Trying to Hit the Brake on Texting While Driving | Hacker News Reader

Trying to Hit the Brake on Texting While Driving

nytimes.com

33 pointssrikar46 comments

This is the knee-jerk reaction de jure of our age.

New York has made it a very serious moving violation (5 points, equivalent to speeding 40 mph over the limit) to have any electronic device in your hand. It's ok to use devices affixed to the dashboard, including GPS devices. If your a teenaged driver, you automatically get a 60 day suspension.

Using technical controls to govern behavior is bad policy. There's a reason why jamming radio signals is a serious crime -- it's too easy to make unanticipated mistakes.

In my opinion, the problem is that drivers, by and large, are absolutely terrible at driving. They're so bad at driving that they have no idea how bad they are at it.

We're a nation of self-promoting, self-obsessed, angry narcissists, incompetently sitting behind the wheel of multi-ton, wheeled death machines. We have a single license tier for a ridiculous variety of vehicle shapes and sizes. We have zero ongoing driver education requirements, and only require retesting if sufficient complaints are received (when's the last time that's even happened?) or we reach sufficient age.

Demand better driver training. Stop engaging in inane behavior when you have greater responsibilities. Demand that others in your life do so as well.

I honestly wonder whether mobile technology has contributed to this problem or whether it has just finally allowed us to measure "distracted driving" accidents accurately.

Everyday for my very short route of 1.5 miles from work to home I see texting drivers. I don't like texting much myself, so I don't feel the urge to use the device for it, and I have now idea what would make these people stop?

I walk 2 miles to and from work every day. I can tell you fiddling with phones is rampant along the path I walk. I often see people not yielding to me who are looking at their phones. If I weren't such a defensive walker, I might be dead now.

The other day, I saw an associate who has money problems and kids at home buying shampoo for $10 at CVS... The same shampoo is $5 at Wal-Mart.

How do we stop parents from starving resources from their kids by buying overpriced stuff?

This is a perfect example of how badly comment quality has degraded on hacker news.

I read it as some deserved ridicule of malkia's comment.

What exactly about malkia's comment deserved ridicule?

That I drive for 1.5 miles only, but I have my own reasons :) which I won't put here... since they are ridiculous (lol).

It's a little satire of how serious issues get dumbed down by Sally Struthers appeals to "think of the children".

As I pointed out in another post in the thread, technical controls are last ditch place to enforce policy. You could take the same lame "the children!" Argument and apply it to speeding (why not govern speed in cars?) or food service (make it impossible to undercook an egg) or a thousand other things.

That's a false equivalence. Someone's bad driving can kill me. Someone's bad purchasing decisions can't ( at least in the short term).

Give me an insurance rate reduction and I'll bite.

The article mentions that even people who agree that texting is a bad idea find that they have trouble stopping themselves from doing it.

These folks could limit distraction from incoming texts and calls by turning on "Do Not Disturb" mode.

I'd actually appreciate a mobile OS feature which lets through incoming text messages and auto-replies saying "I'm driving right now, I'll get back to you when I safely can."

Is this problem largely going to go away as voice control of phones (and car integration) get better?

Windows Phone does this - when paired with a list of specified Bluetooth devices (such as a car GPS or stereo), it can switch to a DND mode automatically with an optional auto-reply.

Motorola seems to have recently rolled out a similar feature across it's entire Moto G/E/X product line - Drive Mode for their Moto Assist product.

But unless these kind of features become opt-out, I suspect it won't help that much. Right now you have to actively seek them out and turn them on, which many people aren't going to do.

Does texting need auto-reply? There's no cultural assumption of an instant reply over that medium.

Though I wish that you were right without exception, my experience is that at least for some people this does not hold true.

Texting has largely replaced phonecalls. Therefore most people expect you to get back to them within a couple of minutes, not hours.

I have used, and have seen others use, texting in real-time applications where immediate response is required. Like texting someone that you're at the door (and the bell doesn't work) instead of calling them.

Generally the younger you go, the more texting is expected to be instant communication.

While I don't disagree, I think such people are wrong. Even if you're at my door and the doorbell is broken, if you don't call, I might miss your text. I won't apologize because you didn't call. To me texting is asynchronous and if you want real-time, synchronous responses, you should call. The expectation of any kind of timely response is ridiculous, IMO, and is completely inappropriate. I could be doing any number of things that require full concentration (work and sleep come to mind), be out of cell range, have forgotten my phone, have a dead battery etc. I have seen people get upset over not having their texts responded to and I judge them, rightfully and harshly, as being inconsiderate, demanding, and selfish. If it is indeed a cultural norm, it is an extremely inconsiderate norm indeed.

Don't get me wrong, you're welcome to feel however you like. But many don't really see any difference anymore between texting and calling, since both go to the same device. Your objection "you should call because I may be out of cell range or have forgotten my phone" strikes me as illogical especially for the kind of synchronous situation like "I'm at the door, your doorbell doesn't seem to work."

The difference is that texts are easy to miss. Not only that, but by calling you have established synchronous communication. If the recipient doesn't pick up, then you know you have no expectation of a response while the opposite is true if he does. On the other hand, there's no guarantee that your text message was even delivered, this assuming that your recipient should receive it and act upon it is quite presumptuous. That's the difference. Calling establishes a communication channel that texting does not. If one does not pick up the caller knees there is no such channel established and thus no expectation of communication.

No. Texting, like IM and email, is an asynchronous form of communication. There are, however, plenty of people who do not understand that and might demand a more immediate response (as indicated by my own experience and the experience of other commenters here). Such pushy, demanding people have no place in my life and acquiescing to their petty needs should never come ahead of my own and others' survivability.

