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Google Businesses The Internet Hardware

Google and Volkswagen Plan Navigation System 39

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the getting-lost-in-3d dept.
SnprBoB86 writes "Google and Volkswagon are beginning a joint effort with nVidia to build a Google Earth in-car navigation system. The system is planned to feature a three-dimensional display so passengers can recognize where they are in relation to the surrounding topography."
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Google and Volkswagen Plan Navigation System More

Google and Volkswagen Plan Navigation System

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  • It's a shame... (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    It's a shame that volkswagen develops the neat gadgets when they can't seem to get the electrical system in any of their new cars even halfway decent.

  • Old News (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Wow, talk about old news. This was in Googles keynote.
  • why would you need a 3D view? Not trying to be flamebait; I'm just wondering the purpose. Is this supposed to replace current GPS navigation? What are the advantages?
    • You could see that the street you want is the one between the pair of tall buildings that you're about to miss, and not the one between the pair of short buildings up ahead that you thought was your intersection. If you are in city traffic you don't have much time to look at the navigation screen and anything that makes glancing at it more useful makes the whole system more useful.

    • Re:Nice, but... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by FredThompson ( 183335 ) <fredthompsonNO@SPAMmindspring.com> on Monday February 06, 2006 @08:59PM (#14656051)
      A 3D view might be helpful to locate landmarks since the world isn't flat and roads aren't bright colors...

      For example, visualizing where you are from a flat map is different than knowing you're 15 blocks East of the football stadium. Fiddling with the buttons and looking at a little display takes your eyes off the road. The less time you do that, the safer you are.

      GPS things are nice but they're like comptuerized rally helpers. Their scale of reference doesn't cover all the human ways of visualizing space.

  • Why do I need to see the tops of buildings? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by libra-dragon ( 701553 ) on Monday February 06, 2006 @08:50PM (#14656000)
    That'd be great if VW made a flying car.

  • and microsoft? champion of stability? (Score:5, Informative)

    by way2trivial ( 601132 ) on Monday February 06, 2006 @08:52PM (#14656007) Homepage Journal
    partnering with FIAT!

    chortle....

    http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=&q=microsoft +fiat [google.com]

  • Too bad it shows my son's school (Score:4, Insightful)

    by WillAffleckUW ( 858324 ) on Monday February 06, 2006 @08:55PM (#14656025) Homepage Journal
    two miles to the west of where it really is, where the cement mixing plant is located.

    I can see it now, people driving their car, holding their cell phone in the left hand up to their ear, taking a movie of the drive while talking, while the right hand navigates the Google Earth zoom on the GPS-sync out of date Google Earth pics and ... SCREECH BANG CRASH ... time to get another user.

    I'm not really joking - I saw someone driving a Ford truck on the two-lane (one each way) arterial near my house in Fremont on Saturday, and he took both hands off the wheel while accelerating into a blind five-way intersection, elbows nowhere near the wheel, trusting that even though he has to curve to the right, noone will do something unexpected as he tailgated the car in front.

    Time for a new Darwin Awards category:

    Driving under the influence of electronic gadgets.
    • No to worry. If my trusty new Pioneer AVIC-D1 is any indication, you basically have to sign away the rights to your first born child EVERY TIME YOU START YOUR CAR in order to use the navigation features for a drive. And what if you're driving somewhere and want to map in a pitstop to another location. You have to stop, pull over, put the PARKING BRAKE on, and then you are permitted to use the device. Who cares that you have someone else riding with you that could program the device while you safely drive.

      Th

  • not new (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Edmund Blackadder ( 559735 ) on Monday February 06, 2006 @09:17PM (#14656145)
    Infiniti navigation systems already feature 3-d displays.

    But it would be nice if you had a nav system connected to the internet so that it gets updated data. Also Google's local search would be great if put into car's navigation system, but once again it must be connected to the internet.

    The problem with navigation systems is that they come on a CD (or DVD) and do not get any updates. And while streets do not change that often, businesses change all the time so a navigation system is usually worthless when trying to locate a business.

  • AHA! (Score:5, Funny)

    by nemik ( 909434 ) on Monday February 06, 2006 @09:29PM (#14656205) Homepage
    So that's why the BMW.de site got shut down!

  • Great. Topographic feature cues... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Bing Tsher E ( 943915 ) on Monday February 06, 2006 @09:39PM (#14656278) Journal
    ...and here I am in flat old Kansas....
  • As mentioned in this post [slashdot.org] women navigate by landmarks, while men prefer to read maps. So, this, in turn, is navigation for women. However, women stereotypically are more afraid of gadgets. I guess the salespeople in the showroom have their work cut out for them. What I would like to see is a centralized system doing trip planning and distributing traffic flows evenly to spread out congestion.
  • They were going to do that with BMW
  • is any one else bugged by our BIG BROTHER GOOGLE?

    i mean they read my emails, know what i search for, what i buy, store my chats, know my bank account (due to monthly adsense money transfers)

    now they want to know where i drive!

    i can see it now on my personalised google homepage theres going to be a box for "previous drives" with a list of where i driven (similar to current previous searches)

    or even better, adverts poping up on the navigator telling me that i would love a burger from the macdonalds 50meters a
    • It all only does that because you let them. Other mail services and search engines are available. And my GPS unit of choice [gizmondo.com] already tells me about the next TravelLodge or petrol station and is going to be more dynamic in future. Unless I get bored with it and sell it to someone who's lost or something.
  • It will help you to find quicker the nearest VW garage when your need it. It's so hard to find a VW specialist when you need it.

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