Soon, Volvos could sport yet another decal: “No animals will be harmed by this vehicle.” Volvo is working on a system that avoids roadkill. According to Bloomberg, the system

“uses a radar sensor and an infra-red camera to alert the driver to nearby critters and brake if a collision is unavoidable. That technology is due to be rolled out in a few years in cars like the XC90 sport-utility vehicle, priced at $38,400, after employees studied the movement of moose and deer in southern Sweden.”

Even David Cain, who runs the annual Roadkill Cook-off in Marlinton, West Virginia, does not see a conflict of interest:

Quick, what’s the point of having a navigation system in your car? To get where you want to be going, right? Well, IBM has another idea: maybe instead of taking you where you want to go, navigation systems should be offering to take you where a paying advertiser wants you to go. Say, right past their shop, for example. Popular Science quotes from one of IBM’s patent applications

Conventional route planning systems determine optimal routes based on different preferred conditions, including minimizing travel time or minimizing the distance traveled. By focusing on optimal route determination, the known route planning systems fail to consider non-optimal routes whose presentation to travelers may have value to other parties.

So, it’s not quite to the point of your nav system saying “I can’t let you not pass a Starbucks, Dave,” but in the future your navigation could strongly suggest that, rather than going to the farmer’s market, you stop by the supermarket that happens to pay IBM the most.

Under attack from privacy advocates and US Senators, Onstar will be dropping plans to automatically track vehicles that are not subscribed to its service, and will make post-cancellation tracking an opt-in option, rather than opt-out. A GM statement reads:

DETROIT – OnStar announced today it is reversing its proposed Terms and Conditions policy changes and will not keep a data connection to customers’ vehicles after the OnStar service is canceled.

OnStar recently sent e-mails to customers telling them that effective Dec. 1, their service would change so that data from a customer vehicle would continue to be transmitted to OnStar after service was canceled – unless the customer asked for it to be shut off.

“We realize that our proposed amendments did not satisfy our subscribers,” OnStar President Linda Marshall said. “This is why we are leaving the decision in our customers’ hands. We listened, we responded and we hope to maintain the trust of our more than 6 million customers.”

If OnStar ever offers the option of a data connection after cancellation, it would only be when a customer opted-in, Marshall said. And then OnStar would honor customers’ preferences about how data from that connection is treated.

Maintaining the data connection would have allowed OnStar to provide former customers with urgent information about natural disasters and recalls affecting their vehicles even after canceling their service. It also would have helped in planning future services, Marshall said.

“We regret any confusion or concern we may have caused,” Marshall said.

Concerns over privacy have haunted GM’s OnStar business for as long as it’s been around, and responses like this video have become something of an annual routine for OnStar’s executives. The latest round of furor involves changes to OnStar’s policies, which the New York Times describes thusly

The first regards what happens when a customer cancels the service. Until now, when OnStar service stopped, so did the vehicle’s two-way communications system. As of Dec. 1, however, that will not necessarily be the case. Vehicles of owners who no longer subscribe could still be monitored via the system’s still-active two-way cellular link.

The second policy change concerns the potential use of the data collected by OnStar, which includes information like the vehicle’s speed and location, current odometer reading, driver seat-belt use and air-bag deployment. Under the new terms, OnStar reserves the right to share that information with other companies and organizations, even data culled from motorists who no longer subscribe to the service but who have left the two-way communications connection open.

Of course, OnStar says GM customers can opt out of the service, but it’s making the case that by only sharing anonymous data, it can limit meaningful privacy concerns. But OnStar doesn’t exist in a vacuum, and as it continues to sell Americans on the notion that security is worth sacrificing some sense of privacy for, it will find itself increasingly pulled into a national debate.

[Ed: The above video is not intended as a specific example of the problems we faced, but a general illustration of the wider issue]

While on a junket for the Hyundai Veloster I was treated to yet another instance of The Most Infuriating Thing About New Cars – the lack of any decent way to connect your iPod to the in-car entertainment system.

