The Connected Car Challenge: Part 2

some some interesting stuff. I think it is coming on, you know, coming up soon. Yeah, let's get right to it. Well, the next one, I really want to hear your your thoughts on this one because this is the one that I thought, well, if there's a if there's an item on this list that Scott's gonna have something to say, it's going to be this one. Number five was connected

cars will likely be shared cars. So Forbes is actually talking about the nature of car ownership itself changing and that there's a move to shared ownership models like like zip car, the zip car service, where you don't actually own a vehicle, you have a you know you you subscribe to a service where you have access to vehicles, but at the end of the day, you turn that back over to the service and then you go on

your married little weight. And Forbes points out that this there will be new business opportunities with connected cars, such as customer service and power management for electric vehicles. I don't really see how that fits in with the It almost feels like that was something that they felt. This also is a thing that we need to put somewhere, and it doesn't really fit here, but doesn't fit anywhere else either. So we're just gonna here too. And I'll

tell you what my overall impression of shared cars. You know, I'm not one for public transportation, right, kind of fits with being the car guys here, right, I mean, I like my own personal vehicle and I like to be in my own personal space, and I'm just not one for the train or the bus or any that. I understand. I understand its purpose and I know it it fits well here in the city, but um, I'm just not that guy. And so my my idea of of automakers,

you know, they have to respond. I mean, I understand why they do it, I get it, but they're kind of jumping on this model that was built or based on the bicycle sharing programs that were so popular, And that's exactly what they're saying, Well, it worked for for bicycles, why not make this work for cars. And there's a

lot of reasons why car sharing has its problems. I mean, there's Oh I was just gonna say, I think I think if you look at it from a global standpoint, I could be understand forbes point a little more in that I could see certain certain cultures in Europe, for example, uh taking to the shared car model more easily than the United States. But in the US in general and specifically the Southeast, specifically the city of Atlanta, we car culture is a big part of our identity, right. Car

ownership is a big part of who we are. And now you might live someplace like New York City where the population density, the public transportation options, and other things like just the scarcity of resources for land for parking mean that owning a car there might not make sense for you. If you live in Atlanta and you don't have a car, it's really hard to get around. And there are a lot of cities in the United States

that are like that. And I just to me. I think saying that car ownership is going towards this share car model is being a little generous. I don't think that's the case universally. All Right, well, car makers are doing this. I'm gonna surprise you a little bit here at the end with the last thing that I want to mention on this. But, um, they are doing this already.

I mean, there's the BMW Drive Now program, there's the Mercedes Ben's Car to Go program, which is like car letting the number to go program, and they're doing that with their smart car platforms. So then it's not the full size Mercedes that they're doing it with, of course. Um, but I think that, you know, programs like this, I mean, they can kind of alienate drivers who also like to drive their own cars. So there's there's another solution here

that I think is maybe the best one. And this is the best one that I've heard of so far. This is the program from Autie. It's OUTI solution. I don't know if it actually has a name. It's just

kind of the Audi car sharing program. And this is one that is different than from the others, and that you pay one monthly fee or one one price and I don't know if it's monthly or yearly or whatever, but um, it's kind of like a lease cost would be your price would be for a vehicle a flat rate, and then you have your choice of three different vehicles

at any time you want. And the way it works is that, let's say that you you choose from like an A one or a T T for for city use, you know, something that you can you know, commute and economically right understand, and uh, then maybe on the weekend or something, you need to, um, you know, go out into the country for a trip through uh, you know, wine country or wherever, and you want to rent a convertible.

We don't have to rent the convertible. You already have access to it through this, through this outide car sharing things. So you just you know, notify them you're gonna pick up this model there, you're gonna drop off the other one that you have, and then you know, later on you've got some friends that want to go to the movies or something, you can pick up a Q five crossover from them and you can take five or seven

of your friends out to the movies. UM, seek your choice of three different vehicles at in any way you want throughout the month or the year, or however you want to break it down. Um, And it's just a way of you know, you drop it off, you pick up what you need, and then you drop that off again and pick up what you need, and it's just this continuous cycle. I suppose there's gonna be some you know, we don't have that available until you know, Sunday type

of situations. But um, for the most part, you're able to choose the vehicle that you want because they know that let's say Lisa Car and you're kind of you're tied to that. Then if you want to lease an economical A one or T T or something like that, there's nowhere to haul anything. But you may need that for for moving, you know, helping a friend move. You may need to get a crossover or a full sized vehicle. So it really opens up this, uh, this this area

that no other auto manufacturers doing that. I mean, you could always rent a vehicle like that, of course, you know, any anywhere you can get budget or hurts or whoever. But um, this is through a manufacturer, and it's totally different. It is interesting to me. And it may also be that there's some generational differences as well. Right like that that as we see the younger generations come up, that their idea of of ownership is different from the previous generations.

