• @golli@lemm.ee
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    1807 months ago

    If once you do not succeed, just try again next year. They tried and backtracked putting heated seats behind a paywall not even a year ago see here.

    Unless laws are made to make this fundamentally illegal, they’ll just keep pushing until it sticks. And once one manufacturer succeeds, they’ll all follow.

  • @db2@lemmy.world
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    2237 months ago

    Oh look, another reason not to buy BMW, I’ll just add it to the other 456788656752 reasons.

    • @jonne@infosec.pub
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      807 months ago

      The problem is that once one manufacturer starts doing this, they’ll all do it, so you won’t even have the option of buying a new car without a subscription.

    • @helenslunch@feddit.nl
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      7 months ago

      I was a BMW mechanic from 2009-2012. I can’t believe anyone buys them after what I’ve seen. The engines are all made of plastic and start to literally crumble to pieces and leak oil from absolutely everywhere after ~70k miles. We had to have customers sign disclosures on these cars because inevitably they would just crumble to pieces when we went in to replace one part and we’d end up having to replace others to reassemble it. Or we would pressure-test the cooling system to find a leak and end up creating several more.

      On their V8s there’s a plastic cooling tube that runs from front to back on the engine. The tube itself is like $10 but you had to disassemble the entire engine to access it so it would cost several thousand $ in labor.

      We eventually started selling an aftermarket CNC aluminum one that was threaded and expanded into the hole. We would just beat the old one out with a hammer and thread the new one in in a couple hours and they’d never have that problem again. Why BMW couldn’t think of that is beyond me. The people who did made buckets of money selling aluminum tubes for hundreds of dollars just because they could.

      You might expect cost cutting like that from a Kia or something but not from a car that’s advertised as a premium brand and sold at premium prices.

      You’re literally just paying more for less.

      • @db2@lemmy.world
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        77 months ago

        The Buick 3800 had a tube like that on top, it would crack from thermal stresses and piss out hot coolant. There was an aluminum aftermarket replacement like you describe but it was Dorman and a cheap fix. Buick also addressed the problem in later versions. I miss that engine.

      • @SreudianFlip@sh.itjust.works
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        27 months ago

        I used to own a W124 series Benz (bought used for 5% of sticker price, I ain’t no fauntelroy). Nearly everything on it was redundant or excessively skookum.

        When systems that weren’t as rugged started going down, like the vacuum controllers for doors or the 4matic computer etc, the car still worked safely with reduced convenience. A few minor design flaws like the wiring harness but that’s it. Room to work under the hood, too.

        It was built in '93 when the engineers still ran the company.

        Current main driver is the super reliable '03 CRV.

    • @iamanurd@midwest.social
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      37 months ago

      I love my bmw plug in hybrid. I don’t see myself ever paying for a subscription though. Maybe if it comes with pizza, but even then it’s unlikely.

        • @unexposedhazard@discuss.tchncs.de
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          7 months ago

          Please do if possible.

          Seriously tho, was it so hard to understand that i was pointing out that all big car companies are starting to do this?

          If this is a reason not to buy a BMW then its a reason not to buy any modern car. Which it is imo.

          • @db2@lemmy.world
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            127 months ago

            The problem is a huge number of cars were removed and destroyed which would otherwise have been in the used market. It’s a big reason why even used cars are priced so high. Buying used isn’t what it used to be.

            https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Car_Allowance_Rebate_System

            And they want to do it again not because it helped anyone get a car but because it let them make the prices so stupidly high.

            I agree that new cars suck but they’re removing the stocks of used cars that would be worth buying at any price and at our expense.

            • @unexposedhazard@discuss.tchncs.de
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              87 months ago

              Agree with that yep, its also already been shown years ago that modding used cars into electric cars is totally doable, economic and saves fuckloads of resources. Same thing happening with tractors too btw. Lots of farmers are buying up old tractors because they can actually repair them on site when they break down. With modern ones they have to wait for some asshole from john deer to come in with a debugging laptop to do the exact same thing for lots of money and downtime.

      • @MisterFrog@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        While this is completely true, it’s a bit tone-deaf. Fuck cars, but many people barely have a choice because their public transport consists of a handful of busses that come once an hour and nothing is close by.

