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Text-Messaging Behind the Wheel
Posted by
CowboyNeal
on Sat Jun 28, 2008 09:44 AM
from the move-over-cb-radio dept.
from the move-over-cb-radio dept.
theodp writes "TIME interviews 21-year-old Taylor Leming, creator of the 600-member Facebook group I Text Message People While Driving and I Haven't Crashed Yet! While Alaska and Louisiana just became the latest states to pass laws banning text-messaging behind the wheel, Virginia resident Leming is still happily texting away while driving despite some near-accidents. 'Sometimes it just seems easier to text 'Be there in 5' instead of calling,' explains Taylor."
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Darwin (Score:5, Insightful)
Why is it important to text that you'll be there in 5 minutes anyway? You can also wait 5 minutes.
And I hope when he crashes and kills himself he doesn't take others with him. Driving and calling (even hands free), texting, or doing anything else (tuning the radio, setting up your nav system) for that matter is just dangerous.
Re:Darwin (Score:5, Funny)
Idiot: Be there in 5 mins.
CRASH!! BANG!!
Makes sense to me.
Parent
Re:Darwin (Score:5, Funny)
God: That didn't seem like 5 minutes to me.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Idiot: I didn't die immediately!
Re:Darwin (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Darwin (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Darwin (Score:4, Funny)
Driving and calling (even hands free), texting, or doing anything else (tuning the radio, setting up your nav system) for that matter is just dangerous.
My taxi driver the other day was obsessed with his nav system while driving me home -- He was playing solitaire on it. If I had been able to communicate with him, I would have cursed him out.
Parent
Re:Darwin (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Darwin (Score:4, Funny)
I don't want to discourage you from being a skeptic. By all means, be a skeptic. ;^) But did you even read what he said? He said, "Canadians". ;^p
Parent
Re:Darwin (Score:5, Insightful)
And yet, barely anyone gives a second thought to tuning their radio while driving or talking to a passenger while driving - both things that are shown to create just as much of a distraction.
I don't think there's anyone out there who never ever deals with distractions while driving. Having a sandwich, drinking something, changing tracks on a CD, driving while not having enough sleep... everyone does it on one level or another. All of it is dangerous, but the only thing that seems to get people keyed up is cell phone use. Can anyone explain to me why?
Parent
Re:Darwin (Score:5, Insightful)
People who use their phones while driving don't grasp how dangerous it is.
I'll tune my radio on the road, but only when I'm in a clear patch when nothing is happening at the moment. I also take as little time as possible to do so; all of my favorite stations are programmed into buttons, so it just takes a moment, and doesn't take much attention.
The same is true with my passengers. When the driving gets tough, I will stop talking to them, often in mid-sentence.
But people who use cell phones on the road don't seem to understand these ideas. They will frequently place the cell phone first, driving second. They won't interrupt their conversation for a difficult section of driving, they won't try to minimize their conversation, and to compound it all they frequently have only one hand free for actual driving, which means less steering control and poor or nonexistent use of turn signals.
Parent
Re:Darwin (Score:5, Insightful)
You know what else is dangerous? Driving.
I'm not saying that I'm safe while other people are not. I'm saying that there are things you can do to limit your distraction and reduce the danger of the activity. The problem is that people who talk on cell phones while driving by and large do not do these things. Some of them do, and are thereby reasonably safe, and I have no problem with them.
Parent
Re:Darwin (Score:5, Insightful)
Phone talkers who only phone while on straightaways and only press one button to do it (speed dial) can make exactly the same argument. Guess what? It's still dangerous. Changing the radio station while driving is dangerous. Period.
Talking on the phone engages your attention for a continuous period of time. A half-second to push a button != several minutes of distraction. Not saying the momentary distraction is not dangerous, but it does not even come close to approaching the level of danger that talking on the phone while driving presents.
Text messaging is even worse though, since it requires the concentration to produce the text mentally (much more thought intensive than speaking naturally) and some form of error correction (or worse, watching your phone constantly as you enter text). Sadly, these people don't always have one-party crashes. If they only killed themselves in car crashes, I'd be fine with it.