So it could very well be that I'm starting to get again to that age where I start getting set in certain expectations and when those are are subverted, I get antsy. Well, the the idea of sharing a car gives me hives. Yeah, well, and it could literally do that too. Uh. The next one on our list, you know, you know, sometimes we get get a little dirty here

on tex stuff. Um, the next one is the question about built in or brought in connections, which is a great debate and we kind of touched on this elier with the idea of the auto manufacturers partnering with mobile companies. Um. The idea here being, is the connection built into the car itself or is the car a conduit that connects

to your personal mobile device. So if you have a smartphone, you maybe through Bluetooth, connect to your car, and essentially your smartphone is the thing that's providing all the apps, the connectivity, all that. Your car is essentially a user interface and display that can tap into that stuff. So what we have here is a hardware issue. Okay, so I understand that now. Also, I want to say that I don't think this is a problem. Really, it's not

an obstacle. I think this is just the automakers trying to catch up with what's going on because that five year cycle or you know close to it that we're talking about versus uh. You know the software that's updated for our phones and all the apps that we can bring into our cars. Now, that is so fast. I mean it's daily you can come up with with new apps. How to auto manufacturers keep up with that being able to allow their systems to interact with that, It just

doesn't work that way. Um. So I think it's just happening so fast right now that that they're just trying to catch up. Um. The thing you know we should probably mention here is that there there are some programs or systems in the work. I don't know how to describe what these things are, but um like Apple car Play. Um, and there's also the Open Automotive Alliance that we should probably talk about a minute. So, so Apple car play,

how do you understand Apple car Play? So, Apple car Play is a system that would tie in with an iOS device and Apple Phone iPhone UM, and so it's it's the thing that allows you to connect directly to iOS. So your phone is providing the power, it's providing the not not literally the power, but the connectivity. But your

cars controls are mapped to commands to your phone. So let's say that you wanted to you have your music streaming through the phone, then your car control, like if you hit fast forward, it's mapped to the control on your iPhone that would be fast forward through that song. So really that's just a simple this button needs to be mapped to this function kind of thing. Beyond that, it is it brings things like uh iPhone apps into

the cabin of a car. I assume it's got a limitation on those because you probably don't want the driver of the vehicle playing Angry Birds as they're speeding down the highway. But things like navigation or notifications, that sort

of stuff gets pulled in, okay. And then there's the Open Automotive Alliance, which is just kind of the Android answer to that whole thing, right right, And that could be either a Boden or Broaden system, Like you could have a car manufactured that is essentially if you think about it, think about that entertainment guidance system whatever, think of that is just a glorified smartphone, but it's in the form factor of an entertainment system in your car. Okay,

I got it. Now, there's a few big manufacturers that have already joined the Open Automotive Alliance. There's Toyota, Audi, BMW, Kia, and I think more of Joint. I just don't have the updated notes on what you know, who's there. Now. One thing that I think we should just touch on here is that this also does it or does it not require the auto manufacturer to kind of create the ways for the the the user to interact with these devices. So UM, doesn't that change the way they design interiors

or the interface of of UM the vehicle itself. I mean, so wouldn't I guess it would be beneficial for them to UM to to kind of work on controls that are not universal, because that would be impossible but the manufacturers, but UM, maybe for a particular manufacturer, maybe like for Toyota, that they would design a user interface that would remain constant for I don't know how how long should they leave it remain constant, like maybe five years um without

change in every model year, so that it's something that you can you can get in and you know where the buttons are, you know what everything does, you know what what every feature and function is, just without even looking. And this this is a great point you're bringing up, Scott, because uh, these operating systems update on a yearly basis, sometimes more than once a year. So sometimes you'll get updates to an operating system, and sometimes those updates dramatically

change the way the user interface looks. Now normally the stuff that you have is more or less in the same place as it was before the update happened. Because the you know, Google and Apple both know that if you mess with an operating system too much, you're gonna lose your customer base. You want to make it useful, you want to make it accessible, you want to make it engaging, but you don't want to make so many changes that no one knows where their stuff is anymore.

