I think this is a great idea but for whatever reason, hardware that is disabled until I pay pisses me off. I understand the logic behind it and it's probably a win for both the company and the consumers. But it's still distasteful to me. Anyone else feel that way?
BMW wants to charge a subscription fee to enable heated steering wheel
41–49 of 49 posts
Re: BMW wants to charge a subscription fee to enable heated steering wheel
#42I think this is a great idea but for whatever reason, hardware that is disabled until I pay pisses me off. I understand the logic behind it and it's probably a win for both the company and the consumers. But it's still distasteful to me. Anyone else feel that way?
It's not just you. It's not a win for the customer although people might tell you it is. Feels like dystopian sci-fi where people have to pay for everything and own nothing.
Re: BMW wants to charge a subscription fee to enable heated steering wheel
#43Having an optional subscription to enable the heated steering wheel or adaptive cruise control is bold (and probably a bad idea) because people want what they buy to be 'a good value.' Tesla has made me believe that software 'eating' cars is the future because, by letting software take over capability from hardware, it allows for software updates to improve earlier models of cars, making them a better value long-term…
Tesla Model 3 SR+ were originally sold without rear seat heating. Later it became possible to enable it for a fee, via the Tesla app. Few clicks and voilá, suddenly you have rear seat heating. So every car already had the hardware, obviously because it would be more expensive for Tesla to produce two variants of seat elements.
Re: BMW wants to charge a subscription fee to enable heated steering wheel
#44This is interesting. It seems like everything is going subscription-based. It sort if makes sense in that software can be improved upon after sale and needs to be maintained, but on the other hand a single but fix can be sent to an arbitrarily large number of units, so with this model only the largest companies will be able to compete in features and price. With so many purchases to consider, and less and less time d…
> It sort if makes sense in that software can be improved upon after sale and needs to be maintained
Sure, but its not like a heated steering wheel should need software maintenance. It shouldn't even need software.
Re: BMW wants to charge a subscription fee to enable heated steering wheel
#45While I dislike “subscription everywhere” model, I suspect this could work miracles for second hand market, allowing consumers to add options to their purchase. I wouldn’t be surprised if these options are thrown in as “freebies” to the first owner and free for a couple of years and then turn into subscription.
It bothers me that they're intertwining a subscription model for something that shouldn't need a subscription (steering wheel heaters). If the car came with one, it should just be available. Adding this layer of abstraction complicates things and puts an unnecessary burden on to the user to consider a complex pricing structure of what features they want for what duration of time. Between healthcare, airlines, music,…
This sort of reminds me of Tesla's higher capacity battery via software. The fact that the whole battery is there and it's just a software lock makes me kind of angry.
Re: BMW wants to charge a subscription fee to enable heated steering wheel
#46Re: BMW wants to charge a subscription fee to enable heated steering wheel
#47Having an optional subscription to enable the heated steering wheel or adaptive cruise control is bold (and probably a bad idea) because people want what they buy to be 'a good value.' Tesla has made me believe that software 'eating' cars is the future because, by letting software take over capability from hardware, it allows for software updates to improve earlier models of cars, making them a better value long-term…
Tesla Model 3 SR+ were originally sold without rear seat heating. Later it became possible to enable it for a fee, via the Tesla app. Few clicks and voilá, suddenly you have rear seat heating. So every car already had the hardware, obviously because it would be more expensive for Tesla to produce two variants of seat elements.
This model has been around for a long time. I recall a job back in 1997 where I had to add code to permit a service person to enable a feature on a machine. All the machines shipped with the same hardware for the reason you said: manufacturing costs would be too high to make some with and some without.
I had never heard of this before so I asked if it wouldn't piss customers off to see that they were just paying for some guy to come in and enter a code and not to actually install anything physical. The answer was "it never has before." We'd been doing it for years by that point.
Re: BMW wants to charge a subscription fee to enable heated steering wheel
#48So you have to pay extra to go round corners?
You sure do if those corners are on a race track: https://www.mylaps.com/transponders/
no transponder no racing for you
Re: BMW wants to charge a subscription fee to enable heated steering wheel
#49The inability to receive future (prepaid) self-driving software updates on a Tesla if I remove the GSM interface to prevent corporate tracking my driving movement 24/7 is the main reason I am likely never going to buy a new one. This sort of rent-seeking is really terrible.
Is there something I'm missing here, or are you really complaining that your car can't download updates after you disabled its network interface?
Any modification to the car’s surveillance systems means that the company will no longer service your vehicle.
If you prepay for an update, but modify the car to not track you, it is my understanding that, network or no, it will not receive any service (including updates) from Tesla.