The GM developing Wi-Fi app to help pedestrians avoid being hit (video)

 
Since even the threat of serious injury or death isn't enough to keep people engrossed in their phones from walking out into traffic, General Motors is developing a new pedestrian safety technology that will sense the phone itself. Using Wi-Fi Direct, a peer-to-peer wireless standard that's like a medium-range Bluetooth, a car would be able to detect a smartphone directly and alert the driver in time to avoid kneecapping the pedestrian.

GM says that Wi-Fi Direct would allow devices to connect in one second, rather than the seven to eight that devices would need when connecting through a cell tower. While GM is still developing the concept, it also has plans for a smartphone app that would warn approaching vehicles. It could be used by bike messengers, construction workers, and others who are frequently at risk of being hit by traffic.
Scroll down to watch the video explaining the concept.

  

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Toyota builds 200 million vehicles after 77 years in business.

  

Two hundred million of anything is a lot, and the point here is that Toyota has built a lot of cars. The automaker announced this week that sometime in June its 200,000,000th vehicle rolled off the assembly line.

Toyota's feat took the company 76 years and 11 months. It has been in the car business since August 1935, but it wasn't until 1972 that Toyota managed to produce its first 10 million vehicles – some 36 years that were, of course, interrupted by World War II. In the past four decades, however, Toyota has grown at a tremendous rate, with its next 190 million vehicles taking just 40 years and five months. Toyota's Corolla has been its top seller, accounting for over 39 million units worldwide.

By comparison, when General Motors celebrated its 75th anniversary in 1983, it had already built over 235 million vehicles, according to General Motors: The First 75 Years of Transportation Products by the Editors of Automobile Quarterly Magazine.

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