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New Jersey legislators aim to ban most in-car subscriptions

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Re: New Jersey legislators aim to ban most in-car subscriptions

#11

Post by Arrath »

neogodless wrote: post #10

> if an automaker or other associated party can prove that it costs money to maintain the feature and/or service in question, then it'd be legally allowed. This would include services like OnStar and such. While I don't disagree with the exception here, I think they should outlaw mandatory subscriptions... like OnStar, which GM has started to add to most of their cars. It's not in the MSRP, but it's a required cost a…

> I think they should outlaw mandatory subscriptions

Agreed! Mandatory subscriptions are outrageous.

Re: New Jersey legislators aim to ban most in-car subscriptions

#12

Post by devrand »

neogodless wrote: post #10

> if an automaker or other associated party can prove that it costs money to maintain the feature and/or service in question, then it'd be legally allowed. This would include services like OnStar and such. While I don't disagree with the exception here, I think they should outlaw mandatory subscriptions... like OnStar, which GM has started to add to most of their cars. It's not in the MSRP, but it's a required cost a…

I think it still works for that. In the OnStar case you have the option to decline the service, but you still need to pay for it. That would likely run afoul of the requirement that it has ongoing costs to support the service.

So I think this law would force automakers to either back-off or include it in the MSRP.

Re: New Jersey legislators aim to ban most in-car subscriptions

#13

Post by raverbashing »

pxx wrote: post #3

I don't get it. People seem to think that if you ban this practice, you'll get the premium package for free. That's not going to be the case. Currently, you can pay for heated seats all up-front or via a monthly subscription. This proposed legislation prevents you from paying for it via a monthly subscription. So automakers will stop allowing you to do that. All you've done is limit customer choices.

> prevents you from paying for it via a monthly subscription

And why in tarnation would I pay monthly for something that has a fixed cost to the manufacturer?

Re: New Jersey legislators aim to ban most in-car subscriptions

#14

Post by [deleted] »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #7
Hamuko wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aren't they suing California now for having "too strict" of emissions regulations because California's position in the marketplace makes it so that their rules become de facto law of the land? If that goes through, I'm not really sure if California can do really any automotive regulation that other states won't like.

Quoted post unavailable.

[deleted]

Re: New Jersey legislators aim to ban most in-car subscriptions

#15

Post by [deleted] »

sublinear wrote: post #8
pxx wrote: post #3

I don't get it. People seem to think that if you ban this practice, you'll get the premium package for free. That's not going to be the case. Currently, you can pay for heated seats all up-front or via a monthly subscription. This proposed legislation prevents you from paying for it via a monthly subscription. So automakers will stop allowing you to do that. All you've done is limit customer choices.

Nope. The cost of the hardware is always necessarily still passed on to the customer before they even pay for the subscription to "unlock" it. It's double dipping. It makes no sense to gamble that upsells will be successful in exchange for a more competitive price. There's guaranteed loss with that idea. The components pre-installed must cost something and it's not possible for the manufacturer to get that money back…

[deleted]

Re: New Jersey legislators aim to ban most in-car subscriptions

#16

Post by bluGill »

Workaccount2 wrote: post #9
pxx wrote: post #3

I don't get it. People seem to think that if you ban this practice, you'll get the premium package for free. That's not going to be the case. Currently, you can pay for heated seats all up-front or via a monthly subscription. This proposed legislation prevents you from paying for it via a monthly subscription. So automakers will stop allowing you to do that. All you've done is limit customer choices.

> People seem to think that if you ban this practice, you'll get the premium package for free. No, no one thinks that. What people do think is that if they buy it, they will own it, and it will be theirs. Not a rental from a megacorp whose auth servers shit the bed on the coldest day of the year.

The good news is I can not pay for heated seats, and then run my own wire to get it.. it won't look as nice, but it will work

Re: New Jersey legislators aim to ban most in-car subscriptions

#17

Post by bryanlarsen »

sublinear wrote: post #8
pxx wrote: post #3

I don't get it. People seem to think that if you ban this practice, you'll get the premium package for free. That's not going to be the case. Currently, you can pay for heated seats all up-front or via a monthly subscription. This proposed legislation prevents you from paying for it via a monthly subscription. So automakers will stop allowing you to do that. All you've done is limit customer choices.

Nope. The cost of the hardware is always necessarily still passed on to the customer before they even pay for the subscription to "unlock" it. It's double dipping. It makes no sense to gamble that upsells will be successful in exchange for a more competitive price. There's guaranteed loss with that idea. The components pre-installed must cost something and it's not possible for the manufacturer to get that money back…

> The cost of the hardware is always necessarily still passed on to the customer before they even pay for the subscription to "unlock" it.

That's not true. Razors are the canonical example of a product sold below cost, there are many others.

> The components pre-installed must cost something

They must cost something, but there's also a significant cost to creating multiple SKU's, and that cost is likely more than the cost of the heated seats.

Re: New Jersey legislators aim to ban most in-car subscriptions

#18

Post by dfxm12 »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #7
Hamuko wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aren't they suing California now for having "too strict" of emissions regulations because California's position in the marketplace makes it so that their rules become de facto law of the land? If that goes through, I'm not really sure if California can do really any automotive regulation that other states won't like.

Quoted post unavailable.

No post body was provided.

Re: New Jersey legislators aim to ban most in-car subscriptions

#19

Post by kabdib »

Workaccount2 wrote: post #9
pxx wrote: post #3

I don't get it. People seem to think that if you ban this practice, you'll get the premium package for free. That's not going to be the case. Currently, you can pay for heated seats all up-front or via a monthly subscription. This proposed legislation prevents you from paying for it via a monthly subscription. So automakers will stop allowing you to do that. All you've done is limit customer choices.

> People seem to think that if you ban this practice, you'll get the premium package for free. No, no one thinks that. What people do think is that if they buy it, they will own it, and it will be theirs. Not a rental from a megacorp whose auth servers shit the bed on the coldest day of the year.

Just because you've paid a lump sum doesn't mean that terrible servers aren't involved every time you start your car -- they could just be checking the perma-status of your purchase every time ("for security purposes").
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