That would be a much bigger problem inside a car, as you point out, So if you have your car connected to a specific type of smartphone, how do you make sure that the experience in the car remains consistent even as the smartphone you're using is becoming more and more sophisticated, and how do you not alienate your your driver? Who? Who says? Why is this such an amazing experience when I use it on my phone? But it feels like

a dumbed down experience when I'm in my car. And to take this to the to another level, I guess is that you know the the the location of the buttons, the location of you know, everything that you access as a driver that you want you want to remain um focused on the road, of course, you want to be You don't want to have to hunt around for the

for the one button UNI exactly right. So I've heard that manufacturers this kind of comes from that Popular Science article as well, um that they're looking to gaming controllers as inspiration for for automotive interiors. And it makes perfect sense because you know, how long does it take you really to learn the buttons of a gaming controller. It doesn't take that long. So you know what what button

maps to what command, then you adapt to it very quickly. Sure, I mean I know it changes between game, you know, from game to game, but that can also be extrapolated to what we're talking about here as well. But but you know where that button is, you know where the A button is, you know where the up and down buttons are. If they could do that for automobiles, and then sure, you have to learn that one time. You have to learn that. You know all the features and

I'm sorry, all the buttons and functions and everything. But once you know that, then it's almost like sitting down at a keyboard, you know, and you don't have to look when you type UM. It's that similar experience. You know that, well, I know how to do that. They've changed, they may have changed what I'm accessing, but I know how to get there right well. And there's some other

issues here. I think that this is truly one of the real obstacles to the connected car, because if you go with a built in system, then the car manufacturers have to figure out the best way to create a user interface, right. They have to design that user interface. One of the attractive things about going with the brought in connection, where you're relying upon someone like Apple or Google to provide the operating system, is that they've been

working on that for years. They're experts at these operating systems and user interfaces and how to make it UM uh, intuitive and engaging and useful. They the car manufacturers would have to reinvent the wheel. They'd have to be coming at this from a totally new perspective as opposed to relying upon the expertise of companies that have made you know, the reason why the Android phone and iOS are the dominant smartphones is largely because of the user interface and

the experience. So the R and D is already done for them. They just kind of just say, we're going to allow you access to our vehicle. Uh, make it work. Now. The challenge with that is which one do you pick? Do you pick iOS or do you pick Android? And if you try to create a system that can work with both, because you could have a Bluetooth connected system

that works with both phones. But if you're talking about something where you're you're accessing apps and you are trying to load in different types of software, then you that makes a lot harder because iOS and Android works so differently that the layout the display for certain apps could be very different, which means that if you have one phone, it might be an ideal experience, but if you have the other phone, it might not be so ideal. So these are tough questions. Do you do you say, all right,

if you have an iPhone, this system works perfectly. If you have an Android phone, you should get an iPhone? Like do you do that or do you say? Listen, no one's gonna be totally happy. But no matter what phone you have, it's gonna work with the system to some degree. I mean, it's it's a tough question. This next one, number seven. I think we can spend about

ten seconds on this happen. And then because we're already touching on off, just this last discussion, it's already touched on stuff from number eight that I want to get into quick. So, um, this is who will pay for connected car services? Um, well, again, this just goes right back to the bundled services, subscriptions things like that. I mean, I don't know what more we can really say about it. I'll tell you the driver pace to pay, and you

know that that is rolled down to us no matter what. Yeah, yeah, whether whether it's rolled down into a sticker price where somehow there's been a negotiation between the auto manufacturer and the carrier saying listen, we're gonna build in x amount into the sticker price of this car. You guys get that amount and then in return you have perpetual service for that cars system, and then there's no subscription. I

don't think that world is going to happen. I think the world that's gonna happen is that there will always be some form of subscription service and you will have a monthly bill, whether that's something that's added onto your smartphone or it's separate. I think that's what's gonna happen. All Right. I'm totally unco comfortable with the idea of

subscription service from my car. And unfortunately, when you think about a connected car, you have to imagine that a lot of these services are going to be key to the operation of that vehicle in some way. I'm going to be checking out the used car lots. Yeah, for a long long time from now, we'll see Scott will be driving around the student baker that Fozzy Bear had in the mouth of movie Fight the Power. All right, So this is the one that I will have a

question for you on this. But this is number eight. How many apps should overloaded drivers be able to access? And this is exactly what we were talking about, how but it's more of more of a question of like what's the limit because people are already distracted. There's so much going on while people are driving, and uh, I know everybody has a different threshold for this. I understand that.

