This is not a vent board or any other kind of therapy. Before you hit the POST button, ask yourself if your contribution will add to the level of discussion going on.

Important notes on articles:

• Please do not copy entire articles into your post; rather, provide links to them.. We are now links-only for ALL Internet publications. If only a small portion of the article pertains to your post, Fair Use allows you to copy those one or two paragraphs, provided you cite the author's name and the publication for which he writes. Otherwise, put a link in the HTTP Link box.
• Even if you're copying a reference to an article, provide a link to the page from which the article came. We're trying to cut down on duplicate topics, and the posting process will check the link to your article to see if it's already being discussed on this board. At the very least, you'll save yourself some grief on the boards.
• If your first reaction after reading the article you're going to share is the author is uninformed / stupid / a jerk / all of the above, it's not worth sharing with anyone. Not every article needs to be discussed. The more the hair-pulling articles are discussed (e.g. ESPN Page 2), the more the authors will write hair-pulling articles.

Post being replied to

There's probably a reasonable middle ground between by ThreeD

disabling technology and accessibility technology.

I use the built-in call functions and do not find talking on the phone using the hands-free call technology distracts my attention from driving. I think it would be hard-pressed to establish that using such technology distracts drivers to the point of danger, above and beyond "non-device driving" (however defined).

When I was in graduate school, I had some peers in IO Psych working for a professor who was on contract with DOD (they had better fellowship pay than I) -- they were examining eye-movements during driving. What I recall is that there was a critical length of time the eyes could move away from the road and back to the road. I don't recall the length, but say that it was 0.5s. It was pretty clear data -- eyes away from the road for > 0.5s led to missed signals from environmental inputs or anticipating changing status, regardless of what the activity was (tuning radio, lighting a cigarette, looking at rider, finding change, etc.) and regardless of the intensity of the environment (e.g., heavy traffic with lots of changes versus low traffic). Eyes away for < .05s did not see an increase in missed inputs nor anticipation. There's more to it, but that's the basic gist and 0.5s is not the critical value, I'm just using it for example. I got fairly interested because of the very sophisticated dynamic system modeling.

So, you're correct in the sense that anything that takes peoples' eyes & attention (a much more slippery concept) away from the road is a potential distraction. It seems reasonable to add some qualifier like, "for longer than half-second."

HTown touches on this dilemma, I think. Drunk driving is a state of impairment that is present at all times. Distracted driving is is a state of impairment that is present at intervals. Essentially any driving with any thing that pulls eyes for longer than that is distracted driving. That's not a very useful definition and would be impossible to legislate. This is why I've always struggled with tying it down to a specific device/activity in the car.

Technology can help sense some of the signals of distracted driving (e.g., lane drifting) or missing sudden environmental inputs (e.g., auto-braking). Technology can also help integrate communications into the driver's experience without pulling eyes (e.g., voice commands).

What would be better still is for people to de-prioritize non-emergency related instant communication; that's not a legislation issue but a societal one.