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Cars bricked by bankrupt EV company will stay bricked

pluralistic.net

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Re: Cars bricked by bankrupt EV company will stay bricked

#21

Post by bathtub365 »

Maybe before you launch a product over a certain price point you have to prove that you will be able to support it for a certain period of time. Kind of like how in certain jurisdictions you have to have money and plans set aside for environmental cleanup after natural resource extraction. These cars are now effectively e-waste far before they should be because there was no plan in place for long-term support.

When working as a vendor with mature automotive manufacturers they’ll often evaluate your company to ensure you’ll still be around over the timeframe that they intend to sell or service cars with your parts in them.

Re: Cars bricked by bankrupt EV company will stay bricked

#22

Post by dns_snek »

dzhiurgis wrote: post #13
mikestew wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not even convinced that the cars won’t work without working servers. All of the links in TFA are behind a paywall I’m not going to bother working around, but is there any evidence that Fiskers need a home to phone in order to keep working? Or is it that one can’t remotely start the vehicle (as one example) without working servers? ‘Cuz $DEITY knows that “bricked” has a very wide range of colloquial definitions.

Wonder if we should have a dedicated agency that for keeping control server up. Allowing manufacturers to open/close your vehicles at whim sounds putting too many eggs at same basket. DMV is the one who knows who actually owns the car after all...

I expect government(s) to step in at some point and ban the practice entirely because it's such a foolish cybersecurity risk to have unnecessary single points of failure. It's basically a big red button that reads "cripple our economy, please" that our adversaries can hit at any time.

Re: Cars bricked by bankrupt EV company will stay bricked

#23

Post by paulryanrogers »

KetoManx64 wrote: post #16
paulryanrogers wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By a narrow definition of 'worked'. There are a lot of bricked cars out there, unless someone cracks them or the new buyer can revive the systems needed.

I don't think there's much "free market" here at all considering how much government money, tax breaks and other incentives are provided by the government for "green energy".

Markets aren't truly free without a government to ensure fair competition. Otherwise the biggest players just become a defacto government in their market. And society only has one environment in which to exist. It would be crazy to let companies destroy it just because they can afford to. Even Adam Smith doesn't advocate that markets be entirely free of all regulation.

Gas companies are burning the world to the ground just to get a few more quarters of profit. They'll buy regulators and presidents of they have to. In fact one is openly selling himself to them at a bargain rate.

Re: Cars bricked by bankrupt EV company will stay bricked

#24

Post by hulitu »

mrgoldenbrown wrote: post #17
mikestew wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not even convinced that the cars won’t work without working servers. All of the links in TFA are behind a paywall I’m not going to bother working around, but is there any evidence that Fiskers need a home to phone in order to keep working? Or is it that one can’t remotely start the vehicle (as one example) without working servers? ‘Cuz $DEITY knows that “bricked” has a very wide range of colloquial definitions.

https://techcrunch.com/2024/10/08/fisker-bankruptcy-hits-maj... Not all the links are behind paywalls. Fisker themselves are among the groups saying they don't know how to get the cars running again.

> Fisker themselves are among the groups saying they don't know how to get the cars running again.

Eh ? Like any gambling game: Insert Coin

Re: Cars bricked by bankrupt EV company will stay bricked

#25

Post by tb_technical »

This is why I'll always buy cheap used cars - they already have a history of running. All they need is intensive oil changes and occasional part replacement for a couple years before I move onto my next used car.

I avoid all the whizbang rent seeking bullshit just by driving horrible old cars.

I really hope someone makes a conversion kit for the computer in these cars. It would suck to be out on a new car, and just have a brick sitting in your driveway.

Re: Cars bricked by bankrupt EV company will stay bricked

#26

Post by KetoManx64 »

paulryanrogers wrote: post #23
KetoManx64 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think there's much "free market" here at all considering how much government money, tax breaks and other incentives are provided by the government for "green energy".

Markets aren't truly free without a government to ensure fair competition. Otherwise the biggest players just become a defacto government in their market. And society only has one environment in which to exist. It would be crazy to let companies destroy it just because they can afford to. Even Adam Smith doesn't advocate that markets be entirely free of all regulation. Gas companies are burning the world to the groun…

That's completely and utterly false. Governments corrupt anything and everything they touche and are the primary reason that monopolies exist. Why are there 3/4 major network providers in the US? Because they received billions of dollars in grant money from the goverment and did not have to compete in the market with prices. Do you know who is one of the biggest individual consumers of oil? Take a look at the military industrial complex. Want to know why Microsoft is so far ahead of Linux? Take a look at how much money the US government has paid to Microsoft/tax cuts/grants. Want to know why Amazon has no other competitors that are anywhere close to their scale? Take a look at the tax breaks it has received from different government institutions. The list goes on and on.

