Toyota has given up on EVs. Not.

[One Ping Only]

I was reading today that the self driving feature will be by monthly subscription only starting February 14th.
So, as with BMW and their heated seats, you presumably paid for the feature when you bought the car, but can't access it without paying the blackmail. Unleash the hackers!!

MSN

And this is where I call TOTAL BS!!! BMW sent me a questionnaire @6 years ago regarding “how would I feel about subscription-based features and options?”

I told them if I buy the car with things installed they had better well work when I buy it or they can keep their product. Sirius’ marketing tactic was the gateway drug to this entire marketing philosophy and tactic. They got people used to the concept and accepting of it, so they took it to the next (and intended) level.

Now we have subscription based auto features, subscription based software, apps, video and audio content, etc…..all designed to siphon off our wallets monthly FOREVER and ultimately leave us with NOTHING, and them in control of the on/off switch of it all. F them. I’m sorry but f them. THEY make huge extra money off these subscriptions.

I want ownership of said product and its features, not beholden to a glorified landlord.

That’s why we purchased a good 4K HD player and started my own physical 4K movie collection. Even if purchased digitally to download and keep, it’s still OURS. I’m also working towards that with audio.

Right now I’m going through the MS OFFICE situation in like fashion. Bastids.

 

[One Ping Only]

First sign of trouble with a car I get rid of it. Not always the best decision financially but I dont give a shit. I dont want to spend one second dealing with or thinking about a car with a problem. I've come really close with the Jeeps.

Jeeps have their own things as well, and the Grand Cherokee line with their ‘misunderstood by many’ tire requirements that will smoke a transfer case (and do) if not followed. Many suburbanites are finding that out the hard way…but are blaming the vehicle. No, dummy, read your manual and stick to the tire requirements and you’ll be fine.

All that said- today’s autos are a ‘consumable’ and have planned obsolescence engineered into them, and into the parts they use. That tactic started in the 90’s in auto industry, and it’s based upon greed. Pure and simple.

 

[Bongo Lewi]

Well, you'll never guess what happened today! I was at a meeting, and a colleague wanted to go to lunch. He has a brand new Tesla X (I think). So... I rode with him to lunch! My first ride in a Tesla (or any EV). Total Self-Driving! It was freaky! And then he let me "not-drive-it" back to our meeting. I didn't touch the controls. Really weird! And like I said... freaky. It even parks itself, backing into a space.

Was I impressed? Sure. How can you not be? Would I want one? Still a no. And this one cost $100k! Yowza. He said, "I didn't buy a car. I bought a chaffeur."

By the way, at least in the new cars... the mechanical "emergency" door latch is in plain view and in a naturally reached location. He said his wife uses that routinely out of habit.

You have sampled a gateway drug. Resistance is futile.

 

[Bobster]

I was reading today that the self driving feature will be by monthly subscription only starting February 14th.

I was going to comment that many of Tesla's "features" are sub-based. I've even heard that some speed and economy settings are also limited unless you pay...

 

[Racer88]

I was going to comment that many of Tesla's "features" are sub-based. I've even heard that some speed and economy settings are also limited unless you pay...

Yeah... that's bullshit. Didn't one of the German marques even make the heated seats a subscription-based feature?

 

[NavyVette]

I think I have mentioned before that around here I cannot see self driving working well. My truck thinks the loop I live on is a 70 zone and the highway leading to town is a 35 zone.

In Arizona 1/2 the time my truck thought I was driving through fields because of all the new roads.

AND even if it DID know the speed limits Montanan's are notoriously immune to speed limits, so I'd have to kill the feature.

 

[NavyVette]

Yeah... that's bullshit. Didn't one of the German marques even make the heated seats a subscription-based feature?

Pretty sure that was BMW

 

[Bongo Lewi]

Pay as you go heated seats seems ridiculous at face value but if you think about it the subscription model isnt all bad. Just pay for what you use, nothing more. Kind of like in-app purchases. Dont want that feature? Don't turn it on. But if you change your mind, you can.