I know there's some people and now they shouldn't, But I know some people feel comfortable looking at their phone and texting while they're driving. They shouldn't do it, obviously, but some people say, I can do that, no problem. I haven't had a problem yet, not that I recommend or condone it or anything, but I understand and that some people are better at that than others. Other people can't even look in the rear view mirror without swerving out of their lane. That's just the way it is.

But when I think about this, I think about all the stuff that's been added to a driver's kind of uh not response. It's not really responsibility, it's they're they're electing to do this stuff. So, um, when I was younger, I mean not not much younger, I mean maybe even ten years ago. Now I think about it, Uh, you know, there were so many other types of distraction. Of course summer included now, but like kids in the car or even adult passengers too in some cases, No, I know

if your adults. Suits certainly fall into the distraction category, eating in the car, things like that makeup application in the morning. Here's one. How long has it been since you've seen anybody reading a newspaper in a car? Because that used to be common to see somebody with a

newspaper or a novel in front of them. Took a cab in New York City, no kidding, but but I mean that was that was kind of the level of and and now, of course they're gonna look at a kindle or they're gonna have their phone out and they're gonna be reading that way. But how long has it been since he was seeing somebody with a newspaper? I mean, that's not that's that's that's true. I don't know. It's it's something that the side of the times, I guess maybe,

or shaving. I've seen people shaving while they're driving. I've heard of it. Yeah, I've never seen it. Electric shape, I don't think so. Yeah, someone in the back seat actually giving them the shape their driver car driver side uh seat is reclined back like yeah, yeah, the hot towel and everything. Okay, no, nothing like that. But my question to you is this now they're talking about what will there be a limit of the number of apps

that you can you can access? And I don't even know if that's the answer, because some apps are more distracting than others. But but my question for you is do you feel that drivers are already at their limit now or do you think that they could actually function well if they were given even more distractions where they kind of just adapt. Would they evolved to the point where yeah, I can take on one or two more things, and then later yeah I can take on one or

two more things and just keep going like that. I think it all depends on the implementation. So for example, if you're acted car can do things like start an internet radio station, pull up a navigation uh a navigation program to tell you where to go, and then also occasionally give you notifications. But let's say that the only thing that you are actually able to see is the navigation and that the radio stuff is in the background, and that the notifications are all audio, so that you're

hearing the the notification but you're not reading it. I think that would be one way of getting around this, where you're not creating even more of a distracting environment. I think there are other ways that you could if it were like a typical smartphone, where you might have an app open and a notification comes out over on top of that and and blocks your view and as

you read something that would be really dangerous. Um, the number thing is interesting to me because not just for the number of apps that could potentially distract the person. I think you could. Again, if you're running it in such a way where a lot of stuff is running

in the background, that's not as big a deal. But the number is also interesting because if it gives you unlimited ability to download apps to your to your car, whether it's through your phone or it's something through a native system on the car itself, that's a security issue. It's a vulnerability. It should decides that number. Is it five, is it ten? Is it a hundred? I mean, what

is it? And even even if you've decided a number, if someone has designed a poorly made app, or maybe they've done it on purpose where it creates a security vulnerability to your car's computer system, that's a big problem. And that kind of goes back again. We sort of talked about that in the self driving car episode, about this idea of a car that can can accept incoming communication from the outside world. That's a security thing that you've got to you've got to consider it. And so

that's a that's an unanswered question. So I see that as a true obstacle. That's problem. That's a big problem. I don't think it's insurmountable. I think it's something that we can certainly uh figure out. But it's one of those things that I hope gets figured out in the R and D lab before it ever becomes a a

you know, standard in consumer vehicles. You hope there's not some automotive board at General Motors or something with people that really have never downloaded an app that have decided, well, we're gonna limit at ten, because that seems like a right nun. Now, I know there's a there's a boardroom that has a bunch of people. I mean I've worked for I've worked for people who had me print out their emails, So I know that those folks are out there, and I know what you're saying, and I mean it'll

be just a mix of the two. I think that's probably what's gonna happen. Yep, yep, agreed. So uh, the next one, I don't know if we could actually talk intelligently about this. Yeah, maybe we we Well, it seems like we've maybe just briefly talked about this in passing

in the hallway maybe or something. Number nine is all about self driving cars, which is interesting because connecting car does not necessarily have to have anything to do with self driving, although we are, like we said, seeing more and more of those elements that that are necessary for a self driving car make their way into our vehicles.

