设计让联网汽车开进现实

    路径寻找只是智能设备所能改善的最基本的一层功能。现在人们每到一个地方，对这个地方的探索心也越来越强。他们希望导航显示屏上也能出现这个地方的社交和服务信息。比如在文化娱乐方面的推荐、物流信息、附近有哪家商店在打折，或者是关于这个陌生地的本地小常识。未来，我们会在应用领域见到越来越多具有这种特色的产品，比如谷歌的Field Trip，它能提供主动的定位服务，当然还有可以利用大量数据进行智能推荐的Foursquare等。

    人们想要的是一种无缝的体验，使他们不必从驾驶中分心。要想做到这一点，一个设计上的关键挑战就是要平衡数据过多与智能服务之间的关系，更好地为用户提供有用的信息。

把汽车变成移动平台

    美国人每天平均要在自己的汽车里待90分钟，那么开车上下班能否不再那么无趣和浪费时间，变得更有意义和效率呢？未来主义者史蒂芬•P•约翰逊为汽车设想了一系列异想天开的点子：它可以是早餐的餐桌，也可以是衣柜、健身房甚至是一个特殊的办公室。尽管这些创意有点像动画片那样不羁和搞笑，但是将来汽车很有可能将不仅仅是一种代步工具。要想实现这个目标，它必须要与我们目前在平板电脑或智能手机上进行的工作和娱乐活动实现无缝对接。

    目前，我们上下车的时候，我们正在智能手机上进行的通话或正在听的音乐都会暂时中断，因为它要连接车内的通讯装置或是切断与它的连接。如果它能与车内的扬声器器无缝对接，不必让我们的视线从路面上离开，那该有多好。

    这种无缝对接除了能给驾驶员带来好处，也能让乘客从中受益。比如车里所有平面空间都有重新设计的潜力。除了在后排座位前面安装屏幕之外，后排座位的车窗能不能也变成能够玩游戏的界面？或者开发出像谷歌眼镜那种水平的现实增强功能，让乘客可以从新的角度探索和欣赏沿途的风景？

    如果这个设想得以实现，将会对教育产生很大的影响。届时，一辆汽车就是一个互动教室，一个学习的空间。学生可以在乘车经过某地时了解这个地方，从历史和社会的角度观察它的地形地貌。另外，当你乘车通过一座城市的购物区时，透过车窗就可以浏览商店里的商品，或是搜索一家你喜欢的餐厅，而这些只需通过汽车的后排车窗就可以完成。

自动环保

    未来的联网汽车的意义并不只局限于“联网”，同时它也必须能自觉地管理它的环境影响和社会影响。在这方面，汽车厂商可以学习一下Automatic等驾车应用。它既是一款硬件设备，也具有像Jawbone和Fitbit等健康应用的特征。它可以根据车速和其它驾驶习惯判断人们消耗了多少燃油，从而让你变得更加节能，最终让你在驾车时有意识地做出更环保的选择。

    Route finding is just the base layer to be enhanced by smart service. Increasingly, people want to deepen their exploration of the place that they are traveling. They want social and service information to overlay and compliment the navigational display. For example, cultural recommendations, logistical information, sales at a nearby shop, or a local's knowledge of a new place. We're seeing more of this in the app space with products like Google's Field Trip that hints at proactive location services and, of course, Foursquare that uses their extensive data points for smart recommendations.

    People want a seamless experience that doesn't distract from their driving. A key service design challenge is to balance the tension between data overload and smart services to add meaningful information for travelers.

The car as mobile location

    The average American spends over 90 minutes in her car each day. What if instead of a disruption, a person's commute could become productive? Futurist Stephen P. Johnsonimagined the car in a series of "ludicrous ideas" as new spaces: breakfast nooks, closets, gyms, and even as a specialized workspace. While these ideas are cartoonish and playful, imagining the car as more than a means of transport is not farfetched. To transform the car into this new space, it needs to seamlessly continue work or entertainment we are engaged with on our tablets and smartphones.

    Right now, when we enter and exit our cars, our conversations or the media we're listening to on our smart phones are disrupted by having to connect and reconnect our communication devices. What if the activity could seamlessly continue into our car's speakers without tying up our hands or distracting our eyes from the road?

    Beyond the driver's advantage of this seamless experience, passengers could also benefit. One potential is for all the surface space within a car to be reimagined, beyond the usual placement of screens, in the back of seats. What if back-seat windows became surfaces for game-based activity? Or if a Google Glass-level of augmented reality enabled passengers to explore and understand landscapes in new dimensions?

    This could have major implications for education, as a car could be transformed into an interactive classroom or training space. A student could learn about the space they're passing through, looking at the geography from a historical or social perspective. Imagine mobile window-shopping as you pass through a city's shopping district or search for a preferred restaurant, all from the backseat of the car.

Automated environmentalism

    The future of the connected car means more than being digitally wired. The vehicle of the future must also be consciously connected to its environmental and social impact. In this respect car manufactures could take a cue from driving apps like Automatic. Both an app and hardware device that's akin to wellness apps like Jawbone and Fitbit, Automatic tracks how much fuel you're spending based on your speed and other driving behavior so that you can make more fuel-efficient, and ultimately, environmentally conscious decisions when you drive.