Unless they're literally going to reinvent the wheel, what can they do that hasn't been done? Tires that can't deflate are a must; maybe even spheres.
If you're going to reinvent the car, you have to do a ground up reinvention. What I love out of the whole skateboard electric shtick is the possibility of bringing back any old car design and being able to slap it onto the drivetrain template. Laser scan some classic 40s and 50s designs, 3D print the panels, and plop it down onto a standardized bottom. Consideration being given for the wheel placement, that is.
Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but vehicles just don't have any soul to them these days.
Modern car design is quite soulless for the most part, the Alfa 8C and a few others being exceptions.
I once owned this, which I still think is one of Pinninfarina's best works:
Talking of Tesla, I just read Elon's second 10 year manifesto. The relevance to this thread is that one of his plans is that your Autonomous Tesla when not in use by you can toddle off on its own and work as part of a 'collective' being Uber style taxis. Musk thinks the income could easily equal your car payments. What a mind blowing thought ... There goes your car, off to work. LOL
Yeah, I want the liability for that... and I want random strangers messing up my [expensive] vehicle. What a ludicrous idea. That's the most socially disconnected idea I've heard from him.
Talking of Tesla, I just read Elon's second 10 year manifesto. The relevance to this thread is that one of his plans is that your Autonomous Tesla when not in use by you can toddle off on its own and work as part of a 'collective' being Uber style taxis. Musk thinks the income could easily equal your car payments. What a mind blowing thought ... There goes your car, off to work. LOL
In this future why would anyone even own a car. One of the best things that could happen (imo) is the depersonalization of the car. It should be a shared means of transport, not an extension of one's ego / personality, or the expression of one's imagined status. People can and will do as they please but having a 60 grand car sitting in your driveway 90% of the time makes little sense. I can envision a day when public transport as we know it, along with personal car ownership will be replaced by autonomous vehicles. This will give rise to a new business opportunity - leisure tracks - where people who enjoy driving can have fun without stop signs, congestion, and silly speed limits.
Yes and no. I think you have the right ideology but the wrong execution. Mass-transit is the environmentally sound way to go. Mass-transit in the style of automobiles is not. The reason the USA has lousy mass transit is down to the automotive industry. This is historical fact (such as the monopolist abuses that destroyed rail systems).
i grew up in a location that had no effective mass-transit, so it is indeed part of my comfort zone to have my own automobile. If mass-transit weren't crap here, maybe I'd have grown up differently and be less averse to using it. Then again, dealing with other people smoking and being loud/rude/violent, and insanely loud mass-transit itself still really puts me off.
i know my bias. If the system realigned itself with quality and accessible mass-transit, I'd adapt. But it won't. Your idea above is the way this stupid system is likely to progress. Inevitability doesn't make it good.
In this future why would anyone even own a car. One of the best things that could happen (imo) is the depersonalization of the car. It should be a shared means of transport, not an extension of one's ego / personality, or the expression of one's imagined status. People can and will do as they please but having a 60 grand car sitting in your driveway 90% of the time makes little sense. I can envision a day when public transport as we know it, along with personal car ownership will be replaced by autonomous vehicles. This will give rise to a new business opportunity - leisure tracks - where people who enjoy driving can have fun without stop signs, congestion, and silly speed limits.
Given Apple's business model to date has been Personalization of tech. Do Apple really have the right perspective for a world where nobody own a car full time?
I doubt it very much, but the idea that everyone needs to own their own vehicle seem very outmoded to me and a massive waste of money. But whereas technology is easy to change and update, attitudes and habits... not so much.
In this future why would anyone even own a car. One of the best things that could happen (imo) is the depersonalization of the car. It should be a shared means of transport, not an extension of one's ego / personality, or the expression of one's imagined status. People can and will do as they please but having a 60 grand car sitting in your driveway 90% of the time makes little sense. I can envision a day when public transport as we know it, along with personal car ownership will be replaced by autonomous vehicles. This will give rise to a new business opportunity - leisure tracks - where people who enjoy driving can have fun without stop signs, congestion, and silly speed limits.
