Cars will need fewer screens and more buttons to earn 5-star safety rating in EU

It would already make a huge difference if safety ratings took into account people outside the vehicle. If a car is essentially guaranteed to kill the occupants of the other vehicle, the cyclist or the pedestrian, it shouldn't get a high safety rating just because its occupants are unharmed - it's still a dangerous murder machine after all.

Right now the US seems to be stuck in a spiral of ever-increasing vehicle size. People look at the larger vehicles around them and they feel unsafe so they buy a larger vehicle - which makes everyone else buy even larger vehicles. The irony is that everyone would be far safer if we all stuck to properly-sized vehicles, because those huge vehicles result in way higher energy collisions.

Well yeah, it's a great opportunity for officers to exercise their subjective perception and discretion in pulling over individual drivers. More integrated car screens to confuse with a phone or tablet are a feature not a bug in this regard

I cannot understand why using a phone in a vent-stand is considered not okay, while using the same phone through a different screen is.

Yes, the apps are simpler, but some operations are just as involved.

Buttons and knobs are great --some MFGs went overboard on frankfurter finger knobs and buttons as well as making them look as cheap as possible --like dull grey cheap parts as if manufactured by Hasbro.

>> honda camry

Toyota Camry

I mean "terribly" no, but imagine you can take that cost of materials, and eliminate those jobs by going 100% digital, not lower the price of the vehicle, and then pass on the savings to your shareholders? Might even be worth a golden parachute.

Whatwhatwhat? There are cars where you have to use a touch screen to indicate turns?

I tried several search terms and I cannot find a single example. If somebody has a link, it would be much appreciated.

It's a matter of scale as far as expense. If my company produces 100,000 cars, and the stalk assembly/parts cost $50, now I've saved 50*100000=5 million dollars a year. To me it's clever in the same way that all-wheel drive users existing brakes to manipulate wheel-power delivery versus a complicated (and expensive) 4WD transmission. Clever, yes, but impossible to use in a tactile manner and thus dangerous because it forces eyes-off-road ( a simple steering wheel button might save money and still afford tactile aspects)