Peter GleickMar 9
Interesting to think that Donald Trump may have, completely inadvertently and at a horrific cost, finally woken up the world to how urgent it is we get off our dangerous addiction to fossil fuels.
Electrify everything.
Ban the production of gasoline-powered vehicles.
Tax oil companies dry.
Subsidize all renewables and EVs.
Show threadEggs now in different baskets.

@petergleick 1/2 Perhaps in the middle of all of this we can not lose sight of the fact that, modern electric cars are, from a data privacy perspective an absolute disaster and incredibly invasive.

I do not want to give up my anonymous petrol-engined car that cannot leak any data and cannot be hacked remotely until I can buy an electric car that has these features.

Get rid of the iPads in the middle of dashboards. And the surveillance cameras festooned all over the cars.

Mar 9 at 8:23amWeb
Show threadEggs now in different baskets.Mar 9

@petergleick 2/2 With open FOSS computer systems that are free of the control of surveillance capitalist billionaires.

Such that I can install LinuxMint Nissan Leaf Edition and rid myself of all financial dependencies on corporations who really do not need to fleece me or anyone else any more.

And rid myself of the inevitable enshittifiction that follows closed source walled garden digital ecosystems.

https://youtu.be/T4Upf_B9RLQ

A Day in the Life of an Ensh*ttificator

YouTube
Show threadIcyBeeMar 9
@the_wub @petergleick This is not a feature of electric cars, but of all modern cars.
Show threadEggs now in different baskets.Mar 9

@IcyBee @petergleick Yes correct, but I live in a country where 16 petrol cars were sold last month. After a total of 487 petrol vehicles sold in the whole of 2025.

So when I have money for one of todays new cars, in about 15 years time when depreciation has given me a helping hand it is unlikely that there will be any secondhand petrol cars for sale.

https://www.abcnyheter.no/livsstil/norge-2026-bare-16-nye-bensinbiler-er-registrert/1441927

Norge 2026: Bare 16 nye bensinbiler er registrert

Trenden fra 2025 slår enda tydeligere ut i år.

ABC Nyheter
Show threadKernel Bob Mar 9
@the_wub @petergleick Keep an eye on Slate Auto. They're promising no data connection on their EV trucks. They're doing it to cut costs, but it happens to be a privacy bonus.
Show threadEggs now in different baskets.Mar 9

@kbob @petergleick

I am aware of Slate but no thanks. I might as well buy a Tesla if I really want to support a billionaire.

In such a scenario I would prefer to wait until batteries are small enough to provide a weight to range ratio closer to that of a fossil fueled car and convert one of my old cars to an EV. Or buy an L7e class car with the minimum of electronics in it.

https://www.newsweek.com/slate-auto-confirms-funding-bezos-involvement-2069605

Slate Confirms $700 Million in Funding, Bezos Investment

Slate Auto, the startup electric vehicle manufacturer, confirmed to Newsweek that the company closed on $700 million in Series A and B funding in late 2024.

Newsweek
Show threadBeeCyclingMar 9
@the_wub @petergleick The best alternative to a petrol driven car is no car. (Though it's going to take a lot of work to get America to the point where not having a car is viable for most people, given the way they've ruined their cities.)
Show threadEggs now in different baskets.Mar 9

@beecycling @petergleick Living without a car would be very different in this bit of rural Norway.

We are nowhere as remote from services as many people in the US are.

So I think that cars are going to be an essential part of our lives for some time to come.

Do we want surveillance economy vehicles that make billionaires richer or do we want something else that we have much more control over that meet our transport needs in similar ways?