But why bother? Why not just have a 3G wireless broadband node integrated right into the car? Then, a car could become its own little wi-fi or Bluetooth hotspot. All your wi-fi or Bluetooth devices could connect to the Internet using the car’s 3G node. Wouldn’t it be great for passengers to simply pop open their laptop, PDA, or wi-fi enabled phone in the car and have it just work? And because you’re connecting via IP, you have all the flexibility, reach and power of being on the Internet, not just connected to some proprietary, closed, auto-only network.

Almost anything you can do with a special auto-to-auto network, you can do with an IP network, and in many cases, do a better job with more choices and flexibility than a purpose-built auto network. Think of all the really cool applications you could do with integrated Internet access plus GPS. The car itself becomes a node on the internet. It could talk to its manufacturer’s vehicle support site, keeping track of driving records, trips, gas mileage and checking for service bulletins. This could be integrated with the service records for the car, assuming it is serviced at one of the manufacturer’s dealerships. If properly instrumented, problems could be diagnosed remotely.

And here’s something I’ve always wanted: be able to “talk” to my car’s internal computer system using my laptop. Why not? If the car has a full function little server in it, instead of those special purpose, non-integrable systems, the car’s server could present a web-site you could hit with your laptop through the car’s built-in wi-fi or Bluetooth network. And this could be tied in with service information at the manufacturer’s engineering and service sites. Now when the “Check Engine” light comes on, you could find out in plain English what’s wrong by going to car’s home page.

In terms of traffic and directional information, what could be better than being tied into the most up-to-date maps from a centralized repository, like Google maps? Real-time actual speeds could be forwarded to a central server (one you’d be able to choose, I’d hope) and traffic information would be thus crowd-sourced and redistributed out for rerouting around tie-ups.

Oh, and of course, you’d be able to use IP telephony over the link as well. Wouldn’t it be cool to be able to use Skype audio and maybe even video, right from the car? And by using either the GPS time information, or an NTP server on the net, the clock in the car would never be wrong again! And you’d never have to set it for time zones, since it knows where it is at all times. Now that would be a true GeekMobile!

So, there’s today’s brainstorm. I just found out through Twitter that Chrysler is indeed planning something like this for 2009. If you know of any other plans or projects like this, please let me know in the comments.