Open Source Electric Cars — Good Idea Or Not? 178
thecarchik submits this interesting bit of flame: "Many are keen on the concept of open source electric cars — that is, electric cars where the built-in software can be tweaked, parameters can be changed, and in theory, the cars can be improved. Only it's a really, really bad idea. ... Even carmakers themselves have trouble with software — Fisker has issued a recall and apology recently with its Karma — so allowing average Joe to tweak the car's inner workings seems like a bad idea. Changing the characteristics of an electric car isn't as simple as re-jetting the carbs or swopping out the air filter." Whether software is controlling electric cars or not seems to me beside the point; access to the underlying software doesn't guarantee improvements, but blocking access to it doesn't stop car makers from making software mistakes — it only ensures that those few interested hackers who might be able to work around them have a harder time of it. (Not that tweaking car software is new, or going away.)
wrong (Score:5, Interesting)
Many are keen on the concept of open source electric cars — that is, electric cars where the built-in software can be tweaked, parameters can be changed, and in theory, the cars can be improved.
Operating systems can also be tweaked, parameters can be changed, and they have indeed been improved. Do you see average Joe tweaking the swappiness of his kernel? Also, opensource isn't just about tweaking but also contributing back to the community the improvements found.
so allowing average Joe to tweak the car's inner workings seems like a bad idea.
So what? Average Joe can also play with the inner workings of his phone, router, TV, etc.. does he do that? No, if he wants to mess with his router he asks to the geek living next door.
lame
WikiSpeed (Score:4, Interesting)
The WikiSpeed [wikispeed.com] project is aimed at producing street legal cars that get 100 MPG, have 5 Star crash ratings and would be priced at $25,000. They've won an X prize already.
They are applying the principles of agile development to every aspect of the process possible. Everything is modular so that you can work on an engine system separately from other parts of the machine. You could do a hybrid, or straight electric system if you wanted to.
People often project their inadequacies on others. (Score:5, Interesting)
Many people want to make the things they aren't competent to do, or don't trust themselves to do, illegal for YOU to do - unless you hold special license. These people may well believe that they are inherently better than you, but they also have an instinctive willingness to obey authority figures such as Milgram's white-coated doctors [wikipedia.org] and government-sponsored certification authorities.
In reality, you should be able to tinker however you will with anything you own, and simply held responsible for any harm that you do in the process. Full stop.