Electric cars need to make artificial sounds. Huge opportunity for ringtone miscreants.
Aren't cars a lot like smartphones?
Consider the sales rep. He's got a BMW full of unnecessary features like a beeper that tells him off for not attaching his seatbelt, and a sixth gear. And he'd trade them all for what he really wants, which is a Merc.
In his pocket is a Blackberry Curve. It's got pointless push to talk. Meanwhile he dreams of an iPhone 4.
And consider the woman (sexism alert, girls). She identifies her car as 'a silver one', and mislays it in supermarket car parks.
Similarly, the manufacturer and product name of her HTC Hero will remain forever a mystery to her. It's simply 'a white phone' - and it frequently lies unanswered and lost in the depths of her handbag.
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Well, soon there could be another similarity between cars and phones. Turns out that the European Commission is concerned about the silence of the electric car and the effect it might have on pedestrians bumping off the front of them in a spray of blood and gristle.
It's recommending cars be fitted with artificial sounds – and they needn't even sound like car engines.
You got there before me, didn't you?
Car ringtones.
Brrngtones, if you will.
Already, it's been mooted that your little runaround could come with the sound of an Millennium Falcon (when will those Star Wars child/men ever go away?). But wouldn't it be good if you could change your motortone as often as you liked? I like the idea of a car that plays the Benny Hill theme as it whizzes by.
And what an opportunity for D2C miscreants. Imagine all those Lexus drivers wondering why their car makes a sound like like a fart followed by laughter, and why every petrol receipt includes a £9.50 payment to Motones UK (registered in Bermuda).
Could be good for lawyers too, when the first Kia driver mods his car to sound like a Ferrari.
And the Crazy Frog? When electric mopeds go completely silent, he'll be back in the perfect setting to delight us all with his comedy stylings.
Happy days.