Yes and no. I think you have the right ideology but the wrong execution. Mass-transit is the environmentally sound way to go. Mass-transit in the style of automobiles is not. The reason the USA has lousy mass transit is down to the automotive industry. This is historical fact (such as the monopolist abuses that destroyed rail systems).
i grew up in a location that had no effective mass-transit, so it is indeed part of my comfort zone to have my own automobile. If mass-transit weren't crap here, maybe I'd have grown up differently and be less averse to using it. Then again, dealing with other people smoking and being loud/rude/violent, and insanely loud mass-transit itself still really puts me off.
i know my bias. If the system realigned itself with quality and accessible mass-transit, I'd adapt. But it won't. Your idea above is the way this stupid system is likely to progress. Inevitability doesn't make it good.
I grew up in a location - a city - where you can set your clock by the trams, trains and busses and where there is no social stigma attached to using public transport. People that can easily afford to drive to work prefer public transport or bicycles because of the hassle of parking, wasting time in traffic (not able to read or work), or for the fitness benefit. But I take your point - the way to get people to use public transport is to make it the better choice, e.g. clean, efficient, on time, and plentiful. In London (UK), where I spent most of my working life so far, and where public transport is plentiful even if it is not on time or particularly reliable, and where rush hour is big 'crush', it still beats sitting in traffic for hours on end. The loud/rude/violent aspects you mention have never been an issue in any city where I have used public transport.
But where I live now, in North America, where public transport is poor and the car rules at the expense of pedestrians and bicycles, I mostly use a car in the winter and a motorbike in the summer.
And yeah, inevitability does not make anything good. Investment in public transport should have been kept up since the introduction of the railway. Nothing more dull than traveling for hours on end along a perfectly straight highway in the blistering heat.
Too Late. Maybe Tesla will be buying Apple in 5 years.
The Car project is the probably what is sucking up resources from other projects causing things like the 9.7 iPad Pro to be delayed (should have been out in Sep 2015). This is why there are so few updates to the computer line.
Tesla has been able to ramp up their production over years starting with the Roadster, then the S Sedan, X SUV, and next the mid priced car, while building out their national charging network. If apple delivers an all electric car they probably won't have the benefit of starting small. The expectations will be on for a high quality high volume seller with high profit (which will mean high price). This may actually come down if Tesla's Giga factory can produce the batteries Tesla needs for less money.
Finally a Trump presidency could be a big problem for Apple which relies on foreign manufacturing vs. Tesla that has American Manufacturing.
I'd prefer Apple do it right rather than do it first. Worked for them in terms of smartphones and tablets and it's better for us loyal customers. I don't need to be on the bleeding edge.
Unless they're literally going to reinvent the wheel, what can they do that hasn't been done? Tires that can't deflate are a must; maybe even spheres.
If you're going to reinvent the car, you have to do a ground up reinvention. What I love out of the whole skateboard electric shtick is the possibility of bringing back any old car design and being able to slap it onto the drivetrain template. Laser scan some classic 40s and 50s designs, 3D print the panels, and plop it down onto a standardized bottom. Consideration being given for the wheel placement, that is.
Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but vehicles just don't have any soul to them these days.
Modern car design is quite soulless for the most part, the Alfa 8C and a few others being exceptions.
I once owned this, which I still think is one of Pinninfarina's best works:
A majestic blend of severity and grace, boldness and subtlety, sharp
angles joined by soft curves, the Fiat 130 Coupé was a true catwalk
beauty, a masterclass Pininfarina classic that was widely copied in the
Seventies but never equalled. That commercial success eluded it was more
to do with social problems ” the utilitarian connotations of the Fiat
brand in an image-driven luxury Coupé sector ” than any failings endemic
to the car. In every respect, the 130 lived up to the sophistication
that its styling projected, an opulent, exotic, refined and thoroughly
engineered car built to a standard rather than price.
Launched in 1971, it was current for six years and 5,000 units, but
not even the patronage of celebrities such as Sophia Loren, Marcello
Mastroianni and Dusty Springfield (hers had gold-plated door handles)
could raise its profile.