As TTAC Editor-In-Chief Ed Niedermeyer and I toured Oregon’s various scenic byways in the newest Hyundai, our musical selections were repeatedly interrupted due various errors, whereby Ed’s iPhone was unable to sync, refused to completely sync, or randomly re-synced. Our attempts at listening to the new Bon Iver album, or Burn After Rolling (the listenable mixtape made by limp-dick rapper Wiz Khalifa) were interrupted by a blast from XM’s pop station, as the iPod integration took a giant shit on us. Nothing spoils the conversation like having your ambient rock or gangsta rap interrupted by Katy Perry or Lady Gaga.

So let’s say you drive occasionally a bit over the legal limit, wouldn’t you like something like this?

“Unlike traditional camouflage systems which rely on paint or nets to hide vehicles, ADAPTIV can instantly blend a vehicle into its background.

With the ADAPTIV system installed, a unit has: The ability to blend into natural surroundings. The ability to mimic natural objects and other vehicles. A significantly reduced detection range.”

The Crusade against distracted driving is taking its toll – on the telcos: “State laws that mandate use of hands-free devices when talking on a mobile phone behind the wheel may have cut handheld device usage in half over the past year,” reports Edmunds.

A report released by the Governors Highway Safety Association (GHSA) talks about a bloodbath caused by cell phones:

GM’s Onstar division has long raised privacy concerns among the professionally paranoid, but now it’s putting all that observational power into the hands of consumers, with a pilot program called “Family Link.” Described in GM’s presser as “a new optional service that will explore ways subscribers can stay connected to their loved ones,” the service includes

• Vehicle Locate: The subscriber can log on to the Family Link website to view a map with the vehicle’s exact location at any time.
• Vehicle Location Alert: Subscribers can set up email or text message notifications to let them know the location of their loved one’s vehicle. They can choose the day, time and frequency of the alerts.

But that’s not all: if the pilot proves that consumers are willing to pay for the right to surveil their loved ones,

Future considerations for the pilot include Speed Alert, Boundary Alert and Arrival/Departure Alert.

Forget Big Brother… with this system, you can be Big Daddy, in the center of your own little family-sized panopticon. From making sure the kids stay out of trouble (“Say, son, what were you doing in downtown Detroit last night?”) to checking up on your loving spouse (“Honey, why did you say you were going to the gym, when you just parked for an hour at the Slee-Zee Snooze Motel?”), it’s how today’s on-the-go families foster an atmosphere of suspicion and mistrust. Because why let the government have all the voyeuristic fun?

If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face — forever. —O’Brien, in “1984”.

O’Brien was wrong. The picture of the future is a picture of you: completely naked, with your privacy invaded, taken as you walk along the street, sit in your own vehicle, or pursue your own private business. You will be recorded forever, your movements will be marked, your possessions will be noted, you will become completely subservient to a government you may not even remember electing. Eventually, you may die of cancer, moaning out a final cry of drug-addled defiance as you are culled — in a quite humane fashion, of course — to prevent excessive healthcare costs.

The company helping to bring you the above future is called, without irony, “American Science and Engineering, Inc.”

Former TVR owner Peter Wheeler used to explain the lack of airbags in his firm’s high-powered sportscars by arguing drivers would be safer if he installed a metal spike in the middle of each steering wheel. That was back in the late 1990s and early 2000s… since then, the rise of adaptive cruise control, “attention assist” systems, collision-sensing brake pre-loading and more have only made his critique all the more provocative. And, according to research cited in a Wired Magazine report, Wheeler’s philosophy seems to have a strong basis in science.

“The point the automakers are making, which is true, is that they go to extreme lengths to make these systems work and extremely reliable,” [Stanford University’s Clifford] Nass said. “The reliability on these systems is very high. If you have automatic cruise control, it’s not extremely often you have to jump into the fray.”

Therein lies the problem. We come to count on our cars to keep us out of trouble, even in situations where the technology isn’t designed to.

“Road hazards other than the car in front of you are so rare, especially on the highway where these adaptive cruise control systems would be in play, that they would, over time, encourage a complacency that undermines safety,” said Erik Blaser, a psychology professor at the University of Massachusetts, Boston, who studies vision and perception. “You stop paying attention to the driving.”

