(Photo: The Star)

What's a thousand-pound steel monster controlled entirely by a computer, no human required? It's a driverless car! And it's one step closer to legally operating on public roads. The Singularity is nigh, friends.

According to Ars Technica, the California State Senate officially passed SB 1289, which--following the creation of standards and performance requirements by the DMV--would allow robot cars to hit the open road.

Writes Ars:

California legislators have sent a bill to the governor’s desk that could push forward the development of autonomous cars in the Golden State. The new bill requires the state’s Department of Motor Vehicles to adopt new regulations, including safety standards and “performance requirements” for new autonomous vehicles. Once those new rules are put in place, the bill “would permit autonomous vehicles to be operated or tested on the public roads in this state.”

We spent years driving up and down that stretch of freeway between Palo Alto and San Francisco, so we understand California's eagerness to pass this bill. Driverless cars can't possibly be any more dangerous than the drivers sitting in traffic on the 101 right now.

Mr. Baptiste (jasonlbaptiste.com)

The first sound we heard upon ringing the doorbell at the Onswipe offices just off of Union Square was the pitter-pattering of puppy footsteps. "Is that a dog?" we asked aloud to the well-dressed man who was also waiting to be let into the office. Sure enough, an Onswipe employee opened the door and a scruffy white dog excitedly greeted us.

Once we were in the loft-like offices, out came TechStars alum Jason Baptiste, Onswipe's colorful founder, who after introducing himself made the dog (named Johnny) sit and shake. Johnny refused to do a spin though. "He'll do anything if you have food," acknowledged Mr. Baptiste, wearing a dapper grey suit and pink tie.

We were at Onswipe to discuss the company's recent growth, which has been on an impressively upward swing since February. Onswipe's staff has quadrupled to 25 in the last year, with plans to grow to 48 employees by year's end. The company also recently added two new executive level positions: former VP of AOL Video Richard Bloom as its first COO, and former VP of sales at Jumptap Jared Hand as its first CRO.

Onswipe is a platform for publishers to transform their presence on iPad, iPhone and Kindle Fire--and soon other devices--into beautiful experiences. By serving up both the content and the ads, Onswipe can anonymously collect data about the browsing habits of users, and use that information to better target ads based on interests. The number of page-views Onswipe's platform powers has increased by 344 percent since January, Mr. Baptiste told us.

"The mission of Onswipe is still the same," said Mr. Baptiste, once we'd settled into a conference room. "Apps are bullshit. A lot of companies love to pivot and change ever so slightly to something vastly different. Our mission from day one is to be the platform to power the way the world experiences the web on touch devices, reimagining it for devices that aren't built for onclick but for onswipe."

On an iPad, Onswipe renders web pages beautifully. They take on the appearance of glossy magazines--swiping through articles becomes a luxury. But Onswipe also serves ads in between articles, which have taken on a more print-like feel, boosting the bar for ads on the web. "Most ads on the web, they're not about emotion--they're about algorithm. They don't give you the storytelling that a print ad gives you. We think that's finally going to change," said Mr. Baptiste.

"I hate bad ads. Our altruistic mission is to fix ads on the Internet," he added. "In print they get ads that are so beautiful people rip them out and put them up on their wall. Why can't we do that with online ads?"

Toward the end of the meeting, Mr. Baptiste pulled up his own website so Betabeat could get a good look at Onswipe. A quote from Joan Didion's essay "Good-bye to All That," written in chalk on a patch of asphalt in Washington Square Park, dominated the screen.

"I love New York," said Mr. Baptiste. "That's why we've succeeded. There's just a certain energy. We hire people that are raw talent, hungry; they have a Silicon Valley-esque energy and hacker talent mixed with New York's own secret sauce. Onswipe takes the best of what New York does: emotion."

We wonder what Ms. Didion would have to say about that.

(Photo: Ink Head)

Valley-based startup accelerator Y Combinator celebrated its 15th demo day yesterday, with 75 fledgling startups pitching their ideas to a dazzling collection of idea-hungry VC firms and pageview-hungry press outlets. Here's what we think some of the companies do, based on their rather unpronounceable names.

Markupwand: Daily deals flash site for Harry Potter cosplayers.

Tapin: A British female rapper.

Amicus: It means friend in Latin, so maybe it's like Buddy Media, except for a time-shifted, papyrus-based social network.

Scoutzie: A reason to be sad Harper Lee is alive to see the tech boom.

Vayable: Mobile payments network for sex workers.

Hubcilla: A place to store your ferrets.

Microeval: A store for tiny anvils.

BufferBox: Vagina shining service, "like shoe-shining, but for vees."

IMGFave: Sony attempts a Twitter client.

Plivo: A store for buying virtual plows for Farmville.

Airbrite: A modern-day, super high tech Light Brite.

Everyday.Me: A social network for narcissists.

Spinpunch: A punchbowl on a lazy Susan.

Mth: A social network for never-nudes.

ProFig: Like PETA, but for figs.

Coco Controller: Ice-T.

Zapier: Birchbox for swords.

Collections.me: A social network for hoarders.

Keychain Logistics: An excel-like tool for mapping out which Claire's keychains you and your friends had in middle school.

Survata: For people that call their yoga teacher a "guru."

Referly: A referral program for door-to-door weed dealers.

Instacart: Artistic filters for MarioKart screenshots.

Virool: Spittle that forms at the edge of your mouth when you spend too long looking at a screen.

BigCalc: An iPad-sized calculator.

Knowmia: An encylopedia for bulimics.

Kamcord: What Kimmy from Full House calls her DVR.

Tomoguides: Sushi app where you have to care for your sushi like a Tamagotchi.