[Maynard]

Is it just me, or is there something really wrong about selling an item as a safe answer to distracted driving, when it is actually facilitating it (on-screen text projector, with 'hand gesture controls'). Fussing with buttons or handheld is obviously a problem, but data consistently shows that the real issue is attention lapses, and that 'multitasking' is really a myth - having your texts projected on a screen is better, but in the same way that using a car-mug for your beer makes driving drunk safer, 'cause less chance you'll wreck from spilling the beer.

[Ubermeister]

I happened to see a Navdy installed in someone's Infiniti G35 while at a stoplight. I was close to buying one but after seeing it on his dashboard I'm glad I didn't. It is a lot bigger than I was expecting it to be. It looked pretty goofy honestly. He tried to "drag" me when he saw that I was looking in his car and I'm sure you can imagine how that went I even gave him a one count head start...

[drdunkyn]

Originally Posted by Maynard

Is it just me, or is there something really wrong about selling an item as a safe answer to distracted driving, when it is actually facilitating it (on-screen text projector, with 'hand gesture controls'). Fussing with buttons or handheld is obviously a problem, but data consistently shows that the real issue is attention lapses, and that 'multitasking' is really a myth - having your texts projected on a screen is better, but in the same way that using a car-mug for your beer makes driving drunk safer, 'cause less chance you'll wreck from spilling the beer.

I am in complete partial agreement! Any conversation, whether hands-free, hands-full, or with a passenger is part of the "distracted driving" phenomenon, and is a huge contributor to accidents. I guess where these add-on HUD's are more helpful is in providing driving directions, speed, alerts more directly in the line-of-vision. I haven't seen studies on whether this truly helps or is MORE of a distraction, but it seems that once the novelty wore off they'd be helpful. The other one apparently is adding in the option of blind-spot indicators in the future, so maybe another bonus.

I love the image of Ubermeister's duel -- seeing some numb nuts launch ending with his screen in his lap probably provided enough distraction for the whole week!

[Maynard]

I'm going to have to use that 'complete partial agreement' - perfect for the next 'green belt training' or 'effective learning' class they put me into. And I am with you that true heads up displays - for essential vehicle data - are a great idea that does help with both safety and convenience. The real issue is with the competition from visual-motor-language tasks (reading texts is the ultimate, but also things like album covers and song titles, or the advertisements that are soon to appear); these suck attention in, then hold it for too long. When you are talking, your brain will usually allocate the resources to the driving (at least this is what I tell my wife, to explain 'not hearing' that she wanted to stop in the DSW on the way past .