Want to Control a Car With an iPad? There's an App for That [VIDEO]

Credit:

How do you get any cooler than an autonomous car? Try an autonomous car controlled by an iPad.

Developed by the AutoNOMOS Labs project at Germany's Freire University, this project combines a modified Volkswagen Passat, equipped with sensors, GPS, radar and scanners, with an iPad app that dictates coordinates and other user information to the car.

Check out this video to see the first autonomous German taxi ride, all controlled using an iPad.

I'm still not quite sold on the concept of self-driving cars (look, I've seen The Jetsons, that stuff is cool and all, but the robots revolt from time to time), but I love the idea of telling a cab my destination in advance.

Maybe the first step to autonomous cabs would be finding a way for us to interface with the GPS systems inside street cabs. That way, we could let them know where we're going so that a dispatch system could happen more seamlessly. We know of a few startups working on that very problem.

Or maybe I should stop trying to be practical and just enjoy the iPad-controlled Volkswagen. Yeah, I think I'll do that.