How would you like to be more connected with your vehicle? This may sound more appealing to those of us with longer work commutes. Toyota and Salesforce.com are going to team up and make this a reality. The program, referred to as Toyota Friend, will be a private social network that connects customers with their cars, dealers and the automaker. This is an effort to entice more people to buy electric and hybrid cars.

Now, after further research, I have found some interesting possibilities that Toyota may toy with including monitoring their drivers’ health and mood. Related to automobiles, the network would relay vehicle specific information to the owner, like maintenance tips or alerts. While the second part is a great idea, I think the first part sounds a little creepy and unnecessary. In a society that seems to be to be getting more and more “big brother” everyday, this is just another straw and eventually we are going to break the camel’s back. Does your car really need to know your blood pressure or know when you’re stressed? It comes back to automobile manufacturers adding gizmos and gadgets simply because they can I guess. I’m not sure that would make me any more inclined to shill out the money for an electric car.

I do however applaud Toyota and Salesforce.com for their collaboration efforts in trying to become more interactive with consumers, even if it is at a more personal level. A lot of organizations could learn from this and become a little more proactive in reaching out to its customer base. The social media boom will no doubt make this a priority and easier than it’s ever been to connect. On the other hand, outside of the pertinent information, how much are you willing to share with companies?