Onstar Scares Edmunds

Edmunds Editor-in-Chief Karl Brauer apparently shares our ambivalence about GM’s in-car nanny, Onstar. And not for paranoid reasons either. He explains:

See, I like to think of myself as relatively self-sufficient. Sure, I’ll ask for help but I have to really need it first. However, on a semi-regular basis, when I’m in an OnStar-equipped car I find myself unintentionally activating the system, which in turn causes tremendous guilt because I feel I’m bothering an OnStar employee who could be helping another driver, maybe even someone with a true emergency.

Brauer goes on to recount a few incidents which led to his conclusion that Onstar’s benefits don’t outweigh its annoyances.

I hit the button outside my house, asked for directions to the nearest Wells Fargo ATM, and was directed right past a nearby Wells Fargo bank (with two ATMs) to a Ralph’s grocery store a few miles away. I thanked OnStar, hung up, and drove back to the bank to make a withdrawal.

While I was disappointed in OnStar’s knowledge of my local ATMs, I was far more troubled by the concept of bothering another human just to get driving directions (insert your ” the difference between men and women” joke here). My overriding feeling after hanging up?

“Oh…um…sorry to bother you…disembodied OnStar voice. Hope I didn’t interrupt any truly important calls.”

And that last line seems to define Brauer’s experience with Onstar.

My next OnStar experience came in a Chevrolet Malibu Maxx, circa 2003. I was at our test track making slalom runs, which as you might guess involved a lot of high G, back-and-forth activity. About halfway through my third run I heard the OnStar tone and then a female voice asking me if I was okay. Apparently the slalom run agitated the car’s stability sensors, which then initiated a call to OnStar to see if the car had crashed.

“Oh…um…sorry to bother you…disembodied OnStar voice. Hope I didn’t interrupt any truly important calls.”

There are more of these irritating interludes, but what’s most interesting is the realization Brauer comes to:

It’s not that I don’t appreciate the safety and security services it offers. It is easily the best solution to a host of problems, such as a real emergency situation that incapacitates the driver, or when a GM vehicle is stolen.

But when I drive a GM car I always feel like I’m no the verge of activating OnStar, and short of being in a serious accident I simply don’t want to bother anyone.

Which is why God invented cellular telephones. And Brauer is absolutely right. Hating on Onstar for potential governmental big-brotherism misses the point. Big Brother isn’t objectionable because of “his” specific political leanings or because we may or may not have something to hide. Rather the Orwellian phrase is appropriate because it speaks to the stifling environment of omnipresent surveillance. Whether you do have something to hide or you simply don’t want to bother anyone, the reality of living with a disembodied voice playing nanny wherever you go is a kind of apolitical totalitarianism of our own making.

To which I’d add one more point: Brauer finds Onstar annoying because he sees himself as being “relatively self-sufficient.” Those who are not bothered by the incidents he describes see them as the price one pays for what they perceive to be total security. But that mindset is, in itself, an abdication of self-sufficiency. Neither Onstar nor any other system can promise true security in a random, dangerous world. What it does offer is the option of abandoning the alert, aware, defensive posture that every motorist should embody when taking to the road. And it can be a distraction. Unfortunately, safety (or the perception thereof) is rapidly becoming a commodity… and nobody seems to be thinking of the non-monetary price.