Parent
Re:Darwin (Score:5, Insightful)
>And yet, barely anyone gives a second thought to tuning their radio while driving or talking to a passenger while driving - both things that are shown to create just as much of a distraction.
I don't think there's anyone out there who never ever deals with distractions while driving. Having a sandwich, drinking something, changing tracks on a CD, driving while not having enough sleep... everyone does it on one level or another. All of it is dangerous, but the only thing that seems to get people keyed up is cell phone use. Can anyone explain to me why?
Mostly because it's the bigger idiots that try to text message while driving. There seems to be a tiered system of stupidity while driving. On one level there's the eating a sandwich or sucking on a soda pop or leaning over to tune the radio. On a higher level of idiocy, there's the people reading a newspaper, doing makeup, driving without your seatbelt, and texting or calling on a cell phone.
Unlike talking to a passenger, who should have a nominal idea of what's going on in traffic, the person on the other end of a call has no sense of when they should shut up or avoid bringing up issues requiring heavy thought. I have no problem with someone making an essential short call when it's safe to say, "Hey Dave, the meeting is canceled today. See you", and then hanging up. It's just that most people who I actually see talking on their cellphones in traffic aren't that bright, and continue to natter on forever while they're swerving and stomping on their brakes.
The title of the Facebook group says it all about the people who text message while driving. "Haven't died, yet!" Congratulations... you win the dumb luck award? Soon to turn into another Award?
Parent
Re:Darwin (Score:5, Insightful)
Because to use your cell-phone for texting, you must look AWAY FROM THE ROAD and at a small screen to read texts.
When you're talking to a passenger, yeah, you're distracted, but talking and listening does not require that you take your eyes off the road. Nor does adjusting the radio, once you're used to using it.
Parent
Cognitive load (Score:5, Informative)
Higher cognitive load.
Carrying on a conversation is more mentally taxing than turning a radio dial, and isn't as interruptable, since you're only in control of half of it. See, for example, this research [cmu.edu]:
"the Carnegie Mellon study, for the first time, used brain imaging to document that listening alone reduces by 37 percent the amount of brain activity associated with driving. This can cause drivers to weave out of their lane, based on the performance of subjects using a driving simulator."
Parent
Re:Cognitive load (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem occurs when driving suddenly requires a lot more concentration/attention than we have to give it. If we can't shift mental gears fast enough to act to avoid a situation, we crash.
Parent
Re:Darwin (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Calvin (Score:5, Funny)
Text used to be a noun, now it's used both interchangeably as a verb and a noun. So many words in modern English are starting to be used like this.
Verbing weirds language.
Parent
Idiot (Score:5, Insightful)
despite some near-accidents
Enough said.
Also, just because someone hasn't had an accident in the past, it doesn't mean they won't have an accident in the future.
Re:Idiot (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Idiot (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:Idiot (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Idiot (Score:4, Insightful)
"I would support [a law], however, because I consider myself to be a pretty good law follower and would feel pretty horrible if something happened because of me breaking a law."
Yeah, because something bad happening because you do something you know if fucking stupid would be ok.
What, she'd only feel bad if she killed someone while doing something 'against the law'?
Idiot.
Parent
Kids these days (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Kids these days (Score:4, Informative)
In my experience, this is how people carry out such short conversations.
Party 'B': Hello, B speaking.
Party 'A': Hello, it's me.
Party 'B': Hello, A.
Party 'A': Whereabouts are you?
Party 'B': I'm just walking past the music shop opposite the church. Where are you?
Party 'A':I'm walking past the hotel. I'll meet you at the swimming pool.
Party 'B': OK, see you later. Goodbye.
Parent
Re:Kids these days (Score:5, Informative)
I agree. I just don't have time for text messages. It can take an hour of back and forth to have a two minute conversation. I can barely put up with IM, but it is required in our office so that people can interrupt your train of thought if you accidentally get on a productive streak.