Let's say you dont want to pay for heated seats because you live in Florida. Then you move to Wisconsin. Or you drive there to visit the kids. You wish you had heated seats. And mirrors. And steering wheel. Maybe you only need those features for two weeks.

Imagine not buying a car at all. You buy a subscription. It's yours to drive and only yours. You pay for miles driven and features used. Take that a step further, your subscription includes all the fuel and maintenance. And insurance. This is a business model that's been brewing for a few years. Volvo is already testing the waters with it.

Financially these different models could save someone a lot of money. It wouldn't work for everybody - but it could for a lot of people. The hurdle is that it requires that one rethink the entire concept of car ownership. Mongo no like change. Mongo keep car.

For a while in DC I had only a motorcycle. Not a good thing in bad weather. So I started using Zipcar. I never once failed to find a car within walking distance. I'd unlock it with my phone then get in and drive away. No fucking around with paperwork and asshole agents like at the airport or urban rental agencies. I could leave it anywhere I wanted and not return it to the place I picked it up. The cars always were new and clean. This was a million times cheaper for me than owning, maintaining, and parking a car in the city. It bears mentioning that I would leave DC and be gone for weeks at a time. Often not returning home for 2-3 months. A car or a dog in that situation is a handicap.

I also rode the Metro every day I was in the city. It takes you anywhere you want to go in DC. Arguably the best public transportation system in the country and I've ridden them all. Note: You can party all night and not get a DUI going home on the Metro. When friends or family visited they would push back when I told them we were taking the Metro. They would say, "Oh is it safe? Isnt it dirty and full of bad guys? Only poor people use the subway". Wrong. They watched too many movies and live in a suburban bubble. Never once were my guests not impressed with how easy and safe it was to get around DC thru the tubes.

Anyway ... back to car ownership alternatives: Zipcar works great in an urban setting. It's not going to work as well in Hogs Knuckle, Nebraska. Subscribing a vehicle vs buying one makes the car feel like it yours, but the concept is otherwise similar to Zipcar.

 

[Bongo Lewi]

I think I have mentioned before that around here I cannot see self driving working well. My truck thinks the loop I live on is a 70 zone and the highway leading to town is a 35 zone.

In Arizona 1/2 the time my truck thought I was driving through fields because of all the new roads.

AND even if it DID know the speed limits Montanan's are notoriously immune to speed limits, so I'd have to kill the feature.

It does know the speed limit. You can put the Tesla into a different self-driving mode that ignores speed limits. It attempts to get you where you want to go as fast as possible. This feature has been strongly criticized. I call it "I have to take a shit " mode. Tesla calls it "mad max".

 

[Bongo Lewi]

In case you find yourself in DC:

 

[Racer88]

Pay as you go heated seats seems ridiculous at face value but if you think about it the subscription model isnt all bad. Just pay for what you use, nothing more. Kind of like in-app purchases. Dont want that feature? Don't turn it on. But if you change your mind, you can.

My car is a physical object that I bought and own. It should be under 100% MY control. It's not software that I bought. I bought a physical machine.

Should my house have subscription only toilets? Oh, you want to use ALL FOUR toilets in your house?? The first one is "free," but the others are by subscription!

Let's say you dont want to pay for heated seats because you live in Florida. Then you move to Wisconsin. Or you drive there to visit the kids. You wish you had heated seats. And mirrors. And steering wheel. Maybe you only need those features for two weeks.

I live in Florida. My car has heated seats and even a heated steering wheel. I don't use them. Though, every once in a while I accidentally hit the seat heater button on the blasted touch screen and later wonder why my ass feels like it's on fire.

In any case, I fucking paid for the car. I should have access to ALL of its features.

Imagine not buying a car at all. You buy a subscription. It's yours to drive and only yours. You pay for miles driven and features used. Take that a step further, your subscription includes all the fuel and maintenance. And insurance. This is a business model that's been brewing for a few years. Volvo is already testing the waters with it.

 

[no4mk1t]

The irritating aspect of it is that with luxury sedans like the BMW, the heated seats are likely standard equipment. You can't order the car without them, so presumably, you've already paid for them when you bought the car. I seriously doubt BMW didn't charge for them and is going to rely on the subscription fee to pay for the seats themselves.

