Cars can be purely functional or they can be symbols of status. In the future when a person goes through their midlife crisis, they won’t just buy a fancy car that will look nice in the driveway; they’ll get the one with the holographic butler on the inside.
For reasons beyond comprehension—perhaps in an attempt to drive the wedge between the haves and the have nots even deeper—luxury car company Bentley released a mock-up of a concept for a virtual butler that will live in its vehicles to serve as a reminder to the driver just how rich they are.
The British manufacturer hasn’t issued much in terms of details on the future virtual assistant. One would imagine it would function similarly to a Siri or Google Now-style service, just with a projected face to go along with the voice.
The Mirror reported that Bentley design director Stefan Sielaff said future cars “will of course feature yet-to-be-invented connectivity and technologies… that enhance the lives of our luxury millennial customers, and I strongly believe that how these technologies are integrated into the cabin will become ever more important.”
The decision to market toward wealthy millennials is an interesting one, considering millennials don’t care about cars and are the poorest generation in a quarter-century thanks to falling wages, rising costs of living, and the nearly-permanent anchor that is student debt. But hey, there’s sure to be at least a couple people to make it out of the mire and want to drive around with a hologram at their side.
Here’s some suggestions for tasks that the virtual butler might be able to do to help make the ride better for the rich millennial behind the wheel: read stock prices and congratulate the driver on smart investments; search for high school classmates on Facebook and rate how sad their lives are on a scale of one to ten; count each dollar in the driver’s bank account aloud; suggest taking extra left turns just for fun and to burn more fuel; find a restaurant with a 3-star rating on Yelp, then laugh and say, “just kidding, that place is for poor people.”
There’s no indication as to when or if Bentley’s holographic butler will ever make it into the backseat of its vehicles. If it does, though, make sure you download the snooty accent package to really get the full effect.
H/T Business Insider