But says self driving cars will arrive, but not right now, and Forbes argues that we'll see more driver assist options that developing cars that but that a truly autonomous self driving car isn't in the cards yet. I think, Scott, I think you and I both agree that that's true. I don't see that as an obstacle for connected cars though, No, I don't see as an obstacle either. I think again, this is one of the facilitators I guess that you're trying to build towards that, and I don't see it

as any kind of obstacle. Really, Yeah, I think I think there are a lot of different UH disciplines involved in creating connected cars and self driving cars that are ultimately converging on what is the car of the future. But they're they're independent as well. They're not they're not so closely related that if one falls behind the other, one also falls behind. You know what this is bringing bring up two points and this maybe this may lead

into my Elon Musk bit here. But um, since we've last talked, since we had there are our autonomous car episode, and that's not long ago. Um, this this Popular Science article came out and again it was a real you know, eyebrow razor for me because there's some amazing stuff in there. But they're talking about even moving up autonomous vehicles, truly autonomous vehicles, even a lot closer than we we said in that episode. So uh, you know, there's the Google Car,

which I think we talked about. That was a car that was designed in Detroit, but you know, built in Detroit, but then it goes to Mountain View to be outfitted with all the Google driving technology. Self driving technology doesn't have steering wheel, doesn't have pedals anything like that. Um, pretty futuristic. We'll see how that goes. But it's right now just being developed in or tested in um more like a test track area. Really it's a security area. Um,

not on the city streets. Like there are other self driving vehicles, are right, the ones that are just a converted by the way. The bad news about those cars that that stuff that they outfit it with the gear, it's like seventy five dollars per vehicle. Yeah, often the gear is way more expensive than the car. It's that plus the price of the car. So that's expensive. See one of those when I was out in California, Yeah,

it was pretty cool. Well I was visiting the Google campus, so okay, yeah, a little better chance than right, And it's like fishing a barrel, all right. Um, And then Nissan is talking about doing an autonomous leaf. Mercedes Benz is now saying the end of the decade and I don't remember if we said that or not for the intelligent drive system. Um, of course, Toyota, BMW, GM, they

all have something in the works. And then of course GM's uh semi automated connected car would be the super Cruise system and that's coming out in the Cadillac and I think we mentioned that one. But they are saying that the development time of all this is going to be really really pushed up. Would you say it's accelerated.

What's it's accelerated? The punt a little bit of one well one where we were worked, hey on one glass thing, and I don't know where to put this, so maybe this is where it goes um elon musk you know, Tesla motors and you know we've talked about that too, right, the cars as a platform. And again, I know we've talked about platforms throughout here. So I'm trying to find a spot to put this in because this is impressive

to me, the overall plan that he has. And I don't think a lot of people will really know what the overall goal was because recently, you know, he opened up all of his patents relating to the Tesla electric car technology for anybody to use, right, and said, you're able to you know, anybody can use all of my stuff. It's fine. This is the only way that we're gonna get rapid innovation is by creating this this open source

development type of system. Right. So he's allowing that, and everybody says, well, that's fantastic, what a what a what a benevolent gesture? You know, this is amazing that you're doing this. But it's a very very savvy business decision that he's made here because, um, you know, not only does it make his product grow that much faster, you know,

he can focus on other things as well. And he's also you know, with with the Tesla S Model S. Um, he's actually gained capital enough to build that giga factory that he's talking about Nevada. I'm sure you've talked about or maybe read about that, right. Um, there's the factory that's mainly uh, focused on building things like batteries, his electric car batteries, right, and it's this this huge facility in Nevada. Um. But here's the thing. Traditional automakers are

are kind of like doing this by piece mail. Sure, they're they're you know working. Of course, they got the volt and they've got the leaf, and they've got other it might be one model in the fleet of cars that they offer exactly right. So they've got these little bits and pieces. But the thing is they're lacking infrastructure. He is behind the scenes and not really behind the scenes, but he's got charging stations, he's got you know, these

this battery factory that's coming out. He's got this platform with the Model S that's very successful. Essentially what you're saying is he's defining the standard, and then everyone else will end up following his standard. He has set you're precisely, and it's not only that they're following it, but he owns it. He's going to lease it to other manufacturers. So when you're seeing a Chevy Vault and you know they're gonna advance a little bit, but they're not really

focused on just that. He's focused just on electric vehicles, on on the Tesla and with the infrastructure that he's building with these charging stations and the battery swaps and everything else. No other auto manufacturers doing that. If he can develop an infrastructure that they buy into and say that's the way we want to go, this guy is going to be a multi trillionaire. He's gonna rule the world.

