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Auto giants like BMW, GM and Toyota make drivers ‘subscribe’ for basic features

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Re: Auto giants like BMW, GM and Toyota make drivers ‘subscribe’ for basic features

#41

Post by harha »

rabidonrails wrote: post #33
harha wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think they’re also a bit blind towards what potential market they’re losing, even if it’s just step by step. My peer group would probably have been a great target 10 years ago. Now I hardly know anyone at my level with a car, and if, it’s an old one or cheaper brand. I think this is a luxury product in decline, other options just keep getting better. If I like to pay a lot, I’ll just Uber everywhere. Public transpo…

This sounds right for someone that lives in a city and doesn't have kids. If you have a family then the options you laid out above don't work very well and if you live in the suburbs then constant uber/biking/public transport are not long term options.

I have a family in a city. Judging by the cars around here, I’d say this is more likely to be BMWs market than most of the countryside. And I also think I would have had a car 10 years ago, now it’s just not anything I’d really consider without massive amounts of persuasion.

Re: Auto giants like BMW, GM and Toyota make drivers ‘subscribe’ for basic features

#42

Post by LanceH »

Something which can be helpful when trying to avoid features is looking for "work" versions of the vehicle. It's frequently a different sales manager who is more amenable to plain vehicles. You'll be looking for "fleet" sales, which is generally for corporate clients or maybe high end clients. Some places will insist you go through regular sales.

For example, I bought a pickup but didn't want 4 wheel drive. Being in the suburbs, of course, they only order 4 wheel drives pickups. I ended up getting a "work truck" ordered from a different part of the state where they are used as work vehicles. The useful stuff is generally still available (leather seats), just without the extra that a company won't pay for like pin-striping.

Re: Auto giants like BMW, GM and Toyota make drivers ‘subscribe’ for basic features

#44

Post by sbf501 »

octoberfranklin wrote: post #28
toomuchtodo wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Government regulation is still required. Relying on corporate goodwill is a fool’s errand, historically speaking.

Yes but who regulates the regulators? Google "regulatory capture". Democracies have a poor track record of controlling regulators who make subjective decisions. There is a solution though: regulate size . It's objectively measurable. The Mazda example that GP gives is legit, but it's on the knife's edge of disappearing -- one more wave of consolidation and it will be gone. But of course regulating bigness is a very p…

>Democracies have a poor track record of controlling regulators who make subjective decisions.

I googled regulatory capture.

Let's look at a few things that have been regulated in the past 100 years of US history:

- car emissions

- lead usage in paint and fuel

- child toy safety

- food safety

- workplace safety

I'd say regulation has worked amazingly well since the days of Upton Sinclair novels.

Re: Auto giants like BMW, GM and Toyota make drivers ‘subscribe’ for basic features

#45

Post by Gordonjcp »

One of the features mentioned is a "remote starter" that lets you start the engine from outside the vehicle by pressing a button on the key.

I'm not sure why anyone would call this a "basic feature", or indeed why anyone would want it.

Re: Auto giants like BMW, GM and Toyota make drivers ‘subscribe’ for basic features

#46

Post by cma »

charles_f wrote: post #32

I can somewhat understand the logic of charging me a recurring fee for a service that costs the provider a recurring cost, gets regular improvements, and where data is maintained. TV/sat radio? Ok (not that I would buy that). Remote tracking / start? Why not. Internet access in the car? Sure. Satellite maps with updates? Maybe. I would hope that given how much you charge me for the product, these come included, but M…

> I wasn't surprised that BMW, Tesla or Ford would do something like that. But for whatever stupid reason, Toyota is a disappointment, because I thought they would be part of a few manufacturers not playing that game

I didn't think Sony would follow Microsoft in charging a subscription for online play, but they pretty much had to because buyers didn't weight the hidden costs of it appropriately and Microsoft was already doing it giving them a big margin advantage (which could bleed over into marketshare advantage by investing it in marketing and exclusive titles).

Re: Auto giants like BMW, GM and Toyota make drivers ‘subscribe’ for basic features

#47

Post by sbf501 »

jleyank wrote: post #9
RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #5

This, I think, is one of those cases where we need regulation. I would be fine with banning subscription features in any vehicle. What you drive off the lot is what you get for the life of the vehicle, barring physical damage.

Yup. Bring it under lemon laws when purchased items fail and can’t be fixed without payments.

that's a good point. i wonder how lemon laws would be applicable. or if it would be reworked for the new tech.

Re: Auto giants like BMW, GM and Toyota make drivers ‘subscribe’ for basic features

#48

Post by s1artibartfast »

WastingMyTime89 wrote: post #18
WhatsName wrote: post #11

I wonder if there is a hidden dynamic that makes markets with decreasing competition increasingly hostile towards the end user? Will every industry end up being the next printing/telco in the long run?

There is nothing hidden here. It’s well known and studied that the less competitive a market is, the better at extracting consumer surplus sellers get. That’s why unregulated markets always converge towards monopolistic/oligopolistic configurations. The issue for corporations is that like consolidation, competition law enforcement also acts like a pendulum. Right now, we are at a point of low enforcement with high co…

Alternatively, competitors will arise that sell the products people actually want.

The hard part is designing regulation that curtails the oligopoly without preventing new enterprise.

It is easy to fall into a steady state of high corporate extraction + high regulatory barriers.

Re: Auto giants like BMW, GM and Toyota make drivers ‘subscribe’ for basic features

#49

Post by techsupporter »

rabidonrails wrote: post #33
harha wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think they’re also a bit blind towards what potential market they’re losing, even if it’s just step by step. My peer group would probably have been a great target 10 years ago. Now I hardly know anyone at my level with a car, and if, it’s an old one or cheaper brand. I think this is a luxury product in decline, other options just keep getting better. If I like to pay a lot, I’ll just Uber everywhere. Public transpo…

This sounds right for someone that lives in a city and doesn't have kids. If you have a family then the options you laid out above don't work very well and if you live in the suburbs then constant uber/biking/public transport are not long term options.

> If you have a family then the options you laid out above don't work very well

Genuine question: Why is it that whenever someone on a forum mentions the phrase "public transit", inevitably someone comes along under ten minutes later to tell them how they're obviously wrong?

I am in my 50s. My wife and I have raised children in a city. Many years ago, before transit got much better, we hauled them up into the high-stair buses and strapped their strollers into wheelchair spaces. Trips to the mountains were an annual affair, at best, on poorly-documented shuttle buses. These days, my kids routinely go hiking in the Gorge or out to the Peninsula on nothing but a transit card and a day pack.

My children are now adults and none of them have learned to drive nor have any interest in doing so. Almost our entire friends group is the same, even through the pandemic. The most common reason to be an exception and having been required to learn how to drive is because they got priced out of where they live.

Perhaps it is time for the auto-responders to transit posts to adjust to a wider view of society?

Re: Auto giants like BMW, GM and Toyota make drivers ‘subscribe’ for basic features

#50

Post by margalabargala »

chris72205 wrote: post #26

All of these aren't quite the same though. Charging to use hardware that is already present in a vehicle and contained to that vehicle (heated seats) is not the same as charging to use an app that requires a network of hardware behind the scenes to start a vehicle remotely. The latter has continuing costs and it's foolish to believe that would be free forever. Should you be _forced_ to pay this? No. But that's a diff…

There are multiple different kinds of remote start.

Recurring payment to start your car over the internet? Maybe.

Recurring payment to start your car by hitting a button on your key fob from 50 feet away (vs having to be in the car)? Not so much.

Furthermore, it would be perfectly reasonable for the maker of a $60k car to include in that price the cost of supporting internet connectivity for the lifetime of the car.

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