Tesla has released a new video titled ‘The Future is Autonomous’ which features there upcoming Cybercab robotaxi. In the video, we see new shots of the mobile app, the in-car user interface and how people may use the autonomous vehicle.
With the driver’s responsibility for operating the vehicle being removed, this raises the question, how will you spend your time riding in a robotaxi.
Obvious choices include using your phone, sleeping etc, but there’s lots in between including personal entertainment, and possibly even productivity.
At 19 seconds in, we see a shot of the Cybercab display showing video conference call. We see 7 participants on the call, 6 remote and 1 return video that leverages the interior camera of the Cybercab.
The title of the screen shows ‘Weekly Design Team Sync Up’, suggesting this is a work call. This raises a question around the time spent being driven, given that you could actually be working during your morning or afternoon commute.
In the best case, you leave home later and clock on when you start your trip in the robotaxi. Whether you are using a laptop, your phone, or on a conference call in the car, you’re effectively working remotely until you reach the office.
In the worst case, your commute time, turns into potential work time, given you no longer need to control the vehicle and pay attention to the road. This could further blur the lines between your work and home life and see you working unpaid overtime.
Today, many bosses have to be flexible in when their employees arrive at the office, as traffic jams, accidents in our cities regularly delay people from arriving to the office. When you’re driving to work, there is no option to work while your wait, but in an autonomous robotaxi future, you could start working even if your were delayed.
Later in the video, we see a dog in the vehicle, at first with its owners, then again on it’s own, with a special Cybercab Dog Mode on screen. Firstly its surprising that Tesla is suggesting pets would be allowed in a robotaxi, perhaps these would be privately-owned vehicles, because the chance of damage to the vehicle is far greater with pets.
In a robotaxi world that wants to drop you off and be straight on to the next profitable ride, it is a strange concept that the car would be parked, waiting for the owner to return. If this was a robotaxi, you’d expect to be paying per-minute to have the vehicle available for you (or your pet).
Another shot in the video shows a couple of kids in the car. I’m sure there’s plenty of parents that would love to send a robotaxi to safely pickup their kids and have them routed to home which would naturally be charged to the parent’s account.
This is a great demonstration of new possibilities that open up when cars can drive themselves.
With 1:06AM on the display and a sleeping passenger, Tesla clearly sees a role for the robotaxi to play in getting people home safely. If it’s a choice between a solo ride and sharing a cab with stranger, I think many would feel safer in the robotaxi.
What I find interesting is that the screen appears to know that you need darkness, with the main UI gone, replaced by dark mode (just the date/time) and the subtle blue route progress at the bottom of the display, a nice touch by the Tesla team.
The video also previews life with a Tesla robotaxi, after using the mobile app to request a ride, a push notification alerts you when the car is close (3 minutes away).
Once you get in, the car says ‘Welcome’ on the screen, and has your favourite preferences loaded, including seat position and temperature. I expect we’ll see many more preferences flow as well, including your favourite music, movies etc.
From the robotaxi launch event on October 10th, Tesla showed off plane-like experience of watching a movie and seeing the number of minutes remaining vs the minutes to your destination.
Tesla could allow riders to pause a video when exiting one trip, then resume it when you get in the next.