Though these “semiautonomous” systems are sold as safety equipment, researchers argue that they create a sense of reliance that actually makes drivers less safe (unlike “secret” safety systems like stability control and ABS, which operate consistently without the driver’s knowledge). And, somewhat counterintuitively, these researchers argue that the rise of semiautonomous driver aids actually increases the need for life-long driver eduation.

In addition to the recent tales (and sitcom gags) of GPS units leading hapless drivers into bodies of water, we have a new twist on the theme: GPS units leading hapless drivers astray in Death Valley. NPR reports

After a long day, [Donna] Cooper and her family asked “Nell,” the GPS, for the shortest route back to their home.

“Please proceed to the highlighted route,” Nell said.

But what came next did not compute. The GPS told them to go 550 feet, then turn right, Cooper says.

“Well, at 550 feet it was like a little path, and then it was like, go a quarter of a mile and turn left. There was nothing there. She had me running in circles for hours and hours and hours,” she says.

A park ranger explains that this happens “a couple times a year now,” including one incident two years ago in which a mother and her son were lost on an abandoned mining road for five days and the boy died. Rangers are now working with GPS firms to update their data on small and closed-down roads, but say no amount of work will ever replace common sense when it comes to navigating desert roads. Speaking of which, what happened to Cooper’s family?

Ford’s Sync doesn’t get a break. It attracted undue attention from LaHood’s distracted driving crusade. Consumer Reports had issues with the system. Sync sank Ford in the 2011 J.D. Power Initial Quality Survey. Can it get any worse?

Yes, it can. Ford is being sued for patent infringement.

Usually, we don’t report on recalls. If we would, we would be reporting on recalls all day. Sometimes, we make an exception, if the matter has wider ranging implications. This is one of those times.

The recall: BMW recalls “approximately 50” BMW X3. They have electric power steering. There is nothing wrong with the power steering. But there is everything wrong with the computer that runs the power steering. The steering has a position sensor, and the sensor’s calibration data pertaining to temperature balancing was mistakenly overwritten.” At some point, the computer finds out that something is wrong, and shuts off the electric power steering (EPS).

The wider ranging implications: DARPA challenges colleges to build autonomous vehicles. Google already has “look, ma, no hands” cars drive autonomously through the city, now they want some that read your mind. Cars drove autonomously from Italy to China. Nevada paves the legislative roads for driverless vehicles. What do they all have in common?

„When will it discharge?“ asked a reporter on Monday at Nissan. I ducked under my desk. “In one or two years,” answered Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn. I broke cover when I realized that they were talking about the Leaf powering the house.

Careful when transiting Nevada by car: Soon, there can be driverless cars on the roads of the desert state, legally. Nevada passed Bill 511 ( full text here) that lays the framework for autonomous vehicles.

For instance, the bill authorizes the Nevada DMV to come up with rules for driverless cars. Just think of it: Will you need a driver’s license to operate a car that needs no driver?

We (well, some of us) await the autonomous auto that leaves the driving to a robot, such as not to distract us from twittering and uploading pictures of our cats to our facebookies. That technology is not quite there yet. Volkswagen however thinks “an important milestone on the path towards fully automatic and accident-free driving” has been set. So said Volkswagen’s Prof. Dr. Jürgen Leohold at the final presentation of the EU research project HAVEit (Highly Automated Vehicles for Intelligent Transport – who comes up with that stuff?)

Ford’s President of the Americas Mark “MKF” Fields (sorry, the joke is just too funny to let go of) is responding to recent allegations of slipping quality by Consumer Reports and JD Power, by telling Bloomberg that

We’re largely back on track on some of these early issues

He’s referring specifically to issues with the MyFordTouch system that has been the central issue in the recent quality flap, and the fix for that isn’t particularly complicated.

Ford has reworked software on MyFordTouch to prevent random rebooting that had afflicted the system, said Sue Cischke, vice president of environmental and safety engineering. The touch controls also have been recalibrated to respond more quickly to a driver’s touch, she said.