... When Sergio Pininfarina revealed the 130 Coupé at Turin in 1971, it must
have been with relief, for this was the stylist’s first showstopping
design after a year or two in the doldrums. In a sense, there was
nothing dramatic or radical about the 130. It was a sober, exquisitely
proportioned, large, two-door car, a fusion of gentle nuance and
suggestion, presence, poise and dignity. ... Whatever the case, the appearance of the 130 Coupé was an epiphany
for Pininfarina. At last, it seemed the company had found its way again
after the death of its founder Battista Pininfarina in 1967. A year
after its introduction, the Coupé won the Style Auto award, presented by
a jury of international car stylists.
It defined all its big car design commissions for more than a decade
to come. Arguably, all of them failed to recapture the purity of the
original.
The Rolls-Royce Camargue that emerged a few years later was derived from
the 130, yet the architecture had been corrupted, as the shape
descended into ostentatious caricature. At the other end of the scale,
the 1975 Peugeot 604 emerged as a cheap, bland, four-door mass
production interpretation. Not even the Ferrari 365GT/4 of 1972 managed
to outpoint the Fiat among the style critics, even if it outlived its
inspiration by many years.
I don't foresee fully autonomous vehicles in consumer vehicle by 2020-2021 from any vendor.
People don't appreciate how hard this will be to get right. Especially city dwellers.
Self-driving apparatus is no more than hollow vaporware and intended just to entertain wider public with secondary, actually redundant , stuff. What's really essential to EVs is to make them drive without batteries and Apple seem to have it figured out somehow. If we ever see the true Apple car, it will bear no batteries.
I don't foresee fully autonomous vehicles in consumer vehicle by 2020-2021 from any vendor.
People don't appreciate how hard this will be to get right. Especially city dwellers.
Self-driving apparatus is no more than hollow vaporware and intended just to entertain wider public with secondary, actually redundant , stuff. What's really essential to EVs is to make them drive without batteries and Apple seem to have it figured out somehow. If we ever see the true Apple car, it will bear no batteries.
Self-driving apparatus is no more than hollow vaporware and intended just to entertain wider public with secondary, actually redundant , stuff. What's really essential to EVs is to make them drive without batteries and Apple seem to have it figured out somehow. If we ever see the true Apple car, it will bear no batteries.
Comments
Modern car design is quite soulless for the most part, the Alfa 8C and a few others being exceptions.
I once owned this, which I still think is one of Pinninfarina's best works:
Yes and no. I think you have the right ideology but the wrong execution. Mass-transit is the environmentally sound way to go. Mass-transit in the style of automobiles is not. The reason the USA has lousy mass transit is down to the automotive industry. This is historical fact (such as the monopolist abuses that destroyed rail systems).
i grew up in a location that had no effective mass-transit, so it is indeed part of my comfort zone to have my own automobile. If mass-transit weren't crap here, maybe I'd have grown up differently and be less averse to using it. Then again, dealing with other people smoking and being loud/rude/violent, and insanely loud mass-transit itself still really puts me off.
i know my bias. If the system realigned itself with quality and accessible mass-transit, I'd adapt. But it won't. Your idea above is the way this stupid system is likely to progress. Inevitability doesn't make it good.
But where I live now, in North America, where public transport is poor and the car rules at the expense of pedestrians and bicycles, I mostly use a car in the winter and a motorbike in the summer.
And yeah, inevitability does not make anything good. Investment in public transport should have been kept up since the introduction of the railway. Nothing more dull than traveling for hours on end along a perfectly straight highway in the blistering heat.
The Car project is the probably what is sucking up resources from other projects causing things like the 9.7 iPad Pro to be delayed (should have been out in Sep 2015).
This is why there are so few updates to the computer line.
Tesla has been able to ramp up their production over years starting with the Roadster, then the S Sedan, X SUV, and next the mid priced car, while building out their national charging network. If apple delivers an all electric car they probably won't have the benefit of starting small. The expectations will be on for a high quality high volume seller with high profit (which will mean high price). This may actually come down if Tesla's Giga factory can produce the batteries Tesla needs for less money.
Finally a Trump presidency could be a big problem for Apple which relies on foreign manufacturing vs. Tesla that has American Manufacturing.
It won the Style/Auto award in 1972
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2012/jul/03/sergio-pininfarina
http://fiat130.nl/fiat-130-coupe/
7,177 Testarossas were made, but only 4,491 130 Coupés.