This is why I don't text and drive: Werner Herzog's short doc on what can happen when you do.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xk1vCqfYpos

Since this piece I haven't had the slightest urge to text+drive however as I use my phone for navigation it's impossible to turn it off. I would definitely appreciate some kind of technology installed that was "hey, i see you are moving. no calls or texts for you".

That is quite a film, thanks for the link. The rest of the convo in this thread is a bit pointless to me now!

Just a commentary on the bigger picture: I strongly disagree with the notion that talking on the phone while driving is always bad (yes, I know, some people are particularly bad at it and shouldn't do it, but those people probably shouldn't be talking at all or...in many cases...driving at all.)

But texting while driving is really bad. I've done it far too much, and every single time I note how totally distracted, worse-performing, and basically crappy I am at the driving part (and I am a good driver when not distracted).

Why did I do it? Because for better or for worse, some people have gotten so used to this world of instant communications that if you don't reply quickly enough, they actually get concerned -- "why aren't you answering me? is everything ok?"

So my solution is twofold: 1. I've stopped responding to people so quickly. And if they protest, I explain: I was driving. Chill out. I'm fine. Everything is fine. 2. And if it really can't wait, I just make a call. "I'm driving - don't want to text. What's up?"

We really, really, really shouldn't be texting or writing emails while driving. It's bad news for everyone.

> People know they shouldn’t text and drive.

People know they shouldn't drink and drive either. But the legal BAC limit is not zero. We tolerate a small amount of increased risk to be able to enjoy a beer or glass of wine at a restaurant.

So why this absolutist, zero tolerance approach for texting? Are there no legitimate reasons for texting while driving?

I found out my wife was in labor via a text message that I received while driving. When I reached a stoplight, I sent back omw (expands to On my way!) and drove home instead.

Another time, I was returning home from a long road trip, and hit bad stop-and-go traffic. After sitting in it for fifteen minutes, I texted my wife to let her know I would be delayed.

Obviously texting while joyriding at 70 mph is stupid and ought to be illegal, but I don't see the harm in sending one or two quick messages while stopped or moving at very low speeds. We should have a balanced approach to texting while driving, like we do with alcohol.

> Are there no legitimate reasons for texting while driving?

Not if you're driving -- it's inexcusable. It's hard enough to type on a small device's virtual keyboard while sitting at a desk without any distractions, much less while trying to move a massive, potentially lethal weapon along the public roads.

> I don't see the harm in sending one or two quick messages while stopped or moving at very low speeds.

That's a classic slippery slope -- society would rightly forbid texting simply because different people would define "quick messages" and "very low speeds" differently.

To me this is akin to limiting all vehicles to under 70 MPH to ensure no one speeds recklessly.

The solution is to train our drivers better and start actually pulling people over for using phones while driving, not cripple the capabilities of the technology we have.

> At that point, Katasi generally doesn’t block the messages on the assumption that the passenger will prevent the driver from texting.

Yeah, like that's going to work.

This whole thing seems like an over-complicated, over-engineered technical solution to a cultural problem.

This is smart. Cellular jamming is mega-illegal in the US (even in prisons![0]), and when I first read through this article I missed part of the first paragraph and couldn't understand how this product could be sold.

However, the idea of working with network providers is great, and opens the door to a lot more options, such disabling cellphones in bars, resturants, etc. based on complex filters (e.g., allow "emergency" texts or only from close family).

I bet the movie theater industry will jump on this quickly.

[0] http://www.wired.com/2010/03/prison-mobile-phone-debate-jamm...

Why is it the responsibility or even the right of carriers to deny people the service they pay for simply because it annoys you?

Texting while driving is a public safety hazard, and that's pretty unambiguous. From where do you derive the right to control what I do in a bar or restauraunt?

Why is it the responsibility or even the right of carriers to deny people the service they pay for simply because it annoys you?

Exactly!! Are we so immature that we can't take responsibility for our own behavior and want laws and systems to do for us what we should do for ourselves?

Because a sufficiently large percentage of the population is shitbags.

Yeah, it's always the other guy that needs strict parenting from the government right?

Doesn't really need to be "strict" in this case. Texts could come back with a context from the recipient. Say you text someone, they're driving, you get a status of "In motion," or "In a movie," or something based on the data coming back from the phone.

They're not necessarily unable to respond to you, as in not locked out of their phone by the carrier, but the carrier knows they're moving at 30+mph, and gives that data to the sender.

The majority of people who just want to live safe, comfortable, predictable lives have a right to use government to protect themselves from the (very substantial) minority of people who are shitbags.

Predictable? There's autocratic regimes out there where life is much more predictable. We probably more laws to keep government and other autocratic shitbags in check.

Yes, predictability is something normal people value, and are entitled to structure their society to encourage.

Because bars and restaurants are private property?

How does that grant the carriers the right to deny you service that you are paying them to have? The property rights of bars and restaurants in no way overrides your contract.

If the bars don't like mobile phones they can ban them, or even (assuming it's legal) install Faraday cages.

I believe the suggestion was to allow carriers to disable service at the direction of private property owners.

Property owners do not own the electromagnetic spectrum in their property. I'd go as far as to say that even the carriers do not own the spectrum. They merely rent it (in the US). I'd say they have certain implicit (and explicit) responsibilities when they assumed the spectrum slices.

Did we really go so far as to welcome intrusion where someone can just ping your phone to get a reply with our location? I for one was very concerned when BART shut down cellular connectivity in order to cover up its incompetence.

I think of it more as a condition of the license to be physically on the property in the first place (e.g. no shoes, no shirts, no service).

You can easily block all cellphones on private property without broadcasting crap. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faraday_cage

When I say smart, I mean purely from a cold, heartless, moneymaking perspective. I would not start this business because I agree with you in many cases.

Oh yeah and while we're at it we should also jam people's devices at protests and large gatherings as well. /s

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