Ford is encouraging dealers to spend as much as 40 minutes training drivers to use the system.

“If you’re trying to figure it out as you’re driving, obviously that’s not a good thing to do,” Cischke said.

Ford’s problem, it turns out, isn’t so much a product quality problem as a customer quality problem… because why would consumers need 40 minutes of training on a system Ford insists they are “demanding” (despite, it must be pointed out, the government’s murmured objections)? Unfortunately for Ford, Michael Karesh argues convincingly that Ford’s quality problems go beyond the MyFordTouch issues… but because its quality was so weak before Mulally took over, at least Ford (and the “PR friendly” auto media) can continue to claim “improvement.”

I’m not in the business of helping people Tweet better, I’m not in the business of helping people post to Facebook better. My job is to make sure we keep people safe behind the wheel. I’m not going to deny the fact that people want these things. They do. Especially the generation behind us. They’re used to being connected 24 hours a day.

A car is not a mobile device — a car is a car. We will not take a backseat while new telematics and infotainment systems are introduced. There is too much potential for distraction of drivers.

NHTSA Administrator David Strickland took the war on distraction to the enemy in a speech to an auto technology conference, reports Bloomberg. With nearly every manufacturer racing towards ever greater implementation of connectivity, communication and entertainment systems in cars, Strickland’s rhetorical line in the sand foreshadows a serious confrontation between industry and government. Either that, or this is just Ray LaHood-style hot air calculated to make it look like something’s happening.

AOL’s Translogic [via PopSci] takes a look at the LAPD’s brand-spankety new Chevy Caprice PPV, the born-again Pontiac G8 that you can’t buy at a dealership. But rather than looking at the Caprice’s cop car-creaming performance (as did the Michigan State Police), this report focuses on the LAPD’s high-tech toys… which could just make the Caprice’s V8, rear-drive abilities less necessary than ever. Still, between the Holden-powered, rear-drive performance, the footprint-spying night vision camera and the automatic license plate recognition system, the Caprice PPV will probably make you think twice about speeding the next time you’re visiting the City of Angels.

In conclusion of today’s Volkswagen-heavy fare, a peek into the future of Volkswagen’s most boring, but nonetheless highly successful car: The Passat.

Germany’s Auto Bild thinks it knows what the 8th generation Passat will look like when it hits the showrooms sometime in 2014. While their renderings most likely don’t reveal the exact likeness of the future Passat, Auto Bild’s Passat companion story probably has more than a few grains of truth.

Last January, Toyota’s Prez Akio Toyoda visited Salesforce.com CEO and cloud computing proselytizer extraordinaire Mark Benioff in Benioff’s sprawling compound on the Big Island of Hawaii.

Explaining the many features of a car has always been a challenge. Manuals remain largely unread. When I was at Volkswagen, someone had the brilliant idea of making interactive CD-ROMs. I protested: “So that car stops with a cryptic trouble light, and now the poor customer is supposed to go home, find the CD, pop it into the computer and check what that light means?” My protests fell on deaf ears, and the CDs were made. Now, someone at Audi had a better idea …

While 3D has been getting a big push from Hollywood and the video game and television set industries, consumers have not yet wholeheartedly embraced 3D when it comes to home tv. Stereo photos and videos can be visually stunning and emotionally evocative, but for many people 3D is a no-starter because current 3D tv requires using special glasses of one kind or another. It’s possible though, that consumer acceptance of 3D may come from an unexpected area, the automotive sector. While the technology for autostereoscopic, glasses-free, displays exists right now, there are cost, distance, and viewing angle issues that keep them from being currently applicable for home television sets. Those issues, however, may not exist for automotive applications. In fact, 3D technology is advancing so rapidly that cars may present particularly appropriate applications for the current state of the 3D art.