Re: Cars bricked by bankrupt EV company will stay bricked

#27

Post by paulryanrogers »

KetoManx64 wrote: post #26
paulryanrogers wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Markets aren't truly free without a government to ensure fair competition. Otherwise the biggest players just become a defacto government in their market. And society only has one environment in which to exist. It would be crazy to let companies destroy it just because they can afford to. Even Adam Smith doesn't advocate that markets be entirely free of all regulation. Gas companies are burning the world to the groun…

That's completely and utterly false. Governments corrupt anything and everything they touche and are the primary reason that monopolies exist. Why are there 3/4 major network providers in the US? Because they received billions of dollars in grant money from the goverment and did not have to compete in the market with prices. Do you know who is one of the biggest individual consumers of oil? Take a look at the militar…

Your examples are cases were the corporate interests have captured the regulators. So we're ruled by corps (who often write the laws themselves) regardless of whether they arise from a "free" market, luck, nepotism, sweet heart deals, or some combination thereof. They thrive on apathy and those who buy into their laissez-faire-capitalism-solves-all story.

The answer which has worked before is to end the corruption and monopolies/oligopolies as we did before: anti trust. Voting in honest civil servants, voting out or jailing the corrupt, keeping money out of campaigns, and outlawing professional bribery (lobbying) are critical to enforce the rules that keep the playing field level.

Guess which party has sold out the hardest in the US? Which is led by a man who openly sells deregulation to polluting industrialists in exchange for campaign funds?

Re: Cars bricked by bankrupt EV company will stay bricked

#28

Post by psd1 »

paulryanrogers wrote: post #27
KetoManx64 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's completely and utterly false. Governments corrupt anything and everything they touche and are the primary reason that monopolies exist. Why are there 3/4 major network providers in the US? Because they received billions of dollars in grant money from the goverment and did not have to compete in the market with prices. Do you know who is one of the biggest individual consumers of oil? Take a look at the militar…

Your examples are cases were the corporate interests have captured the regulators. So we're ruled by corps (who often write the laws themselves) regardless of whether they arise from a "free" market, luck, nepotism, sweet heart deals, or some combination thereof. They thrive on apathy and those who buy into their laissez-faire-capitalism-solves-all story. The answer which has worked before is to end the corruption an…

Specifically in the case of ISPs, the infrastructure requirements make it a natural monopoly.

The problem comes when the infrastructure company is also the retail company. That's how you get shitty service. In the UK, the infra monopoly is owned by Openreach. You can use literally any retail ISP, they all pay the same for carriage. They can differentiate on price or service or (yuck) bundling, and you can change providers with minimal downtime.

So I think the answer for the US is to separate infra from retail and regulate the wholesale price.

Re: Cars bricked by bankrupt EV company will stay bricked

#29

Post by psd1 »

tb_technical wrote: post #25

This is why I'll always buy cheap used cars - they already have a history of running. All they need is intensive oil changes and occasional part replacement for a couple years before I move onto my next used car. I avoid all the whizbang rent seeking bullshit just by driving horrible old cars. I really hope someone makes a conversion kit for the computer in these cars. It would suck to be out on a new car, and just h…

I occasionally read blogs about reverse-engineering auto computers, and it is clearly not simple. I don't expect even a popular model to be fully REd on the next decade, let alone a Fisker.

Re: Cars bricked by bankrupt EV company will stay bricked

#30

Post by tb_technical »

psd1 wrote: post #29
tb_technical wrote: post #25

This is why I'll always buy cheap used cars - they already have a history of running. All they need is intensive oil changes and occasional part replacement for a couple years before I move onto my next used car. I avoid all the whizbang rent seeking bullshit just by driving horrible old cars. I really hope someone makes a conversion kit for the computer in these cars. It would suck to be out on a new car, and just h…

I occasionally read blogs about reverse-engineering auto computers, and it is clearly not simple. I don't expect even a popular model to be fully REd on the next decade, let alone a Fisker.

You're right! But rather than reverse engineer the cars computer, how about a complete aftermarket overhaul? You would lose some features, surely, but at least the car would work, no?
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