        As an aside, I spend a whopping total of about $1/day (edit Australian $, so less USD) on maintenance and electricity for my electric cargo bike. I go about 17 km each way to work and the funny thing is it’s only about 10 mins longer than driving, lol

        • @unexposedhazard@discuss.tchncs.de
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          07 months ago

          Yeah i know many people dont really have much of a choice, see the thread nex to your comment. I was more intending to talk shit about modern cars that all seem to have this shit.

        • Blaster M
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          17 months ago

          Imagine a bus coming once an hour… try only twice a day for the entire county… early morning and late night.

          • @MisterFrog@lemmy.world
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            17 months ago

            💀 where is this?

            … Re-read before I sent. I thought this said country, lol.

            Yikes, why even have a bus at that point?

  • @DarkSurferZA@lemmy.world
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    107 months ago

    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.

      • @SreudianFlip@sh.itjust.works
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        67 months ago

        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.

    • N3Cr0
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      97 months ago

      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.

    • @Evrala@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      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 because they’re an automatic and don’t have a turbo, which makes them slower, but also more reliable.

      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 2 or 4 grand including import fees. (Avoid the 2000ish GTT version with a turbo, turbo manifold is prone to warping on that engine and said manifold is hard to find in the US as those engines generally didnt sell in the US)

        • @Evrala@lemmy.world
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          7 months ago

          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 though the 2000cc engine is far more common. I’ve also found English websites that are easy to order just about any parts you want for a Rasheen including body panels.

          Amazon is also nice for finding parts, I was able to find parts for a SR18DE engine on Amazon and that engine was never sold in America. So you can just buy the parts yourself then take the car to a local mechanic for the work.

          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.

          The best listings also have video of the car running so you can hear if something is off with it.

        • @dsco@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          17 months ago

          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.

          • @kalpol@lemmy.world
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            17 months ago

            How did Customs let it through? It has to have DOT spec stuff in the US. I don’t know about more than 25 years old.

      • @Gsus4@mander.xyz
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        7 months ago

        Are there any electric cars that aren’t glorified smartphones on wheels? Something a grandma can drive without ending up in the wrong menu.

        • @IphtashuFitz@lemmy.world
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          67 months ago

          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.

        • @spongebue@lemmy.world
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          7 months ago

          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.

  • Uriel238 [all pronouns]
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    337 months ago

    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.

    • @Incel_Inside@lemmy.world
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      87 months ago

      We already pay shitty spare parts subscription for the shitty cars they make.

      BMW dances in bare ass in front of Chinese erect cock.

  • N3Cr0
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    197 months ago

    Thanks, I gladly stick with my old non-BMW car!

  • Obinice
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    457 months ago

    In what way does the suspension require regular servicing or an online connection to a server to function? That would be the only reason to offer it as an ongoing service cost.

    Otherwise, you’re just paying extra for something already in your car, not for an actual service, which would make no sense?

    What next, paint ongoing service fees for having wheels? Not even for ensuring they’re regularly replaced, serviced, or repaired, just for the ability to use them at all…

    • @Michal@programming.dev
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      377 months ago

      Active suspension is software, just like Photoshop is. You need to pay subscription fee for Photoshop now, and BMW wants a subscription fee for their active suspension software too. Rent seeking and Enshittification.

      • @DudeDudenson@lemmings.world
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        7 months ago

        Except that you have to have special way more expensive shocks to have adaptive suspension compared to fixed. It’s like being sold an I3 CPU for the price of an I9 cpu while being told you can pay a subscription to upgrade to the full performance

            • @TheGrandNagus@lemmy.world
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              27 months ago

              That’s not an excuse for Intel to be shady…

              And BMW is one of the most valuable car brands out there. I don’t get why you’re pretending that BMW is some unknown entity. Unfortunately, many people will swallow BMW’s bullshit.

        • @mangaskahn@lemmy.world
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          7 months ago

          I feel like in this case it’s more like everyone gets sold i9 hardware, but can choose to pay the i3 price for it with locked out features, then decide later to pay the subscription to unlock the i7 or i9 performance. It has advantages for the manufacturer in that there are fewer options to account for at build time and additional revenue later on. I still think it’s a terrible model that should be summarily rejected by customers, but I see why they are trying it.

          • @DudeDudenson@lemmings.world
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            37 months ago

            Yeah they’re totally not charging you for the expensive suspension they’re installing in your car in the hopes that you’ll pay a subscription to use it. 100% not included in the price, clearly no one would ever do that

          • @Hacksaw@lemmy.ca
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            27 months ago

            Nobody is giving away i9 hardware at i3 prices otherwise everyone would buy the cheapest model and part it out for massive profit.