Well he could. He could define what the standard is for multiple things, like if you if you extend this to the connected car, and he identifies the quote unquote ideal approach, whether it's truly ideal or not. If he does that, then you know there's there's a double edged sword here. One edge of it is that everything becomes much more simple because the options are all reduced down

to a single kind of implementation. The other side of that, obviously, is that you don't have the choice that you would have if there were multiple implementations of the connected car. But Scott, I don't know if you're familiar with this.

Are you familiar with the idea that if you present someone twenty options, they have a lot more trouble picking one if you give them three options, even if their favorites on that list of twenty aren't on that list of three, they feel better about making that choice of three than they do with twenty. You know where I think this came up in our conversations. You and I've talked about this. Yeah, it's a kind of an embarrassing example, righte factory. Yeah, you go to you go to the

cheesecake factory and it's a four page menu. It's a little hard to decide, and then when you get something, you're like, oh, maybe I should have tried the you know whatever. But if you go someplace where there's you know, eight things on the menu, and you might think, well, there's only a couple of things here I want to try any you probably feel better about your choice because you don't have as much You know that that post decision regrets how that psychology absolutely is true for automobiles

as well. And and and honestly, you know, if this works out for him, if this if this platform idea, if they start, if other big manufacturers start to buy his platform and say, yeah, we want our vehicle to be built on your chassis with your batteries, it's unbelievable how much money this guy is gonna make with this. It was such a great decision to allow everybody else to build on his platform. Scott, the guy has got to get to Mars somehow, and he will. It's not going

to be cheap, and he will. I just thought that was brilliant, a brilliant move, and I think we're getting towards the end here. Yeah, here's here. The last one I think is really another non entry on this list. In fact, I don't understand how this is an obstacle.

The tenth one was a connected lifestyle is a given that connected cars are a necessity because the factors like you have an emerging demand for safer vehicles, so you have you know, you have that demand for things like that ecoal system we talked about earlier, and also that we have a population of people who are used to being connected all the time and they don't want to give that up just because they happen to be getting behind the wheel of car. Honestly, I don't know how

to even respond to this. I mean, it's it's not a challenge. It's not a challenge. But I can tell you a challenge in just a minute if you want. But I mean, but to me, of course, the connected lifestyles are given. I mean, that's the way we're going. I mean, it's it's it's clear that it's not going to go backwards, right, I mean, we're not gonna we're not going to devolve into you know, going back to the flip phones that I mentioned before, um or the

bag phones or whatever. You're not gonna go backwards. And you know, as far as technology is concerned, and cars are not going to do anything the same, Um, they're going to continue to advance. I mean, look at look at the inside. That's I believe that's the inside of Tesla that we're looking at their photo. That's mostly screen. I mean, it's mostly touch screen inside this vehicle. It's it's like you're again you're it's like you're getting into

a spaceship or something. It's it's totally different from the experience that you had in a car just five years ago. Um, it's it's advancing very quickly. And uh, then I guess we should have just embrace it. Um, I mean it's coming whether we want it or not. It is a fact. And I again, I don't think of that as a The list was called ten obstacles to a connected car. There's no way that saying that connectivity is a necessity

is an obstacle. But again, it's probably one of those things where the list was written already and then someone had to figure out what the name is. Possibly we don't mean to be disparaging to the article right now. I mean it's a good it's a good list. It's a good uh you know, thought starter. And obviously we've had an incredible conversation on it. So it's certainly I think was a well. Uh it was, it was put together well, it had interesting descriptions on each one. Um.

