Cruise Control set at 100 kilometers per hour, you're driving down the highway, listening to Mozart. The kids are in the back seat watching "Rugrats" on the built-in television set. Then you glance at the screen of your personal computer, docked in the dashboard.
You say "map", and a detailed route to your destination flashes on-screen. Then you say "traffic", and you see a live video of the traffic flow three kilometers ahead. If it looked congested, you'd say "reroute" and the computer would offer several alternatives.
There's no need to reroute today, but as you listen to your voice-synthesised e-mail, you're distracted from the prime mover that pulls into your lane head. Your car senses it, and the cruise control automatically decelerates to maintain proper and safe highway space between you and the truck.
Fantasy? All the technology described above could become available in cars of every price range in the next few years.
The worldwide love affair with the car is back, and one of the chief reasons is that car makers can deliver more quickly on what the consumer wants - from better cup holders to concert-quality sound systems to vastly improved child seats.
It used to take up to six years to bring a car from concept to reality. But dramatic advances in automotive technology and in computer-aided design and manufacture mean that consumer feedback can be translated into steel, glass and plastic in a little more than two years.
These days many car manufacturers sponsor focus groups and styling clinics, where potential customers are asked what they think of new ideas, or even what they would like to see. And engineers and designers at some companies have been combined into "platform teams," working hand-in-glove with lifestyle and product specialists who try to discern the elusive combination of metal and mystique that strikes fire in the hearts of drivers. The result: ideas that were once only wild-eyed dreams find their way to our roadways.