Blog Blender

When your car becomes a brick

One of the frustrating things about modern life is when a device that requires software to work properly suddenly does not mean working properly, you essentially have a very expensive brick. Vehicles, that require gears, pistons, and all sorts of other mechanical bits and bobs–are also becoming very expensive bricks due to all of the software required.

Software-dependent cars are still new enough that it’s unclear how they will age. “It’s becoming the ethos of the industry that everyone’s promising a continually evolving car, and we don’t yet know how they’re going to pull that off,” Sean Tucker, a senior editor at Kelley Blue Book, told me. “Cars last longer than technology does.” The problem with cars as smartphones on wheels is that these two machines live and die on very different timescales. Many Americans trade in their phone every year and less than 30 percent keep an iPhone for longer than three years, but the average car on the road is nearly 13 years old.

PJH Studios artwork, Portrait of a sun

PJH Studios

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  • When your car becomes a brick

    One of the frustrating things about modern life is when a device that requires software to work properly suddenly does not mean working properly, you essentially have a very expensive brick. Vehicles, that require gears, pistons, and all sorts of other mechanical bits and bobs–are also becoming very expensive bricks due to all of the…

  • The history of tarot

    Playing cards have been around for nearly 500 years, but their form as tarot cards has only been around since the mid 18th century. Whether or not we believe that the cards of the tarot have supernatural powers, we all think of them primarily as tools for divination. It might seem as if they’ve played…

  • How to colonize space according to archeologists

    Humanity traveled the world throughout its history, creating colonies and cities–for better or worse. If we are to travel through space to other planets, we might need to consider lessons from our past. Their paper, which is published in Acta Astronautica, uses island archaeology to outline eight different lessons that can impact the success of…

  • Raccoons Are Showing Early Signs of Domestication

    Raccoons Are Showing Early Signs of Domestication With dexterous childlike hands and cheeky “masks,” raccoons are North America’s ubiquitous backyard bandits. The critters are so comfortable in human environments, in fact, that a new study finds that raccoons living in urban areas are physically changing in response to life around humans—an early step in domestication.…

  • Dataguessr

    Dataguessr is a clever, little web game where are you need to put a set of facts in the correct order. Mostly, the topics tend to relate to populations in certain countries. What makes it challenging is the margins between items are slim, like splitting hairs

  • The value of AI art

    Josh Collinsworth delves into the value of AI art. The public reaction to AI-generated art, of every kind, might have been awe or joy at first. But the longer time goes on, and the more of this newly cheap material floods the figurative market, the more the reaction becomes decidedly negative. The output of generative…

  • Activists simulate ICE raids in FortNite

    Activists simulate ICE raids in FortNite. The “special event” held on November 20, where players took on different roles that reflect real-life ICE raids, was the first initiative by New Save Collective, a baker’s dozen of gamers with backgrounds in activism and organizing, whose goal is to educate gamers and teach people about their rights…

  • What it’s like being a popstar

    Charli XCX candidly writes about what it’s like being a popstar. Sometimes being a pop star can be really embarrassing, especially when you’re around old friends of family members who have known you since before you could talk. The discrepancy in lifestyles becomes more and more drastic the more successful and paranoid you become. As…

  • AI Agents and the DoorDash problem

    If you are a business owner, what happens when your customer tells the robot to buy something for you based on only set parameters, and ignores everything else such as discounts, loyalty, rewards, or upsells? That’s the possible future with AI agents performing tasks such as ordering a sandwich, or the DoorDash problem. But if…

  • Would you high five a whale?

    Absolutely amazing under water video in Bora Bora of a an encounter with a whale traveling a pod of dolphins.