the car.
And then, when they feel the need to warn you, your entire windscreen goes opaque with a giant warning message.
Blue windscreen of death
Brain surgery - it's not rocket science!
Isn't one of the drawbacks of an ATSC digital signal that it's difficult to maintain a lock on it while you're in motion? They're advertising it as something to do once you arrive in your destination, so its not like people haven't been warned about the realities of the situation
Because if only we could prevent this one particular stupid thing people can do while driving we will eliminate all driving-related injuries and deaths.
Every little bit helps.
But I can't help wondering why the multi-tasking geek always trots out this excuse for inaction.
It's a patently false dilemma.
We can do other things while we do this one thing.
Whatever happened to sitting in the back shutting the fuck up and feeling miserable? I miss those days.