Two years ago, The Guardian found a strange barrier for the acceptance of EVs: Iugophobia, or the fear of plugging in. “Consumer research revealed that 61 percent of potential electric car customers were most worried about the inconvenience of recharging.” As an answer, connectorless inductive charging has been developed both in Japan and in Germany. The same electromagnetic field technology used to charge an electric toothbrush can charge an EV in a special parking bay without the need for wires. The Germans, usually not overly excited about EVs, did what they do best: They created a standard for inductive charging.

As the luckless inventor of interactive video (at least when it comes to car shows), I usually avoid electronic attractions. But then, amongst TTAC’s Best and Brightest is Perisoft, developer of bitchen race simulators, and I absolutely had to test-drive the thing. If you are at the Shanghai Auto Show, it is at the Ford booth, in the left corner. Perisoft can remote into the machine from the U.S. to China, and we discussed cheating enhancing the performance of the simulator. We dropped the idea, because we didn’t want Perisoft to lose future business.

The simulator consists of three screens (made by Dell) and a cab that moves around. There also is a button that says “Motion Stop” – in case you get car sick, I guess. Before they let you drive, you need to sign a release form bigger than what I signed when I drove offshore race boats – a truly murderous undertaking at times.

Some of Nissan’s Leaf cars were beset by the opposite of the alleged sudden unintended acceleration: Sudden unintended arrest. Once started and turned off, the Leafs refused to start again. Which of course would turn the Leaf into a PR embarrassment: Who wants the first serious mass market EV to be a non-starter? After having received complaints both in Japan and the U.S., Nissan decided to do something about it.

Toyota and Microsoft will host a joint live webcast tomorrow, Wednesday, April 6 at 1 p.m. Pacific. “Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft, and Akio Toyoda, president of Toyota Motor Corp., to discuss a collaboration between the two companies.,” says Microsoft.

As a rally driver, you have a navigator in the other seat. What do you need him for? He knows the road ahead and tells you how to drive in the fastest and most efficient manner. As in “you want to take that turn at around 80. When you come out of the turn, stay in low, there’s another sharp right turn right behind that.” Or fewer words to that effect.

When I met Jutta Kleinschmidt, Volkswagen’s Touareg Dakar Rallye driver, she had this lithe Italian woman as a Navigator. “She’s a skinny little thing,” said Frau Kleinschmidt in her usual don’t-mess-with-me style, “but at least she doesn’t weigh much.”

BMW will do one better. Soon, BMW will give you a navigator that weighs just about nothing. As for the skinny little thing – let’s just say that you won’t be interested in the navigator of someone who lists her homepage here. But let’s not get sidetracked.

Quoth Thilo Koslowski [via AN [sub]], principal automotive analyst at Gartner Research (and coiner of TTAC’s favorite new phrase, “the trough of disappointment”):

First of all, the car doesn’t really make a good personal computer, and, secondly, consumers don’t have to have a PC on four wheels. Ultimately, any type of Internet access in the future has to support the ownership experience of the vehicle; this is not about enabling me to have the same experience I have on my laptop

Which is precisely why we find Nokia’s “Terminal Mode” protocol so compelling: it “lets cars be cars again.”

The Autochannel in the UK is talking about a long wheelbase Audi A8 with built-in LTE 4G connectivity. That shouldn’t be a big feat, it’s new technology, but it can be bought off the shelf. The Autochannel pistonheads however are deeply in awe: “LTE technology offers data transfer speeds of up to 100Mbps, which is similar to a fixed-line broadband connection. This means passengers in the prototype can use the LTE broadband connection to stream music, high-definition videos and other data on up to six computer or mobile phone devices with ease.” Sure, and Ferdinand Piech invented the Internet.

With the proliferation of in-car connectivity systems like SYNC, MyLink, MyFordTouch, Blue&Me, etc, the ability of a car to play MP3s, read out text messages and update social media accounts has surpassed such traditional attributes as power, efficiency and handling for many car buyers. And though many of these OEM-branded systems are underpinned by identical software architectures from Microsoft or Garmin, they are taking an ever-more important place in the marketing of new cars. Differentiating these differentiators, then, takes a huge amount of development effort on the part of automakers and their suppliers, and the result is another electronic system with the potential to go out of date with the same speed as a cellular phone. Wouldn’t it be smarter to just create an open-standard connection between your phone and your car so that you don’t need to replace your car when its onboard connectivity electronics go out of date? That’s the goal of the Car Connectivity Consortium, which is aiming to explode the OEM-branded in-car connectivity model.