So that is what grates. You've already bought the heated seats and now you have to pay again to make them work?
Same with the Tesla self driving feature. They are going to charge you $99 per month for a feature installed on the car at the factory and that you already paid for. If you subscribe to the service, you are going to pay whether you use the feature every day, or not at all. I kinda doubt you will be able to pay for it only on the occasions you want to use it. And I'm sure they've designed the subscription process to be too much of a bother to activate/deactivate for occasional use.

It's things like this when you morally want to side with the hackers and cheer when then develop a hack for it.

 

[NavyVette]

Yeah, when I was shopping form my Sierra I specifically wanted a Denali. The dealer asked if I'd take a Denali Ultimate so I looked them up. They start at a cool 13,000 more than the regular Denali, with a few extra features, of which one is "Super Cruise" for hands free driving with a 3 year OnStar with the Super Cruise plan. After the three years, just having the Super Cruise portion of OnStar would be 40 bucks a month, or 400 a year.
I said not a chance.

I ended up getting an AT4X instead of the Denali, but that's a different story.

 

[Bongo Lewi]

Should my house have subscription only toilets? Oh, you want to use ALL FOUR toilets in your house?? The first one is "free," but the others are by subscription!

Do you have septic or city water? If it's the latter you are already paying by the flush. When those who have city water stop paying, they will need a bucket and ladle. This model has been in place for over a century. You pay for the toilets in your home but cant really use them unless you 'subscribe'.

An English acquaintance of mine grew up in London. They had a meter in their house when he was a kid that you had to feed coins into to keep the heat on. Evidently this is was very common. If you dont pay, you are free to make the choice to be cold.

When I was a kid, the local train station had pay toilets that had been there for decades. It cost you a nickel to take a dump. You put the coin in and turned the knob - sort of like a bubble gum dispenser - to open the stall.

 

[Bongo Lewi]

Yeah, when I was shopping form my Sierra I specifically wanted a Denali. The dealer asked if I'd take a Denali Ultimate so I looked them up. They start at a cool 13,000 more than the regular Denali, with a few extra features, of which one is "Super Cruise" for hands free driving with a 3 year OnStar with the Super Cruise plan. After the three years, just having the Super Cruise portion of OnStar would be 40 bucks a month, or 400 a year.
I said not a chance.

I ended up getting an AT4X instead of the Denali, but that's a different story.

I looked at the Yukon Denali $89,000. No thanks.

 

[Racer88]

Do you have septic or city water? If it's the latter you are already paying by the flush. When those who have city water stop paying, they will need a bucket and ladle. This model has been in place for over a century. You pay for the toilets in your home but cant really use them unless you 'subscribe'.

An English acquaintance of mine grew up in London. They had a meter in their house when he was a kid that you had to feed coins into to keep the heat on. Evidently this is was very common. If you dont pay, you are free to make the choice to be cold.

When I was a kid, the local train station had pay toilets that had been there for decades. It cost you a nickel to take a dump. You put the coin in and turned the knob - sort of like a bubble gum dispenser - to open the stall.

Septic. Well.

Nevertheless, the argument falls flat. City services don't come with the house. But toilets do. The city didn't build the house or install the toilets.

To better define my point... if the toilet lids had locks on them that unlocked only with a subscription to the home builder.

I can keep garbage (or poop) in my house, though it's not pleasant when it piles up. I could take it away myself. Or, I can pay the city to take it all away. But I can still use my house however I see fit, since I paid for it.

 

[Bongo Lewi]

Septic. Well.

Nevertheless, the argument falls flat. City services don't come with the house. But toilets do. The city didn't build the house or install the toilets.

To better define my point... if the toilet lids had locks on them that unlocked only with a subscription to the home builder.

I can keep garbage (or poop) in my house, though it's not pleasant when it piles up. I could take it away myself. Or, I can pay the city to take it all away. But I can still use my house however I see fit, since I paid for it.

Irrelevant if you are on septic. But just for the record, you cannot get or retain a certificate of occupancy without sanitation. City water,... you pay per flush like I said. It's not optional. If you stop paying the county will declare your house unlivable.

