The Sony Vision-S series self-driving car is bent on eliminating the driver’s license.
In dutifully applying the First Amendment to the title, “decimated” could be replaced by “needless innovations”, “unnecessary safety risks” and “overzealous leadership”.
The bottom of the barrel low hanging fruit of threshold of ineptitude earns a daily special commendation, as the word of mouth digital metroplex regularly deconstructs the net energy equation supposedly mapping out the complete influence of a closed system. So-called foisted experts in a viral swarm of incredulity and misinformation, employ the various electronic channels prompting a frenetic gullible blind scramble orgy of consumerism with the latest and greatest gadgetry worship at cult-like levels. But skeptics fail to acknowledge the magnitude of temporary climate terraforming inflicted during mass protests in snarling traffic and littering downtowns with discarded signs, detritus that is eliminated through a lengthy tax payer funded ordeal involving city workers and a heck of a lot of overtime.
As long as a tawdry attempt is made to cram more useless features into a smartphone, or force the lexicon of the gaming community tossed into a product line, the ominous salesforce of Ted Bundy-Hitler-Lenin-Patty Hearst could spark a lucrative sensation that effectively cubes the profits of the Tickle Me Elmo franchise successful experiment banishing rationality to the Albanian hinterlands scattered with concrete huts of spy game proportions. Each individual bunker an incessant collector and retail market for private data hacked, processed and displayed for the darkweb cliental Costco style shopping spree. Smile America and Northern Europe, as the cameras are rolling in the form of sentient automated bots welcomed into the sanctity of the home front in allowing unhindered access to the ebb and flow of everyday life, as the concept of “you” becomes obsolete. Boutique laboratories surrounding Chinese ghost cities specialize in the burgeoning field of profile mimicry and the idea of “she’s not just pretty face” takes on a whole new meaning. Individuality is bought and traded in a game where the concept of unique is annihilated by the desire for perfect reality within the jaded confines of electronic trances and fantasy worlds incongruent with reality.
Obligatory breaking news!!! The annual Consumer Electronics Show extravaganza in Las Vegas pursues the cause of overengineering methods of time-tested reliability and redundancy in making life more complicated by unleashing and array of fresh loopholes onto society. While a handful of innovations are worthy of applause, unbridled enthusiasm and hysteria can place a vague invention on an undeserved pedestal. The behemoth of electronics for the consumer and manufacturer of the ultra-popular PlayStation gaming system Sony, made an ankle breaking open field move that shocked the industry and incited the universal cynic.
Curiously and inexplicably, Sony has joined the fray of driverless vehicles consortiums, a more apt and honest term than self-driving vehicles, in announcing plans to build a car customized for the specific appetites of hardcore gamers. While the arrogance and blatant oversight is beyond reproach in unleashing a potential monster onto the roadways, US residents have to face the humiliating status as being active participants of the Guinea pig directive. Humans are ungraciously and recklessly caged in live experiments on area streets and subject to the volatile electronic minds of sentient technologies, a truly unsettling notion considering the less than stellar track record of Uber, Google, and Tesla in actively releasing death vehicles to the roadways with an appetite of flesh and blood.
Imagine the typical teenager with head buried in the smartscreen and navigating like a drunken socialite through the bustling crowds of a downtown corridor. Now design an automobile around this precarious irritating demographic, demand a complete lack of accountability and provide the latest access to global gaming networks via the latest PlayStation console, including a comprehensive entertainment center, and the disturbing finished product would have Ike questioning the validity of an interstate system exploited by flawed robots and even more hapless youth. The Vision-S is sure to notch more road kills than the captain for the Exxon Valdez splitting a six pack with…
The idea of a pair of hyperactive gamers hopped up on Adderall screeching through quiet neighborhoods at relativistic speeds and conjoined to an in-vehicle console tied to five other participants from various continents in an intense interactive video game involving periodic emotional outbursts followed by moments of complete detachment, while completely oblivious to elderly pedestrians, children and pets and the rules of the road, does not elicit much confidence for the integrity of the near future. Time to take a break and bring out the chips and salsa, as the onboard computer is surely adroit and accomplished enough to process every input and stimulus in reacting safely to complex and fluidic situations. Why not lower the legal age to drive to 14 or awarding a license to the highest neighborhood score of Fortnite, and the winner receives a trophy and a community award meant for first responders and veterans?
Sony’s entry into the vehiculus homocidus by softwarus market includes an optional steering wheel and flatscreen windows.
The tech industry is well aware of the technocratic worship of new and glittering electronic products, and the mass worldwide appeal in generating billions. And they want to turn freeways and major thoroughfares into routes run entirely by computers in taking the decision making capabilities from human drivers. More powerful than traditional religious artifacts, the digital false idols transcend a fulfilling spiritual experience if they defy reality and resonate with the dreamland of attainable imagination. Reinforcing reckless behavior and morphing the branding of a vehicle as a gaming enhancement, rather than a transportation device that should be operated with extreme caution may not be the direct intent of Sony in pursuing a ridiculous and dangerous product release, but it’s the thoughtful marketing campaign that counts. In Silicon Valley, driving is not longer viewed as a privilege, but a right of pesky youth.
While AI assistants and sensors are valuable accessories to drivers, the all-in philosophy of ignoring 2 billion years of meticulous and rigorous evolutionary development of the human mind for the engineering accomplishments in the infancy of the digital age defies reason. A heavily accented time traveling soothsaying robot is not responsible for the fate of mankind, but without realistic protocols in place, and experimental technologies relegated to testing grounds until proven reliable, Skynet is already doing its bidding, and individuals only have themselves to blame for preventable tragic incidents increasing at a steady rate. Rumor has it that Boeing and Apple are working on a self-flying iPhone aircraft that will run on ethanol and cut commute times by half.