Bmw slowly becoming a really bad car
Slowly?
They stopped being good cars in 2004. Twenty years they’ve been shit, and people are still swallowing the gravy.
Bad Motor Vehicle
People act like subscriptions are a new thing for cars, and somehow mentally gloss over the fact that they have to physically go in to renew their energy subscription weekly, not to mention the quarterly, and bi-annual subscriptions for oil and various maintenance respectively.
Everything has always been a subscription, you’re just a frog that’s well done.
Don’t get me started on your road subscription.
The key differences is utilities you’re paying for the generation & maintenance of key resources - without gas, water and electricity we wouldn’t be able to survive. Road tax you’re helping to pay for the renewal and upkeep of the road surface (among other local services)… Left alone the road will degrade & will become unusable.
Suspension as a Service is milking what should be a perpetual cost when purchasing the vehicle. If the hardware is already installed, it should be available for the owner to use. They’re not paying for the upkeep of the vehicle, or even ensuring the suspension remains functional… All they’ve done is placed the function behind a pay wall. They can argue they’re maintaining the software, but it’s utter bullshit and I hate the fact this has become a norm within B2B (for example network appliances)
At least with luxury subscriptions such as Spotify, Netflix, NYT, etc you’re getting access to their content, which they renew. Here you get access to something you should have had access to from day 1.
I think what hurts my brain besides the babbling, is the lack of citations.
Are you just trying to sound smart and in-the-know? Bruh, sources matter for such bold claims.
You just blow in from stupid town?
I’m getting vibes of “Yet you participate in society. Curious!”
That kind of mental gymnastics gives me a headache.
Gas oil need money to drill and refind from sources and car suspension does not, it maybe need to get a check up or replace once in a long while and not every months
Today I learned upkeep of heavy machinery is considered a subscription service.
I bet you think drinking water is a subscription service too.
I bet you think drinking water is a subscription service too.
That probably isn’t the example you want to use. I pay a monthly fee to get clean water pumped to my apartment, as do most people.
You do literally get a monthly bill for it, so… yeah?
Bootlicker spotted
Anyone that buys a car that has shit like this is a fool.
The article implies nobody even knew it already had this functionality. I’m sure the customers weren’t told either.
I’ve heard for years that BMW was doing shit like this. Heated seats is what it started with. Toyota did it with remote start but I think they backed down after the outrage.
True, however we must fight this because otherwise, when you need to buy a car, there won’t be an option without a shitty subscription attached
Remember that some of is live in shitty cities with bad or no alternative ways of moving around
I agree totally, but I don’t think it will matter with new vehicles. They’re going to track you and spay on you more than your phone. I will forever drive old stuff. I’m a mechanic so that’s a super easy option for me. I won’t own anything new enough to spy on me, my car will be MY car.
100%, I am not a mechanic but I like auto work and have learned most of the basics. It is not really enough to own an older car forever but it should help out to some extent.
If you ever think you’re in over your head, just remember, It’s just nuts and bolts.
We need a FOSS car…
I’d hoped that BMW (and the rest of the automotive industry) would have learned from the subscription heated seats debacle.
Oh well, no Beemers for me.
We already pay shitty spare parts subscription for the shitty cars they make.
BMW dances in bare ass in front of Chinese erect cock.
The level of subscriptions has become insane
We start again with a strange Germany in Europe:)
Germany; don’t do this please…
Just don’t buy it
That strategy repeatedly fails, companies in the same market will see it extracting more profit and start doing it too.
Then don’t buy their products either.
Just don’t buy any car if they all do this in the future? People need a better answer, don’t find comfort in “just don’t buy it”.
How about you just stop consoooming. There will always be cars without this and if there aren’t: there are more sustainable modes of transportation anyways.
Why is this bad in a nutshell.
A) The only way to control access to this feature is to lock down and phone home. If it doesn’t phone home then when someone figures out a way around your present security its possible for someone to sell said features forever. Such DRM could hurt repeatability by accident or more likely on purpose.
B) There is no reason to fail open so even if BMW is still chugging when they stop taking your cars phone calls and retires those servers you get no more feature.
C) The amount spent over the lifespan of a car wherein people opt to take care of their valuable asset absolutely dwarfs the cost able to be extracted up front
D) This functionality opens the door to a hacker not just turning off your features but turning off your car. This includes state sponsored attackers and people who are just generally pissed off at the geopolitical actions of your country of origin. If you are in the US that is a lot of fucking people.