I have no "text plan" on my phone, so incoming texts that I didn't ask to receive cost me 15 cents. Outgoing don't cost me anything because I don't do them. I don't have time. Life is too short for text messaging. Call up, get your conversation done and move on.
As you honestly don't seem to understand the use of text messages, I'll explain why I find them useful: for communicating small amounts of information that don't require conversation, and out of respect for the other person's time.
Let's face it, most people don't want to be interrupted whenever they're doing something. You might be out shopping for groceries, visiting a friend's house, or eating a restaurant, and you probably have your phone with you in case there's an emergency and/or you need to call somebody, but you don't want somebody to call you and suddenly want to have a conversation. Heck, at least in those situations you can talk if you want to; you can't exactly answer your phone and have a conversation at all if, say, you're watching a presentation at work, or if you're already on the phone with somebody else.
When you get a text message, rather than answering your phone immediately, you can view it at your leisure, and it only takes a second of your time to read it. I can tell my girlfriend, "working late tonight, I'll be home in an hour," or my D&D buddies, "On my way, be there 30 minutes," or a couple of my coworkers, "Meet for lunch at Rudy's BBQ", and it only takes ten seconds of my time and effectively none of theirs. I can even send the same message to half a dozen people at once, and that's much faster than calling half a dozen people and repeating the same conversation every time. If, for some reason, they need to answer the message, they can also do so without disturbing any people around them who don't want to listen to somebody chatting on their cell phone.
Does that make more sense? Yes, text messages are a horribly inefficient way of having a conversation, but they're not for conversing, they're for disseminating information.
Parent
Get a phone and bluetooth headset (Score:5, Interesting)
What a moron!
With a bluetooth headset, I say the person's name, my cellphone dials the number, I say what I have to say, and never have to fumble around with the phone.
Any bets on how long before this guy gets his darwin?
Re:Get a phone and bluetooth headset (Score:5, Informative)
If you'd RTFA, you'd know that "this guy" is actually a girl.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I'd like to see a study done on whether talking to somebody in the passenger seat is just as dangerous as talking on the phone (handsfree or not)
Moron (Score:5, Insightful)
I also hope her insurance company reads time.com.
Re:Moron (Score:5, Insightful)
You learn or you die, you cannot combine the two. Anyway, I hope she crashes and just seriously damages the car, with the insurance company not paying out. There is no reason to wish her harm just because she (at 21 years old) makes some stupid mistakes.
Parent
As has often be said (Score:5, Funny)
the really effective way to make people drive more careful is to replace the airbag in all cars with a big pointy spike aimed at the driver's head.
Why a law? (Score:4, Insightful)
Great Idea... (Score:5, Insightful)
I am starting another group:
"I am drunk While Driving and I Haven't Crashed Yet!"
It sucks that we have to make laws to compensate for commonsense.
Make Organ Donor Mandatory for These Idiots! (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Make Organ Donor Mandatory for These Idiots! (Score:5, Funny)
I would like to make organ donation compulsory for these people. At least they can be of some use after they crash.
I like the idea of compulsory organ donation, but why wait until after they crash, when the organs might get damaged?
Parent
Stop killing people (Score:5, Insightful)
I've lost two people in pointless car crashes.
Please use your goddamn head and pay attention to the goddamn road.
This is what happens (Score:4, Insightful)
Darwin Award here we come (Score:4, Interesting)
We can all remember this thread when the asshat wins a Darwin Award. I've been near clipped many times by people fumbling with their phones. Usually they are gabbing, but more and more it's young kids texting. Youth tends to think it's invincible anyways.
They even reference 'near accidents'. All it takes is for one other person around you to also have a lapse of attention to turn that 'near accident' into a real accident.
If you need to say 'be there in 5' then pull over, or just make them wait 5 minutes. Duh.