I’ve dispatched one of TTAC’s writers to get to the bottom of the copyright fight that’s surrounding Chrysler’s “Imported From Detroit” tagline, as Reuters reports that Chrysler’s claim to the line may not actually hold up.
Chrysler applied to trademark the slogan for use on clothing, bags and other wearable items in January. An attorney for Pure Detroit said the company did not start selling the T-shirts until after the ad aired in early February.

[Moda’s] attorney, John VanOphem, said Chrysler cannot trademark the phrase because it is “merely descriptive.”

“Our position is that Chrysler is trying to claim ownership of something it doesn’t have a right to own,” VanOphem said. “They do not own any exclusive rights to the ‘Imported from Detroit’ phrase.”Chrysler applied to trademark the slogan for use on clothing, bags and other wearable items in January. An attorney for Pure Detroit said the company did not start selling the T-shirts until after the ad aired in early February.

But the attorney, John VanOphem, said Chrysler cannot trademark the phrase because it is “merely descriptive.”

“Our position is that Chrysler is trying to claim ownership of something it doesn’t have a right to own,” VanOphem said. “They do not own any exclusive rights to the ‘Imported from Detroit’ phrase.”

Meanwhile, another battle over automotive copyrights may yet be brewing: Saab has introduced its own answer to SYNC and Onstar, named IQon, a term which may be in conflict with Nissan’s display technology used in the Juke, named I-Con. Hit the jump to see a video of the Nissan system in action, and let us know if you think Saab is going to have to come up with a new name, or if copyright law will let both of these naems coexist.

The Lexus SC430 is not a car that leaps to the minds of automotive enthusiasts as being particularly significant, but it seems it has one last claim to fame. The NYT reports that with the passing of the last model-year for the SC, the 2010, tape decks are no longer available on any US-market car. What, you didn’t realize that any new cars still had tape decks? Remember, the SC first came out in 2001, so it’s been around quite a while. Also, Sony only just stopped making the cassette Walkman last year. So, if you can’t bear to part with your tape collection, you have to buy used. And now, rather than just being an overfed boulevardier that outstayed its welcome, the Lexus SC430 is now a historical bookend to the era of magnetic tape in cars. Time to convert your Milli Vanilli to MP3…

Wards Auto reports that Ford now has more dealerships than Chevrolet “for the first time in years.” Not that this is a sign of growth on Ford’s part… it simply cut fewer dealerships (62) last year than Chevy, which wiped out some 372 at the behest of the government and its consultants. Chevy, meanwhile, has struck back at Ford by offering its version of Ford’s SYNC system… some 3 years after Ford built the only real brand in what is now the crowded field of in-car connectivity options. Of course, Chevy hasn’t released a date or price for MyLink sales, but at this point, what’s the rush? Besides, Ray LaHood is going to really roll up his sleeves and take on the “epidemic” of distracted driving any minute now… right?

Ford brought two pieces of good news for their dealers at this year’s NADA meeting: The dealers will get more cars. And they will get more cash. But wait, there will be less …

While some analysts (who might be sitting on large quantities of GM and Ford stock ) already dream of a sales rate between 15 and 16 million cars by year’s end in the U.S., CEOs of European carmakers are less gung ho.

It’s a nice idea: Each car is equipped with a wireless beacon, transmitting speed, direction and whatnot to other cars. For years, people have been dreaming about this. Now they could have found the killer app for the technology: By mashing up that information, collision courses could be plotted and lives could be saved. Exactly that was demonstrated yesterday to federal officials in Washington.

Want a small electric car that looks like a movie theater or even a stadium inside? Johnson Controls shows the ie.3 concept car at NAIAS. Sure, it has a battery. But it also has spring loaded flip-up seats, just like at the movies. Or at he ballpark.

