Comment on Hyundai car requires $2000, app & internet access to fix your brakes - what the actual f
PabloSexcrowbar@piefed.social 3 weeks agoThe best (worst) example I’ve seen in recent memory has been seat warmers. BMW and other manufacturers tried forcing a subscription on people just to use the seat warmers that are (1) already present in the car, (2) already wired up with buttons in place, and (3) cause no additional outlay of effort on the part of the manufacturer once they’re installed. There’s no valid reason to charge a subscription for something like that beyond straight greed.
sqgl@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
It is like having a grandstand at a football stadium which costs extra to use. Do you resent that?
x00z@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Satellite TV is a service that requires constant upkeep by the companies which costs money.
And your football stadium is a bad analogy.
phutatorius@lemmy.zip 3 weeks ago
You don’t own the stadium, and you don’t own the satellite. So they’re really not the same as a car, which you do (nominally) own.
shiftymccool@piefed.ca 3 weeks ago
I resent that the cost to the car company to install seat warmers is the actual installation of the seat warmers. Running them costs ME money in electricity generated by gasoline I bought. It costs them nothing to run them but i have to pay a subscription to use them on top of paying to power them?
The football grandstand continues to cost the owners in maintenance and space that they own. You pay for the privilege of using something that is not yours. I bought my car, I shouldn’t have to continue to pay for the privilege of using something I already own since the equipment is already there and doesn’t require any interaction with a remote service that would make sense to charge for (navigation, satellite radio, etc…)
sqgl@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
OK I accept the analogies are not good equivalents.
It is not necessarily true that everyone has already paid for the seat warmer hardware. The car may cost the same as if it didn’t have the hardware installed.
The manufacturer may find it cheaper to just install it for everyone and wear the cost in the hope that enough people will pay for the warmer to be enabled.
Of course it is possible that everyone pays for the hardware anyhow but it is not necessarily the case.
pogmommy@lemmy.ml 3 weeks ago
This is such a weird hill to die on for someone who claims to be pro-consumer
lightnsfw@reddthat.com 3 weeks ago
If you buy an object, you pay for all the components that come with that object. If they didn’t charge for all the components that’s on them. As others have said, heating elements don’t require any continued support from the manufacturer. It’s a button and some wires and a control module. Should they be charging for window defrosters too? There is literally 0 explanation for this that isn’t corporate greed.
athairmor@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
It is necessarily the case. No company incurs the cost of making something, delivers it and then just hopes that someone pays for it. You literally can’t do business that way.
architect@thelemmy.club 3 weeks ago
I don’t see how you could possibly think it’s okay to sell something to someone while telling them oh but technically you didn’t buy everything inside it, that’s an extra fee.
Come on you can’t be so broken you can’t see a clear scam right in front of you.
It should be illegal and if any of our institutions had teeth it would be.
PabloSexcrowbar@piefed.social 2 weeks ago
It’s absolutely nothing like that, my dude. There’s no extra service being provided. The product has been manufactured and purchased. It’d be like buying a drill only to find out that you have to pay a fee to use the drill bits you already own, or buying a block of wood and being told that you have to pay the seller money to use the tools you already own to make it into whatever you’re building.
sqgl@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
But his comparisons because people don’t buy the car expecting the seats to have the warming feature. It probably is even offered as an option that the customer rejected upon purchase.
When I download software and pay for the basic tier it has the pro features built in anyhow. I can pay to unlock those pro features but I don’t expect to use those features already just because I already have them.
PabloSexcrowbar@piefed.social 2 weeks ago
Whether they’re expecting it or not, the hardware is there and there is no additional technical intervention necessary from the manufacturer necessary for it to function. A monthly fee for a button to turn on my seat warmers is idiotic. Your bizarre infatuation with comparing cars to stadiums is also as frustrating as it is nonsensical.