Here's A Challenge For The Statisticians... (Score:5, Funny)
Given that at some point the rate of new members signing up will equal the rate that existing members die, calculate the maximum number of members of 'I Text Message People While Driving and I Haven't Crashed Yet!'
Don't make me hurt you... (Score:4, Interesting)
Get robbed (Score:3, Funny)
Don't get mad when I smash out your car window with a tire iron and take your phone at a green light, if you were paying attention it wouldn't have happened.
Hey Taylor, out of the gene pool! (Score:5, Insightful)
I nearly got killed a few years ago by a "distracted" driver who was happily chatting on his cell phone while running a traffic light. It took me over a year to recover and be able to work again and I'll feel the secondary effects of this accident for the rest of my life (definitely NOT a nice thing, trust me).
In most European countries, using a cell phone while driving is considered impaired driving and you basically face the same consequences as if you were drunk in case of an accident, meaning your insurance will happily run away from you and you'll be declared responsible for the accident even if it's not initially your fault.
I'm looking forward to the day it'll be the same here in Ontario as a lot of people don't seem to be able to distract themselves from their crackberries while driving. Maybe a $1000 ticket and a license suspension will teach them a lesson before they get to injure or kill someone.
I for one hope this moron eliminates himself from the human gene pool without injuring or killing someone first.
Striking Back at Traffic Threats (Score:5, Interesting)
I drive a motorcycle in NYC, which is already really dangerous even when people are running only one machine, their car. It's even worse now that people are in their SUVs, sealed from the rest of the world and throwing their weight around in traffic - especially when they're not really NYC residents, but drive those trucks mostly in the suburbs where there's room for them to drive like fools. It's even worse than that with them talking to their phones pressed to their heads, distracted by what's in their hands rather than concentrating with their hands on the wheel. The worst are the SUV drivers with phones in their hands, and of course the very worst are the ones with both hands on a phone, looking at it while they text someone. It's totally insane, though they don't care since they feel like their giant truck will protect them in a collision.
A month ago, one of these assholes cut me off downtown, almost driving me into a parked car (except I'm a very good driver, so I barely recovered to save my life). They raced to the next red light, which was only a block away anyway. I drove up next to their window and waved at them. I wanted to tell them to watch out, as most of them just aren't aware of motorcycles at all, which don't register in their vision like cars do. They were busy texting someone, as they'd clearly been while they cut me off, and they ignored me. So I knocked on their window. They ignored me. I knocked harder, angrily now. They glanced up at me, obviously having seen me the entire time, and waved one hand, mockingly making an "oh, I'm scared" face (even though I wasn't threatening them or anything). They laughed silently inside their big truck, and bent back down to resume texting.
So I bashed off their side rearview mirror. I ripped it from the truck, and smashed at their truck over and over again while they watched in shock.
Then I drove away and got lost among NYC's millions of other cars. Fixing that mirror's got to cost hundreds of dollars and days off the road. If only I could have smashed their window and grabbed their phone, I'd call to check in on how it's going. Maybe next time. If they haven't learned to just shut up and drive already.
Yet another redundant law (Score:4, Insightful)
Is already illegal to drive impaired. Why do we need another law to say the same thing is illegal?
Re:Why such a specific law? (Score:5, Insightful)
Too vague ... one person's "due care and attention" is anothers recklessness.
Besides, banning texting for the driver while on a highway is a no-brainer ... because obviously people with no brains think they can do it "despite a few near-accidents."
I finally bought a bluetooth earpiece when the laws changed, even though my cell already has speaker-phone capability, so it already was "hands-free"; after a couple of weeks, I now wish I had bought it sooner. (Hint - buy a good-quality one with noise and echo cancellation - you don't want to sound like you're talking in a garbage can).
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The problem with non-specific laws is that its open to interpretation. Also we can get rid of all specific laws and have one law: "do no evil".
Your definition of evil may be different from mine.
Also, most states have laws against careless operation of vehicles already.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
In that case, how long would it be since I get a text reading
And in that case, WTF is wrong with just making a phone call?