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BMW heated seats subscription costs $18 per month in South Korea

motor1.com

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Re: BMW heated seats subscription costs $18 per month in South Korea

#271

Post by zasdffaa »

panick21_ wrote: post #206
ClumsyPilot wrote: post #79

We are rapidly moving towards Feudalism. If someone can charge you for using things you already bought and 'own', then average man has no property rights. The fee could be increased at any time, or new fees could be introduced. As the housing crysis deepens, average person will never own a home either. So average person will be in the same position as a medieval serf, conpletely dependand on the whims of the lord, pr…

> We are rapidly moving towards Feudalism. I hate when people say that. This has literally nothing to do with the historic institution of feudalism. Its is the opposite of actually educating people on actual feudalism. Its just using historical terms that people call not to be 'bad' so you don't actually have to explain the problem. We are literally talking about people who can buy a BMW. Did BMW promise them heated…

It's some weird mindset of can't-do speaking there. Maybe a sliver of truth but just failure dialling in to HN. They never offer anything useful, just want to feel important in their nihilism. They are a disease.

Re: BMW heated seats subscription costs $18 per month in South Korea

#272

Post by dotancohen »

chewz wrote: post #193

Good news is that all bmw's come with all the options just turned off via software.. So be smart guys, this is called hacker news for a reason... Just buy bare metal bmw and turn all luxury options on... (and BMW is traditionally very dumb on security)...

  > Just buy bare metal bmw and turn all luxury options on
Bring My (own) Warmers.

Re: BMW heated seats subscription costs $18 per month in South Korea

#273

Post by tm-guimaraes »

akudha wrote: post #171
farisjarrah wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Conversely, I been seeing more people then ever riding, building and modifying electric and motorized bicycles. You can modify a regular $200 mountain bike with a $200 motor kit from amazon and have a $400 motorcycle that you don’t need a motorcycle license for. If you really don’t want to burn fossil fuels, a $1000 bafang mid drive ebike kit can turn a regular bicycle into a hill crushing monster and can be installe…

more people then ever More people than ever maybe, but that is a tiny fraction of the number of cars, at least in the U.S. It is like saying more people than ever are turning vegetarian/vegan. Yes, it is true, but it is still a miniscule number in the grand scheme of things, and the the change is way too slow/small to have any real impact, at least in my life time. I love Jetbrains products, it was irritating when th…

> Next would be what? 10 bucks for my washing machine that I own, $10 for my fridge, $10 for my air conditioning, stove, vacuum cleaner...

This was already happening with planned obsolescence. The EU fought that by implementing a new law that requires big home electronics to have a 10year warrant. I guess the next step for vendors is bundling “service” features for subs

Re: BMW heated seats subscription costs $18 per month in South Korea

#274

Post by cbozeman »

nathanaldensr wrote: post #164
winternett wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was ranting about this 2 years ago and a lot of people laughed it off... I cited an auto start feature o VOLVO cars that required a siriusXM membership. It's unfathomable that we reached this point of monthly subscriptions being implemented on things that we've already paid for. It's the first sign that we're in for a wave of not feudalism, but outright economic slavery. There is no rational consumer protection aga…

There is a way, but you're not going to like it, and we can't discuss it on HN.

Why can't we? The American Founders literally wanted us to take up arms and kill people who violated our essential liberties. You can read this in their own books and papers. They were extremely clear about this... it isn't even up for debate, unless of course you're talking to a moron that's never actually read Jefferson, Washington, Madison, etc.

If we reach a point where we can't even restate what our Founders said, we're already in our twilight as any kind of civilized liberal society.

Now we can argue about what constitutes an "essential liberty". I'm not sure I'd put, "Heated seats in my BMW" in that category.

Re: BMW heated seats subscription costs $18 per month in South Korea

#275

Post by mdtancsa »

chewz wrote: post #193

Good news is that all bmw's come with all the options just turned off via software.. So be smart guys, this is called hacker news for a reason... Just buy bare metal bmw and turn all luxury options on... (and BMW is traditionally very dumb on security)...

I wonder if I could build and app / service for them -- TSOAS (aka Turn Shit Off As a Service) and charge them a small monthly fee to do it. BMW should be in the business of building cars, not pissing off people. They could outsource that to me as a service!