E) Product segmentation on average increases the amount you can extract per user. Allowing segmentation by features turn on or off in software by the month it allows far greater segmentation with no reasonable expectation that the baseline will be lower. This means the lowest end user of a model pays the same for even less. The median user pays somewhat more and the max user pays a LOT more.
F) This means wholly paid for used cars now come with a car payment to the manufacturer.
Now there are half a hundred people on the boards of these companies and 338M of us in the US. 449M in the EU. There is no reason to allow this misfeature to continue to be a thing in our markets. If automakers don’t like those restrictions any one of them can opt to most of the most valuable markets in the world and find their fortunes exclusively in China while their competitors eat their former marketshare.
C and e don’t sound like bad things
All of it is a reason for people to vote not to allow it. This can be accomplished federally or via initiatives in states. If a handful states comprising 30-50% of the pop wont allow it then it will be dead.
Seems like forcing liability would be more successful
More successful or more beneficial?
Forcing the company to be liable for the data they collect would be more likely to stop them from doing it than trying to outlaw them collecting it
No it wouldn’t because poor people can trivially be kept out of court all kinds of ways from binding arbitration to half assed enforcement. As a rule if you want someone to NOT do something you have to tell them they can’t do it!
No it wouldn’t because elected officials don’t represent poor people
But we’re talking about buying new BMWs anyway. Your logic was just too stupid to not laugh at
Forgot one that was mentioned up-thread, which was that even if you don’t pay for the fancy suspension you will still have to pay for fancy suspension parts if they break.
I actually think this is a great idea. Hear me out.
They fit the hardware that you can’t touch while the Motor plan is active, but when the right to repair legislation kicks in, and we start debating whether we actually own the cars we buy, all these scumbag practices will mean that any car outside of the Motorplan should be able to run cracked OS’s and everyone gets free BMW features on their cars after motorplan expires.
I vote they keep going for a bit, then they get their asses handed to them with out of maintenance plan service options and 3rd party features.
If all the cars are the same price I’ll buy the one with the upgrade options and then not pay for them.
I’ll buy the one without an internet connection to be checking if I am subscribed or not.
When I said I wanted Forza in the car this isn’t exactly what I was gaming for.
I’m never buying a BMW again. I had an electric i3 which had an inverter (charger) failure. BMW wanted €12k to fix it. Thankfully an independent offered to do it for 4K. But BMW still wanted 3K just to plug it in and authenticate the new block. Nothing else, just “bless” it. Made the fix cost-prohibitive so we just had to scrap the car. The battery, which most people fear, was fine on this 8 year old car.
Even 4k sounds utterly insane for an inverter, but maybe I am wrong on that. Insane. Yeah I won’t be buying a BMW ever.
Inverter + install + testing. It’s deep in the car so a lot has to come out (I was told).
Luxury car dealers do that all the time. The Volvo dealership quoted me $2800 to get my car to pass extension, about $1500 of which was just tires.
I got a set of tires from Costco for like $800, and then an independent mechanic said everything else was fine and charged me $100 for inspection and emissions.
I know, but in the past the independent dealers didn’t have to deal directly with BMW for fixes. Now with all the authentication needed you can’t just get a replacement part from anywhere any more. Similar to how Apple locked down its batteries, BMW is doing the same.
They can lock down their revenue potential, fine by me
I see many more Teslas on the streets than BMWs in my country and in my city.
And I live in Europe.
Fuck you BMW, who the fuck are you and where you go:)))
You wouldn’t download a Car.
Yes. Yes I would.
Man, never thought I’d see the day that after market car crackz become an industry.
Soon, coming to a piracy site near you: [RZR] BMW i3 crack - Full (Heated seats + suspension + AC unlock + headlight fixes)1.05b.rar
:))))) Amen!
Wouldn’t mind those sweet tunes coming back though.
We’ve come full circle to downloading and running things with titles like:
“BMWaReZ_UnSUSSer+HeetSeeter-v4.20.69.appimage”
carwarez, websites that look like they came from the matrix with magnet links and mega links.
And can a car your rooted pass periodic inspection?
keep original backup, restore, restore new backup afterwards.
😎
Hire a third party to do your tune-ups, specificly one that is jailbreak and hack friendly.
Got it, don’t buy cars built after 2010.
