And also, at the moment, no trucks.
Removed by mod
Make it 10k-12k and it would be a yes if parts and repair ability were guaranteed for 10 years.
Yes, more of this please!
No idea why it has no stereo though. That feels like a pretty basic feature. Doesnt even need to be built in. Just iso standard head unit bay would do.
It’s backed by Bezos. Wouldn’t even consider it for that reason alone.
The design is bad. The front trunk is a bad use of space, and the Japanese figured this out decades ago with the Kei truck. If you want to see real utility, look at this design.
Crazy how so many people have been begging for bare bones, affordable electric vehicles.
Then when one comes on the scene they do nothing but complain. Can’t please anybody these days it seems.
Edit: sp
I hate that Bezos backed them
I find this minimalism strangely appealing. Unfortunately, I do not live on a farm. I hope this thing is useful to those who do, though.
Lost me at “American”.
no touchscreen
Sounds like a dream. Or public transport. It doesn’t have touchscreen either.
Already tired of seeing this cool car and now I’m already seeing more “fuck car” articles and post; as well as countries wanting to limit cars on the road. Something is at foot
Is it a networked surveillance nightmare?
“No touchscreen” is a really great selling point imo
Every smart feature a vehicle *doesn’t *have is a selling point for me. I want my car to be dumb as a boot.
Yep, the more software it has, the less I want it. And I’m saying that as a software engineer.
Nothing made me want to distance myself from technology more than going back to school for computer science.
…well that and all the fascism espoused by tech CEOs.
Well, I want smart boots
After reading the article and the website, I can’t find anything that explicitly says there is no network connection built into the vehicle.
The instrument panel is a screen, and will be used to display the backup camera video. There is some computer capable of handling video processing and displaying the instrument graphics - so more than just low-level electronics to handle the battery and drive control. It could have built-in GPS, it could have 5G, it could still be collecting and sharing data on driving habits &etc, it could be subsidized by that on the backend. Just because those functions aren’t displayed to the end user doesn’t mean they aren’t in the system.
Oh yes I was not commenting on any of that. Data privacy and the reliability of computer hardware and software over time are separate issues.
I was just speaking from the basic-level user experience of operating a vehicle- touch screens are terrible. Pretty much everything you want to do in a car should have 3 requirements:
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Keep your eyes on the road. Controls need to be in consistent locations and have some other way of communicating what they are and what their status is non-visually. Dials, knobs, buttons that lock in-or-out, switches, levers, sliders. Anything close together needs to be differentiated- buttons with different textures, shapes, or resistance for example. This is very difficult and almost antithetical to touchscreens. The strength of the touchscreens is their flexibility- they can have deep menus that re-use a small amount of space efficiently, but the trade-off is that they need the user’s vision to work.
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Non-visual feedback to the user for their activation. Touch screens CAN do this with haptics and sounds. And there are physical inputs where this can be a problem, like regular buttons or knobs with uniform shapes. Levers, sliders, switches, and dials have this as inherent properties
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Response time. Touch screens on vehicles are usually underpowered and seem to take seconds to register an input, then apply it. If the music changes and is suddenly way too loud, it’s annoying to be subjected to that for 5 seconds while navigating the touch screen and waiting for it to work, in contrast to a regular old volume potentiometer that operates basically instantly. Really any music or audio controls can get really annoying with delay, though I’ll admit those are a luxury. Things like the lights are not.
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Not a requirement, but cars should be judged on whether these things FEEL good. Touch screens have improved slightly over time with better materials and haptics, but that only applies to higher-end ones and still isn’t great. Cheap physical inputs can suck too, though they are usually still better than touch screens.
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Everything you describe could be handled by a single ESP 32 module but they probably do have much more computing power than that.
Other articles seem to indicate that it would need you to use your phone to perform updates on the onboard computer.
I guess this doesn’t preclude the possibility of other types of embedded surveillance.
Hoping it doesn’t have tracking 🤞
If they also make a 4wd version in the future then this would basically be the first new car I’d consider buying.
Edit: I emailed them and they said it doesn’t have any data collection at all.
The vehicle will absolutely collect data, but likely won’t be transmitting or collecting personal data (which is mostly done within vehicle infotainment units). It’ll be stored within the hardware which is much more preferred but I’d still consider that “data collection”.
Most vehicles have an Event Data Recorder (EDR) which records and stores vehicle data in the event of a collision/abnormal operation above a certain threshold. They’re mandated in many countries. You can connect to these systems, some easier than others, and get vehicle data such as vehicle speed, accelerator pedal position, brake activation, changes in velocity, yaw rate, steering wheel angle, steering wheel angle rate of change, ABS/TC activation, number of ignition cycles, odometer readings, etc. Newer vehicles with enhanced safety systems (of which this vehicle doesn’t sound like it’s intended to have) can provide even more data including but not limited to proximity to a target object and camera images.
It’s not data in the sense of personal or tracking data, but it’s still data.
I fucking hate the touchscreen in my vehicle.
I dont mind a secondary 8" screen for things like navigation as long as there is no control over functionality of the vehicle on said touch screen.
My 2016 Veloster has a perfect balance
There’s no radio, no Bluetooth, and no speakers of any kind beyond for those required to play basic warning chimes.
Many will consider this a cost-cutting step too far, but the interior was designed for ease of upgrading, with easy mounting space for anything from a simple soundbar to a full sound system.
There’s an integrated phone mount right on the dashboard, but there’s nothing stopping you from bringing something even larger. I expect the low-cost Android tablet and 3D-printing communities to have a field day coming up with in-car media streaming solutions.
This is 100% it.
All I want is a modular car system. Everything modular. Dashboard. Body panels. Whatever. I want 3+ cars possible on one frame, and to not need anything more than basic tools to swap parts around.
You wanna drive a FOSS OmniMech and so do I
I do. I really do.
Gm said they’d build a sled drivetrain that they could just plop bodies on top of but that never happened sadly.
Wonder why? Seems to me like a money printing machine for them, the factory and non- factory repair shops and the aftermarket.
Unless it’s seen as a way to hide your car from illegal activities, which well now that I think about it is probably the reason they didn’t follow through with the idea.
It’d cannibalize part of the market for their higher-priced offerings. Same reason Toyota dropped Scion and GM dropped Saturn.
Probably a balance between it would make it cheap for them to produce, but also bring down the barrier to entry for third party manufacturers to compete with them.
framework truck😭
If only that money wouldn’t be partially going into the pockets of Bezos, it would be amazing.
And while easily replacable panels and such are a good thing. Having the mounting screws exposed like that is a horrendus idea. Because I suspect I know what much younger and very drunk people would do, based on the Mercedes hood ornaments I have in a box somewhere.
I don’t really see a downside to this, so why not line Bezos pockets if he is providing¡g a sane alternative?
