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Toyota Wants to Talk to You ... In the Driver's Seat

by Evan Shamoon on January 10, 2009 at 07:14 AM



To the old fashioned among you who think the recent trend of talking to your car is weird, brace yourselves: your new Lexus may be the one doing all the yapping.

Toyota has announced that new Lexus vehicles will use a system, called Lexus Insider, that sends voice messages to drivers who sign up for the service. Unfortunately, there won't be any sort of 'Knight Rider' dialogue, but it will cover "whatever subject it chooses, from tips on making the best use of the vehicles' features to suggestions for a scenic drive."

Lest you think it will be all Toyota ads, officials are promising that won't be the case. "We're not going to barrage customers with marketing messages," Jon Bucci, vice president of Toyota's U.S. advanced technology unit, told USA Today. The audio could be branded in a similar fashion to what owners will find in the accompanying magazine they'll start receiving. Basically, as one expert says, it's like junk mail.

Sounds great. Count us out! [From: USA Today]

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