Fears of appliance cars finally manifest themselves. More car manufacturers that ever showed their wares at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, the fact that there is a Detroit Motor Show (opening Monday to the press) notwithstanding. Ford notably used CES to take the wraps off its 2012 Focus Electric car.

GM has invested $5 million in the Powermat wireless charging start-up, and they want to use the technology “to charge its soon-to-be-launched Chevy Volt hybrid electric car,” Businessgreen reports. They report from the UK, so they shall be forgiven the “soon-to-be-launched” this one time only. But to charge a Chevy Volt?

Dying to have OnStar in our car, but don’t want to buy a GM car? No problem! At this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, GM unveiled an add-OnStar that fits (nearly) any car.

Don’t want your kids listen to Howard Stern, the Playboy Channel, Hip-Hop Nation or Raw Dog Comedy, at least while driving? No problem: Buy a Ford. It comes with a built-in Chinese Firewall that safeguards the harmonious upbringing of our children. At least while they drive.

In his piece on the approved-for-America Ford C-Max, Jack noted that the compact minivan would offer a “hands-free liftgate.” Well, here it is in action…

Note to those who comment “slow newsday?” whenever there is something that can be construed as even mildly uncomplimentary towards GM (sorry if you bought the stock.) You are right. The newsday must be glacial. First, the Freep’s investigative reporters unearthed a slowdown at Toyota. Now, the crosstown competition at the DetN found GM’s super-secret car of the future. Stop press! It will be that epic fail, formerly known as the Segway.

Imagine: It’s Friday evening, and the sun is down. You are rolling home in your environmentally responsible EV after an honest day’s work, emitting exactly zero greenhouse gases. You give a wave to your likewise electrified neighbor who’s bringing home the bacon to wife and family. You put the car in the garage and hook it up to the charger that nice electrician had installed. You shout “daddy’s home!” Suddenly, all hell breaks loose.

While everybody is dreaming (or shuddering at the thought) of masses of electric vehicles hanging off the grid at night, while that last ICE is donated to the Smithsonian, Volkswagen is taking a completely different tack. Forget the grid. Get your very own power plant. And guess what: It’s ICE powered.

It’s a well-kept secret, which will give the willies to people who are (at least publicly) worried about intellectual property: Microsoft has one of their best R&D centers in China. Located in the silicone gulch in the north of Beijing, MSRA (Microsoft Research Asia) is working on advanced technologies, mostly in the visual area. I worked with them once, and they are NFSWing good. They just had another great idea: Why not mine the knowledge of cab drivers when it comes to proposing the best route on your in-car navigation system?

George Orwell said it would happen in 1984, but better late than never. The European Commission decided that from 2013 on, every new car sold in the EU must have a system called eCall. What is eCall? Think of it as a government-mandated OnStar. If your car crashes, eCall will automatically send an S.O.S. to emergency centers. It will send your GPS-derived coordinates, the number of people on board, impact sensor data, airbag deployment and other data which probably only the EU and the carmakers know.

This summer I had the pleasure of touring Volkswagen’s advanced research lab at an industrial park near Stanford University. VW is developing a number of advanced technologies at this Silicon Valley facility, including its autonomous driving systems and electric battery packs. But in one corner of the lab, VW techs have a driving simulator set up with cameras aimed at the driver’s face. Using these cameras, VW developers measure driver attention and focus, testing just how much the latest Google Maps-based navigation system distracts drivers, and whether a car could offer features designed to keep the driver’s attention on the road.

These are doubtless worthy goals, but this ad for the Hyundai Sonata Turbo made me wonder whether VW pays much attention to changes in facial features based on changes in performance. Surely the kick of a turbo at full boost focuses the driver away from the gadgets and gizmos that VW (and every other automaker) is trying to integrate into its vehicles, and reconnects them with the original automotive “killer app”: a compelling driving experience. Technology, it seems, is being used simply to integrate more technology while minimizing distraction. When will car companies start using that technology to assist their vehicles in providing a more engaging, emotionally-rewarding driving experience?