      • @magic_smoke@links.hackliberty.org
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        7 months ago

        Id probably be angrier if this was some company making econoboxes, but if enshitification wants to target the cars of the rich, fuckin’ go for it.

        • @Kecessa@sh.itjust.works
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          247 months ago

          The people driving those cars are probably closer to you than to the BMW CEO. They’re the same price as what trucks sell for these days and at some point they’ll reach the second-hand market and their price comes down quick.

          • @DelightfullyDivisive@lemmy.world
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            77 months ago

            True. I just bought a 1-year-old 330i, and it’s less than my wife’s Kia SUV (We live in Michigan, have three kids and two dogs, so it makes sense for us to have one big bus that can go off-road, else we’d have something smaller and electric). The BMW also costs far less than a pickup truck of the same age and mileage. US manufacturers have been transitioning out of the business of making sedans for years, because they’re not popular here. It is just a sea of SUVs and pickup trucks.

            I do have a subscription to all kinds of “connected car” crap for the first year, but I’m going to turn all of that junk off when I make some other modifications later this year. I think the subscription is actually pretty cheap, but I just don’t want a bunch of spyware reporting back my location and speed.

      • @jj4211@lemmy.world
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        37 months ago

        At least with Photoshop (as bad as the model is), at least they are actually running the software and storing and backing up the associated data for it.

        With the car, it’s all local to the car without BMW having to incur any expense for that functionality to keep going.

    • @exocortex@discuss.tchncs.de
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      7 months ago

      We long left the era where we “own” things that we buy. As everything is a computer now it has become very simple to control stuff that remotely that was working on its own before.

      So the answer to “why would <CORPORATION> do this” is simply: “Because they can”.

      Every tiny decision is guided by increasing profit. No matter the side effects (short or long term ). Because with many shareholders administering pressure to maximize profits there’s only one way to go (even if it’s a dumb and shortsighted decision) maximizing profits NOW. If you are not doing that because you can see that increasing profits now will hurt profits in the future then you are hindering the project. You have to increase profits now, because if you are not then your competitor is doing it and that is a problem. If you are not going with the project you will be out of a job sooner or later. Then someone will take over that will make the decision you couldn’t do.

      This is a race to the bottom. Morals, integrity, honesty, responsibility and foresight are only obstacles in this logic (because the competition is not bound by them which gains them an advantage).

      It’s simply cheaper now to build everything in the car always and run an operating system that manages all these things and can control what you are doing in your car.

      Cory Doctorow held a great keynote about this some ~10-ish years (?) ago with the title “The coming war on general computation” where he explained the side effects of putting DRM in every stupid appliance. The side effect here is that we cannot hack our cars to switch on the heated seats (or whatever other feature BMW is not allowing us to use for free) because of DRM. It is not “our” car, even though we bought it.

      • @Got_Bent@lemmy.world
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        27 months ago

        I didn’t wake up this morning with the knowledge that I’m about to move to Pennsylvania and convert to being Amish.

      • @DelightfullyDivisive@lemmy.world
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        77 months ago

        This is a side effect of deregulation of both corporations and the stock market. I think that we’re going to see the pendulum swing towards more regulation and consumer-friendly policies here in the US. I don’t see that lasting for the long-term, though. There are too many vulnerabilities in the political system that allow asshole billionaires to manipulate it.

        • @orrk@lemmy.world
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          37 months ago

          it’s not the system that is the problem, it’s the lack of class consciousness, in America the rich have it, but not the working class

    • @exanime@lemmy.world
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      97 months ago

      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

      • @InternetUser2012@lemmy.today
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        47 months ago

        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.

        • @exanime@lemmy.world
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          27 months ago

          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.

    • @x00z@lemmy.world
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      37 months ago

      The article implies nobody even knew it already had this functionality. I’m sure the customers weren’t told either.

      • @InternetUser2012@lemmy.today
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        37 months ago

        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.

  • N3Cr0
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    167 months ago

    So, you buy a car with all these features, but you don’t pay for them. They are disabled by default. You jailbreak your car, everything works without paying extra, but then you realize, you broke your warranty.

    • @BaronVonBort@lemmy.world
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      247 months ago

      Because the people who buy them have it and BMW can get more out of them. The real problem is that they’ll buy it, and other manufacturers will see “hey, it’s a successful model and additional revenue generation!”