I just think the headline was misleading. Thinkably, I've written a few misleading headlines in myself. Well, I have to do what you have to do, so I'll tell you the one obstacle that I do think is that that wasn't on the list. Well, it wasn't, it wasn't. I mean, we're talking about autonomous cars and autonomous features. I've read this in a boy again from this article. I'm gonna you know, I'm just gonna tell you the name of

this article because I think it's fascinating. It's from a popular mechanics mechanics article and it's called ten ways the car is becoming more than a vehicle. And it's from early October of this year. So from and in that article they stated that by autonomous features, now that's just the stuff that allows us to uh, you know, go hands free and um, you know, the carl park itself, etcetera. Autonomous features alone will add about seven thousand dollars to

a typical car sticker price. Can you believe that seven thousand dollars just for the autonomous features alone. And we're already talking about you know, a basic, um standard typical sedan here in the United States is something like it's close to thirty two. That's way way out of line with where it should be as far as inflation goes. I've I've done the numbers, and we can have another

whole conversation about that. But um, it should be according to my calculation, Jonathan, about ten thousand dollars less a lot of that's a huge that's a huge cap on top of it if everything remains constant from you know, like I'm going back to the night seventies or whatever. But but I know that the reason is because of advanced features like this, I mean, all the technology, electronics, et cetera. But in add seven thousand to a typical car, I mean that's incredible to me. Yeah, that puts out

the reach for a lot of people. So so ultimately the biggest challenge of the connected car could be the price tag, definitely, because we're talking about very advanced, complicated electronics and and the engineering and you know, just the R and D that goes into creating that. The automakers are of course going to have to roll that cost over to us, right. Well, yeah, I mean you can't expect any business to just eat the R and D costs.

Of course not. They won't be in business and they would just be selling the same thing over and over again because there be to afford making anything new. But now maybe maybe, just maybe, and I don't know, I don't see it happening this way recently. But but maybe the cost will come down as production levels go up. As numbers go up, it becomes cheaper to build that product, and maybe they'll come down, But we haven't seen that. It seems like the last of teen years. Well, especially

when you look at things like like smartphones. Right the smartphone price for a brand new smartphone stays fairly consistent. I mean, if you're looking at the base price of one, if you're not getting a subsidized model, it has been remained fairly consistent. And the part of that is that even though the there are improvements in manufacturing, we are, they're still getting more sophisticated over time, and that sophistication keeps that price being pretty steady. So we're not seeing

prices fall. I mean, you could get a cheaper phone that's an older one or or less sophisticated one, but I think that's gonna be I think you're right. I think that's gonna be a real issue. By the way, if you guys want to check out the article we've been talking about this whole time, the Forbes one, that one's called ten Obstacles for Connected Cars. It's at Forbes dot com. You can check that out. It is, like I said, it's a great list, and we've gone through

point by point to kind of discuss it. But of course Forbes makes their own points in there that you might want to check out and see the pictures they put together to that that illustrate their ideas. Give yourself at least a minute and have to read it because it is quite lengthy. Yeah, yeah, it's it's it's a quick read, but it was definitely great fodder of our podcast. So I appreciate it. And Scott, thank you so much for agreeing to be on again. I appreciate being asked again.

It was it was a privilege because honestly, this is a lot of fun. We come in here to do this because it's kind of a new take on things. You know, Ben and I have our own kind of rhythm going, and you and I have a different kind of rhythm going. This is fun. I like doing this. This is what it's like for me for every every episode. Now, well, I I really really do appreciate it. So thanks for asking me. So Scott, where can people find you? Boy? Car Stuff Show dot com. It's it's probably the best

place to go. That's our that's our stuff site. We're on Facebook, Car Stuff hs W and um Twitter or Facebook, you know the same. Yeah, And and you and Ben have been doing some great work, like the videos you guys do. I know you guys are working super hard whenever they have one of the big car gatherings that are near here where we're our offices at, working out on the weekend, putting in those extra hours and and

it's really paying off. Those videos are great. I appreciate it's been fun, and yeah, it's a little bit extra work, but but it's it's a lot of fun. And I hope people are checking it out. Yeah, because if you want to see some really amazing, exotic, beautiful cars, things that you're probably not regularly going to see on the street, you need to check out that video series. As for tech Stuff, if you have any suggestions for future topics

or guests or interview subjects, anything at all. You just have a comment about this episode, send it to me my email addresses tech stuff at how stuff works dot com, or drop me a line on Facebook, Twitter or Tumbler. The handle at all three is tech Stuff h s W. And we'll talk to you again. Really some For more on this and thousands of other topics. Does it have stuff works dot com