Minn Kota I-pilot System Remote Access W/bluetooth - 1866550 on 2040-parts.com

CES: GM to open the dashboard to developers

At last year's Autoweek Design Forum, father of the iPod and Nest Labs co-founder Tony Fadell suggested that automakers concentrate on designing and building cars, leaving handset makers to handle infotainment. The latest announcements from Ford and GM -- in conjunction with the International CES -- suggest that automakers would rather treat the dashboard space as a handset. Yesterday, Dearborn, Mich., announced the Ford Developer Program, which opens up Sync to outside application development; now General Motors has announced a similar initiative.

Top Gear: Tom Cruise, Cameron Diaz, Lewis Hamilton & Veyron Super Sports

Top Gear: The Stig, Tom Cruise & Cameron Diaz Update: We’ve added the Star in a reasonably priced car VT with Cruise and Diaz at the bottom. It’s live at the moment, but Top Gear have a habit of shutting down their clips, so we can’t guarantee it will continue to work. Yes, it’s Sunday again.

No sign of global auto meltdown at Tokyo Auto Salon

With more than 600 cars on display and a record number of exhibitors, nothing at the 2009 Tokyo Auto Salon tuner show hinted at the global economic downturn. As always, there was a great mix of styles, from hard-core, 1,000-hp, supertuned machinery to weird customized scooter tricycles. Auto manufacturers tried hard to capture the minds--if not the wallets--of the younger-than-30 crowd with customized versions of production cars, while tuners were busy persuading power junkies to choose them for their next engine modification.