Re: BMW heated seats subscription costs $18 per month in South Korea

#276

Post by dangus »

Unpopular opinion: this could be a consumer benefit, although BMW doesn’t seem to quite have the value proposition exactly where I’d like it to be.

It’s cheaper to build fewer SKUs and variations of a product. The fact that the assembly line never has to change what they’re installing in the car could make heated seats cheaper in the first place.

BMW currently charges $500 for heated seats a la carte in the US, so that costs 1.76 times more than the 3 year subscription at $283. That means your breakeven point is at a little bit over 5 years, without considering present and future value of money.

I could see a lot of BMW owners being completely uninterested in owning the car after 5 years, with so many of them choosing to lease. It is a luxury car, after all.

Now, here’s the other thing, if you do the monthly plan, presumably you could unsubscribe in the summer. So that’s more like $54 a year if you need it for three months of the year. That puts your breakeven point at close to 10 years!

BMW does have a lifetime purchase option, too.

I hope these purchases are tied to the vehicle and not the owner, but I have my doubts on BMW being so benevolent.

I also think it would be ideal if hardware subscriptions like this would simply unlock once the car reaches a certain age to consider its depreciated status.

Re: BMW heated seats subscription costs $18 per month in South Korea

#278

Post by throwaway0a5e »

anonymousab wrote: post #235
colinmhayes wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The auto sector is one of the most competitive in the world. There are tons of automakers that don’t have subscription services.

For now. The problem is that anticonsumer grift will eventually pervade the entire space. If not prevented legally then it will just be a matter of time, because incidental cooperation between all competitors is just so much better for them than trying to compete on this point. And this is an industry where starting a competitor is simply not feasible without incomprehensible amounts of capital.

> The problem is that anticonsumer grift will eventually pervade the entire space. If not prevented legally then it will just be a matter of time

This isn't a guaranteed thing.

Toyota makes money hand over fist selling decade behind the competition vehicles for high prices based on a premise of reliability that the overwhelming majority of buyers will not keep the car long enough to take advantage of and HN never misses an opportunity to praise them for it.

I feel very confident saying that the market for cars that don't include SAAS-esque BS subscriptions will be large enough to sustain a decent number of offerings in the same way that the sedan market is still healthy despite the crossover-ification of everything and the hatch market is stronger than it's been since the 90s.

Re: BMW heated seats subscription costs $18 per month in South Korea

#279

Post by [deleted] »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #79

We are rapidly moving towards Feudalism. If someone can charge you for using things you already bought and 'own', then average man has no property rights. The fee could be increased at any time, or new fees could be introduced. As the housing crysis deepens, average person will never own a home either. So average person will be in the same position as a medieval serf, conpletely dependand on the whims of the lord, pr…

[deleted]

Re: BMW heated seats subscription costs $18 per month in South Korea

#280

Post by tomc1985 »

panick21_ wrote: post #206
ClumsyPilot wrote: post #79

We are rapidly moving towards Feudalism. If someone can charge you for using things you already bought and 'own', then average man has no property rights. The fee could be increased at any time, or new fees could be introduced. As the housing crysis deepens, average person will never own a home either. So average person will be in the same position as a medieval serf, conpletely dependand on the whims of the lord, pr…

> We are rapidly moving towards Feudalism. I hate when people say that. This has literally nothing to do with the historic institution of feudalism. Its is the opposite of actually educating people on actual feudalism. Its just using historical terms that people call not to be 'bad' so you don't actually have to explain the problem. We are literally talking about people who can buy a BMW. Did BMW promise them heated…

Sounds like someone is trying to morally justify their success off the back of those sweet, sweet subscription revenues.

Heated seats is a luxury, sure. But what about music? Kitchen appliances? Movies and TV? Productivity software? Transportation?

All these things are things we own much less of (or "own," as it were, since we got to keep physical custody of the bits, and they didn't try to authenticate against a web service)

The situation is positively feudal, people are sharecropping increasingly large parts of their lives. And the lords sit in their castles, surrounded by yes-men, pushing the limits of legality and ignoring the cries of the people that make their businesses happen.

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