Now, I know you’re thinking the guy who wrote the title
above has to be a geezer. I mean, old guys are always whining about how things
were better in “their day.”
Well, you’ve got me. I’m over 70. And I actually know what
you’re talking about. In the early years of this century, my 80-ish uncle, a
very smart and well educated man, regularly lamented the breakup of AT&T. Put
him in charge and he’d have brought back the rotary dial phone in a heartbeat.
And only in black.
Anyway, I’m different (I hope) and the reason I’m thinking
about this ignition key thing is a news story reporting that thieves can steal
the code from your key fob when you lock your car and then, when you’re gone,
drive your car away by clicking a couple of times on a special device that’s captured
and retained your code. Since vehicles are now keyless, getting in means
getting going.
Police have been scratching their heads about this for a
while, having noticed cars reported stolen when security cameras show people walking up and
driving away just like normal.
Is anyone actually surprised? The keyless fobs use radio
waves to talk back and forth with the car, and ever since Marconi introduced us
to these little darlings of the ether, people have been intercepting other
people’s waves in the hope of stealing something. Human nature, what?
Thieves intercepting car unlock codes was just a matter of
when. Like Republicans agreeing that flagrant adultery is cool.
And expect this problem to get a lot worse in a big hurry, since
car companies are now busy creating cellphone apps that do the same thing as
a key fob. And more. Some apps allow you to not just open your car but also
start it.
Think! All this power will be available on your cellphone!
You know, the device that the kids hanging out on the corner break into remotely
between snorts of…whatever it is kids do these days. Gunpowder?
With the advent of self-driving vehicles, we aren’t far away
from the time when thieves can sit comfortably at the nearest tavern and order
someone else’s car to come pick them up. Easy.
And, of course, that’s what the whole remote entry thing is
about – easy, and easier.
And easy is necessary because Americans are fat and lazy. (Some
have asked which of these comes first? All I can say is it’s a viscous circle.)
True, us guys could
get the car key out of our pocket, but you know the Standard American Gut hangs
so far over the belt it’s hard to get a hand into a pocket. Actual exertion is
required. Also, all that wriggling looks kind of obscene. You could get
arrested.
So I’m expecting someone to invent the shirt-gut-phone-pocket
any day now. Yessir, no hanging accessories needed -- a pocket for your iPhone built
right into your clothing!
The standard shirt-gut pocket will be low, placing the phone
in the “under-gut.” Easy to reach and out of the rain, too!
Fortunately, this will leave room for keeping one’s soon-to-be-obligatory
Glock .38 “over-gut.” Or maybe it will be cooler to call it “top-gut,” as in “Yeah,
I see he’s carryin’ top-gut.”
For women, of course, this second essential device will be
sheltered as well.
Fashion will be rethought, and we’ll all need completely new
clothing that will, of course, be Made in China. Sorry, The Donald.
But it won’t end there. I’m confident that, somewhere in
Asia, a team of entrepreneurs is even now working on a combination phone and
gun for the American market. “Galaxy7NoteGun?” "LTE.38?" Hard to know.
A possible downside of this innovation is that the proximity of gun and phone could mean that the action of
reaching to read a tweet could be misinterpreted by those faster on the draw. But
that’s already a problem now, even before the NRA’s “mandatory carry” laws take
effect.
We’ll just have to deal with some additional few thousands a year in gun casualties. You can’t make
a free country-omelet without breaking some eggs.
In the meantime, AAA will invent a new category of
assistance – dead cell batteries will be a much bigger problem than a dead car
battery.
AAA technician to his office: "Yeah, had to jump start his cell phone. I'll be here another half hour or so."
Is all this really necessary? Can’t we just bring back the
key?
I’m not even sure that using a fob is all that much easier.
Turning a key is so simple even a pro wrestler or a Trump policy advisor could
do it. (Given what we’re seeing at the outset, someday in the next four years that statement is likely to be redundant.)
There is hope. Republicans have always preferred the past to
the present, and lots of things have started to spin backwards even before
Trump takes office. Keep your fingers crossed. We might get those ignition keys
back soon. We'll put them into a slot on the dash right next to the rotary phone dial.
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