Sharon Machlis on a Pioneer announcement about its new dashboard system that aims to keep drivers connected to their social networks… while driving:

I have a simple rule when it comes to what’s OK to do while driving: If you wouldn’t want your surgeon doing it while operating on your brain, don’t do it behind the wheel.

Pioneer’s take:

By providing a larger touchscreen unit installed in the dash that features a user interface specifically designed for the automotive environment and complemented by voice control features, we reduce the risk of distraction while driving.

People are already distracted enough when driving, with in-car radios, sat-navs, and hands-free kits for mobile phones (when they bother to use them), let alone other activities, such as eating and putting on make-up. But, hey, I’m sure Pioneer must have done plenty of work on this, rather than irresponsibly shoving a piece of unnecessary and dangerous technology on to the market. Because, clearly, people won’t be further distracted from not hitting things on or near the road when they’re being piped the latest Facebook and Twitter updates that couldn’t possibly wait until they’ve finished guiding several tons of metal at high speed. WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG?

(Hat tip: Ian Betteridge.)

Top Tory Toff David Cameron revealed earlier today what “we’re all in this together” really means:

• The VAT hike, which hits poorest people worst (since they spend a larger proportion of their incomes on goods that have VAT), will stay.
• Cameron hopes the 50% tax rate, which only affects top earners, will be scrapped.

Hey, Tories, why not just allow the richest in the country not not pay any tax at all? (Oh, you already did that.)

I have the utmost respect for indie developers, especially those who do really good work. For example, without the fantastic Scrivener and WriteRoom, my writing experience when working for magazines would be much less pleasant.

Something that’s pretty common among indie devs is reasonable price-tags. Instead of charging HUGE PILES OF CASH for even a tiny upgrade, you’ll find fantastic apps for bugger-all, with free upgrades for quite some time. This is something the Mac App Store should assist with further when it comes to indies, providing potential exposure, robust hosting and upgrades, and a simple payment mechanism.

Sometimes, though, people are dicks and don’t get the challenges indie devs face. Over at Sophiestication, evil indie dev Sophia has—like some other devs—announced that one of her apps will now be Mac App Store only. The thing is, she’d previously promised free upgrades until version 3, and this new version is 2.5. THE HORROR.

Clearly, Sophia should personally go round to every prior purchaser’s house, apologise profusely and perhaps offer to, say, do their shopping for a week, for free. Never mind that the new Mac App Store price for the app is $4.99 rather than $19.95 (i.e. effectively a tiny upgrade price and about the same cost as a couple of cups of coffee). Never mind that if you love the app you probably got more than $19.95 of value out of it anyway. Never mind that Sophia could have labelled the new version 3.0 and gotten away with it, despite her thinking that doing so would have been dishonest. No, bitch away at being ‘ripped off’ by an indie dev who creates polished, accessible, affordable software, who’s had to make a really tough business decision.

All you people moaning about how terribly disappointed you are, get over your fucking selves. It’s five bucks. If you like the software, support it. If not, just sod off and stop bitching about the amount of money you probably piss away daily (and literally) at Starbucks.

Slashdot reports that VLC has been pulled from the App Store. Inevitably, the article is followed by lots of comments about Apple being some kind of Evil Big Brother, utterly ignoring the fact that it was pulled due to VLC developer Rémi Denis-Courmont being a bit of a dick about a perceived clash between the GNU General Public License and the App Store terms of use.

Still, I’m not terribly sad. All iOS devices lack the storage for loads of on-board video and VLC was a bit iffy anyway. If you’ve a PC or Mac lurking about the place, I instead highly recommend grabbing a copy of Air Video (£1.79, App Store) or StreamToMe (£1.79, App Store), both of which enable live-to-iOS-device streaming and conversion of files accessible to your computer. It’s a bit annoying leaving a computer on, but these apps offer a hugely flexible system, and they also (assuming you have the right leads) provide a simple way to get content from a drive connected to your Mac or PC to your TV, just by using an iOS device.

I’m personally also hoping that 2011 will bring full AirPlay support for third-party apps, enabling converted content to be fired wirelessly to an Apple TV, or, if Jobs decides that’s the Worst Idea Ever, for the apps to be used as a remote to control the same app running on another device. AirPlay’s great, but it gets old wandering across the room and finding a fiddly virtual button to pause a movie when the dog decides he needs a wee.

TechRadar reviews the Samsung Galaxy Player 50. I’ve long been amazed that while companies are clamouring to rip off the iPhone (and, more recently, the iPad), none have really taken on the iPod touch. And yet Apple’s iPhone-without-the-phone is a breakout hit, especially with kids, where it’s often replacing a DS or PSP, or with people happy with a simpler mobile phone but eager to embrace mobile apps.

So, given that Apple hugely rips off the entire world when it comes to pricing, surely Android wins through, right? Spoiler: TechRadar thinks the Samsung Galaxy Player 50 is utter shit.

The review notes that you get some extras over Apple’s device, notably a microSD card slot and built-in GPS; also, it’s £40 less than the equivalent iPod touch. But, like so many others competing against Apple, Samsung’s tried ticking off checkboxes on a specs sheet rather than polishing what really matters to the majority of consumers. For example, the screen boasts a miserly 240 x 400 pixels (pathetic compared to the Retina display on the Apple device and similar screens on Android phones), lacks a front-facing camera and also cannot record video in HD.

Amazingly, TechRadar found things got worse when they started using it:

It spends the majority of its time crashed when you try to launch apps, or even when you just wake it from the lock screen. It’s unusable in the sense that you are completely unable to use it.

Quite how such a device managed to score 1.5/5 is beyond me, but with other reviewers having similar problems, something is becoming clear: Apple isn’t entirely the Apple of old. Its kit isn’t cheap by any means, but it’s more aggressively priced than you’d think. This is perhaps the real reason why we’ve not seen dozens of iPod touch clones, and also why most of the incoming Android slates that aren’t total garbage are as pricey—or even more expensive than—Apple’s iPad.