The New York Times ran a piece today on the darker implications of how technology is taking over today's car interiors. That may run counter to the enthusiastic celebration of car tech we usually champion here at TechnoRide. But I wouldn't want to see a driver going 65 mph fiddling with the navigation system, no matter how cool it is. Unfortunately, it turns out things are already even worse—and by that I don't just mean driving while texting, either.

The article gave a couple of new examples:

- State Senator Carl L. Marcellino of New York was recently riding in a cab in Miami when he noticed that the driver was watching a boxing match on a television that was mounted on the dashboard. "I can understand a monitor in the rear, but up front it is a different world," said Mr. Marcellino in the article. He later sponsored a bill last year to ban all "display generating devices" in the driver's view; NYC already has a law against televisions in the front seat.

- Chrysler advertises the 2008 Dodge Grand Caravan minivan as a mobile "family room," but Chrysler chairman Robert L. Nardelli—who should know better—wants to take it even further. "I think a vehicle today has to be your most favorite room under your roof," Mr. Nardelli said last October at a magazine publishers' conference. "It has to bring you gratification; it has to be tranquil. It's incidental that it gets you from Point A to Point B, right?"

The article said that his assertion left Anne T. McCartt, senior vice president for research at the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, almost speechless. "I don't even know how to respond to that," she said. "There's just overwhelming evidence that distraction is a crash risk."