I was told this story a couple of years ago: A young couple in a neighboring town bought a prefab house and a couple of acres. They didnt get an inspection. The county comes out for some reason and realizes there's no septic tank. A pipe went out from the house to a nearby stream. They condemned the house, the new owners were prohibited from living there. Until they put in a septic tank and drain field of course. 12 grand.

Even if you own the house, you cant shit in it unless there's some kind of plumbing and wastewater system. Unless Florida approves buckets, which I'm betting they don't.

 

[Racer88]

Well, yeah... duh. You can't dump sewage into a stream or other body of water.

Our house was built with the septic system and well system already put in... by the builder.

Paying for heated seats on a subscription basis for your BMW would be the same... EXACTLY the same as us paying the builder to unlock the "extra" toilets in our house on a subscription basis.

Your false equivalency of city services is just that... false equivalence. But you can keep on fanboi-ing on about BMW and why it's "normal" to charge you a subscription for the use of mechanical features already existent in the car you bought.

 

[NavyVette]

Irrelevant if you are on septic. But just for the record, you cannot get or retain a certificate of occupancy without sanitation. City water,... you pay per flush like I said. It's not optional. If you stop paying the county will declare your house unlivable.

I was told this story a couple of years ago: A young couple in a neighboring town bought a prefab house and a couple of acres. They didnt get an inspection. The county comes out for some reason and realizes there's no septic tank. A pipe went out from the house to a nearby stream. They condemned the house, the new owners were prohibited from living there. Until they put in a septic tank and drain field of course. 12 grand.

Even if you own the house, you cant shit in it unless there's some kind of plumbing and wastewater system. Unless Florida approves buckets, which I'm betting they don't.

Every time I have ever been on a city sewer system I paid a fixed monthly fee. Not "per flush" not "per gallon"

 

[Bongo Lewi]

Well, yeah... duh. You can't dump sewage into a stream or other body of water.

Our house was built with the septic system and well system already put in... by the builder.

Paying for heated seats on a subscription basis for your BMW would be the same... EXACTLY the same as us paying the builder to unlock the "extra" toilets in our house on a subscription basis.

Your false equivalency of city services is just that... false equivalence. But you can keep on fanboi-ing on about BMW and why it's "normal" to charge you a subscription for the use of mechanical features already existent in the car you bought.

I dont have any BMWs anymore nor do I expect to ever have another. I'm not advocating for BMW at all.

The point is really quite simple. Many of the things we own (buy) take a dependency on some kind of service that is not optional. Like sanitation. You own the house but you cant run it without paying The Man. If you are on city water. There are a million other examples of how HOAs can tell you WTF you can and cant do with your home and property. You sign that contract when you buy the home. If your car can go 200 mph, that doesn't mean you can ignore freeway speed limits because it's your car and you can do what you want. Nothing works that way in a modern society.

Let's not get too far off track here. The idea of a car being a subscription is going to continue and evolve. Nobody is going to make anybody sign that deal, but a lot of people will. The typical car buyer loves the sizzle not the steak. The gee whiz features like self driving, and all other kinds of computerized wonders will become more and more popular. There will always be refuseniks who all they want is what was standard equipment on a '49 Packard. Me, I want a car that drives me to the barber shop while I take a nap. Upon arrival I tell the car to go find a hitching post and recharge for an hour then come pick me up. All by itself. If I need to be subscriber vs. an owner to get that, I don't give a rip. Makes no difference to me. It's just a means to get me from point A to point B in a manner that maximizes my convenience.

So if you walk into a dealer to buy a car and they tell you up front that self driving, remote unlock, GPS theft tracking, accident detection (all that telemetry stuff) cost extra to turn on... you have a choice to make. Buy the car or not. Most of those services tether you to the manufacturer. It's all built in already. You just either turn it on for a fee. Or you don't. There's nothing new about this.

Using GM as the example... there a lot of On-Star components built into the car that cannot be removed. Your position is I paid for all that gear so it should all be activated. That is not the direction the world is going.

NFL player 2070.