Import something old and fun! Cars from smaller countries have lower mileage and can be cheap because they aren’t as valuable as a comparable car from the US. It isn’t hard to find a 25 year old car with about 50,000 miles on it.
JDM cars are especially nice now because of how weak the YEN is. Look outside the popular JDM cars and there are tons of things with easy to find parts for dirt cheap.
Or hell, get a not top trim of a popular model, and you can get something cheap. Want a station wagon built on the same platform as the Nissan Skyline? The Automatic Stageas are cheaper because tuners don’t want them.
Nissan Rasheens with the 1500cc engine are easy to maintain and have an engine that was used in some American cars, get the first true AWD CUV for about $5000 plus import fees.
Another cheap option is a Toyota Caldina, get a reliable awd station wagon with a nice interior for 5 or 6 grand including import fees. (Avoid the 2000ish GTT version with a turbo, turbo manifold is prone to warping on that engine)
Where are you finding things like this? What’s parts availability like?
I used picknbuy24 to get a Nissan Tiida for $1200 USD with like 25k miles. Parts are normally the same as they are on already imported models.
Carfromjapan.com has the best search features I’ve found, once you know what you’re looking for https://www.goo-net-exchange.com/ is also nice because they translate the car condition sheets.
Parts availability depends on the car. For the Rasheen for example most of the engine parts can be found at any parts store for the 1500 and 2000 cc engine versions cause those engines were also in American cars. I’ve also found English websites that are easy to order just about any parts you want for a Rasheen including body panels.
Once you find something that interests you just Google that car name parts and you can usually find someone talking online about how owning that car has been for them.
big oil licking their lips and nodding their heads
Are there any electric cars that aren’t glorified smartphones on wheels? Something a grandma can drive without ending up in the wrong menu.
The Bolt is ok. It has a screen and Android Auto and stuff, but I only use it for Android Auto navigation and energy stats when I’m curious. For pretty much everything else, there are good ol’ fashioned buttons.
Oh, it does have OnStar and some stuff associated with that, but GM discontinued the worst of it after a class action lawsuit.
My wife used to drive an electric Smart Car for her work. It had a range of 60 miles (less in the winter), and she called it a glorified golf cart. But it was perfect for the 20 or so miles she’d drive each day.
Got it, thanks
Probably safe up to 2016 as long as it’s not luxury brand
One of our cars is a 2016 GM and I just unscrewed the cell antenna instead of ripping out the cell module. Tracking disabled, or at least unreliable. The subscription nav is useless and easy to ignore. I would like to figure out how to prevent the siriusxm ads built into the infotainment system, still.
I look forward to better infotainment hacks down the road.
Not necessarily. My 2015 SEAT (for folks in the North America: That’s basically Volkswagen) is one of the latest cars that do not completely fuck you over. TPMS is passive, so you don’t need expensive sensors. You can also update the maps on your own (OK, here they pull you over if you don’t know the simple trick). Parts are also cheap.
no, SEAT IS VW
I own a Seat Ibiza 2021. To me it’s one of the last Ibiza to give value for your money. Totally reliable vehicles.
This is why I don’t mourn Western car companies getting slaughtered by Chinese EVs. They can’t really provide value by nickel and diming customers with subscriptions for components already installed on their privacy-invading overpriced cars.
One of the reasons electric cars were able to outcompete ICE-specialized companies is because they undercut on all sorts of nice to haves like buttons and pieces that they forgo by using a screen, wifi, updates, beta testing.
But they don’t pass on those cost savings to you. They are even sold as luxury products. They even take the carbon credits. That’s bullshit if you are serious about mainstream adoption.
ICEs are doing all of that shit now too. The truth is ICEs are fucking overpriced and manufacturers didn’t want to lose money.
You do realize all car companies do scummy things? BYD along with others uses parts serialization so you can’t install any parts unless BYD installs it for you an updates the software to take the new serial number.
I think you’re thinking of Xiaomi, Louis Rossman did a video assuming they were doing Apple-style serialization but all it was doing was blocking installation of self-driving if the headlights weren’t standard. It wasn’t DRMing brake pads or preventing buying headlights from a junkyard, there was a functional reason.
With each company that gets away with doing this crap, the more companies will add these artificial locks to the products that thwy sell.
If there isn’t legal protections for consumers, ot won’t be long before there are no consumer friendly options available to buy.
