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New Car Mode for iPhone will prevent texting and driving

Before you leap into the future and let your car decide when you’re not paying attention on the road, give your Smartphone a chance to keep you focused now and eliminate texting and driving. Designers Joey Cofone and Michael Vanderbyl have created Car Mode, “an integrated setting in iOS 7 that turns off all visual distraction on the phone’s screen,”explains Cofone on his website.

Designers think that Apple, the world’s leading Smartphone manufacturer, should address a problem that is responsible for 1.3 million crashes annually in America and hope that it will incorporate this technology into its phones rather than leaving it as a separate app. Cofone remarks, “This way new users can immediately feel familiar with the new functions and seamlessly apply them to their life.” Currently, similar technology can be seen in some Windows handsets and Android phones like the Moto X.

You can use GPS navigation and handsfree calling feature even during Car Mode. Image by fastcodesign.com

Designed keeping road safety in mind and inspired by the familiar Airplane Mode in smartphones, Car Mode disables the internet and cellular network, as soon as a vehicle starts moving. However, Car Mode does allow features like hands-free calling, music, and navigation to operate. Car Mode aims to keep things as “visually non-distinct as possible so as to remove the urge from users to take their eyes off the road and look down at their iPhone,” reports iPhoneInformer.

How does Car Mode work?

Car mode connects your iPhone to your vehicle via Bluetooth. Once that happens, it pushes your calls to voice mail and sends an auto reply to people texting you while you’re driving. In case of iPhones that do not have Bluetooth, Car Mode can be selected manually. Drivers get no onscreen alerts, buzzes, or beeps that could distract them and put their lives in danger. Your iPhone displays all the notifications once the car stops and the ignition is turned off.

Will people actually use Car Mode?

Some wonder if drivers will actively use this technology, especially since it is something they are not forced to adopt and can choose to opt out of very easily. Only some very direct incentives can encourage people to use it. Although, saving yourself from the possibility of a crash should be incentive enough, we all know that isn’t working. Confone suggests that Apple partner with insurance companies that offer lower rates for increased car mode use.

Car Mode is only a concept now but a concept that took the top spot at the recent AIGA Command X competition. Unlike other conceptual technologies that make it easier to stay connected (and distracted), Car Mode works to tune out much of the world — at least the world that exists outside of what you should be paying attention to on the road..