Law enforcement agencies are increasingly using sophisticated cameras, called “automated license plate readers” or ALPR, to scan and record the license plates of millions of cars across the country. These cameras, mounted on top of patrol cars and on city streets, can scan up to 1,800 license plate per minute, day or…

Low-digit license plates are big in Arabia. Abu Dhabi’s 1 sold for $14 million in 2008 while in neighboring Dubai 1 is registered to Sheikh Mohammed, the emirate’s ruler. This is plate number 1 from Oman attached to 612 hp of German bliss and I saw it go like hell.

Here in the USA, you can almost always spot an Indian product. This is very different than Chinese products, which are so numerous and varied as to be anonymous. But Indian products you find in the America, they almost all have this artisan/handmade quality. Whether it's jewelry in bins at Anthropologie or manhole…

In America, no form of personal expression is greater than the vanity license plate. Vanity plates give ordinary people the platform they need to show the world just how clever or creepy or kind of dickish they really are. 

We're no strangers to motor vehicle departments restricting certain words from personalized license plates. Typically, genitalia, other sex themes, and things related to fecal matter and racism (same thing, really) are verboten. But what about words like PITA, SCOTCH, and RAIN?

Georgia! It's a bastion of decency and morality nestled deep within the Bible Belt. And for that reason, state officials can't let people drive around with whatever they want on their vanity license plates. Of course not! Such brazen displays of impropriety could upset people and cause them to riot in the streets.

No, it's not a Photoshop, this Virginia plate reading "RU 18YET" is real. We checked.

The Camry has never been a lusted after sports car, but in its day it was something more than the beige appliance it's become. Specifically, it was a Forest Green sedan (or coupe or wagon) you could be proud to own. Now it just makes you bland and, as this plate shows, invisible.

I got insanely lucky the other day driving north on Highway 101. In a stretch of no fewer than 30 miles, I passed a Volvo P1800S, Jensen Interceptor and a Mercedes 300SL. And all of these cars had one noticeable thing in common: they all had modern California license plates.

As we increasingly cluster in ideologically like-minded niches, our experiences with social media become more like highlight video. Some obnoxious buddy is saying BOOYA! about something on DailyKos, or someone else is demanding that we please trade the idiot president to another country for two prospects and cash.