BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple
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I mean on one hand, having Apple (or Google) software in your goddamn car is TR - but on the other hand, this is next level price gouging. It's not like these are low cost cars with tiny margins where the manufacturer needs to squeeze every dollar from their customers to maintain production, these are luxury cars...
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1 - Take a free product (Apple CarPlay) and put it in your car
2 - Charge the customer a yearly fee to use it
3 - ?
4 - Profit !!!
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How much do you need to pay to keep your car offline?
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@timebandit Apparently they were charging a one-time activation fee before, that's already retarded but apparently not quite enough for BMW.
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@blek The one-time fee was $300 from what I've read.
Since a lot of BMW drivers just rent the car for a couple years, they will save by just paying the yearly fees.
Because, of course, if you have enough money to buy a BMW, you can't pay the $300
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I am pretty sure that the general assumption is that the original owner won't have it for more than two or three years anyway.
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@timebandit @ScholRLEA Yes, most BMW drivers probably lease them for a few years and then get rid of them. But I think that makes it even worse, because either the original owner or whoever is providing the lease definitely cares about resale value, and this isn't going to do anything good to that. People who buy used cars don't want to have to go to the original dealer and pay fees for a service.
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@blek But BMW is the least expensive mean of transportation
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@timebandit I prefer trolleybuses.
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@timebandit said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
@blek The one-time fee was $300 from what I've read.
Since a lot of BMW drivers just rent the car for a couple years, they will save by just paying the yearly fees.
Because, of course, if you have enough money to buy a BMW, you can't pay the $300
My boss was just telling me he had an BMW for a while. Idling on the freeway (you know, that's what we do on highways here) would actually drain the battery because of all the electronics. With newer BMWs, they added something to prevent that. But if you changed the battery, you had to go in to the shop and pay (of course!) to get the system reset - or it would drain the battery again.
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@blek said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
I mean on one hand, having Apple (or Google) software in your goddamn car is TR
Having BMW (end user) software in your car would be 3 orders of magnitude bigger WTF.
Yes, Apple software sucks, Google software sucks, and Microsoft software sucks, but everyone else's software sucks a hundred times more.
Look at it another way: if I have to use a touchscreen computer for music and navigation, it doesn't make that much of a difference whether it's embedded in a car or in the form of a smartphone. And I wouldn't buy a BMW phone so I wouldn't want a BMW-OS in my car either.
(Not to mention, if I already had an iPhone then I'd want an iPhone compatible car, and that means bowing down to whatever Apple says. But that's a different issue.)
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@anonymous234 said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
Having BMW (end user) software in your car would be 3 orders of magnitude bigger WTF.
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@anonymous234 Well, yes, I don't want any touchscreens or large color displays in my car, I want a primitive computer that can play MP3s from an SD card or USB drive and display a few stats like current/long term fuel consumption and estimated range. Preferably on a monochrome display. Car manufacturers are unbelievably retarded when it comes to user interfaces, it's bearable with old cars that couldn't really do much but as the in-car systems get more complex it becomes a nightmare to deal with.
I really don't think in-car systems provided and maintained by third parties are any solution to the problem, it just adds another potential headache. I know it's unlikely but what if Android just dies? What if Apple decides to stop making iPhones? Or what if either company decides to completely overhaul the current system without preserving backward compatibility? We can all go fuck ourselves, that's what.
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@blek At least, they could just have a touchscreen that connect to your phone and use whatever software you have on it.
Then it would never become obsolete in theory.
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@blek said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
but on the other hand, this is next level price gouging. It's not like these are low cost cars with tiny margins where the manufacturer needs to squeeze every dollar from their customers to maintain production, these are luxury cars...
That's precisely the reason why they do it. BMW buyers are willing to spend excessive quantities of money to have small details that others don't. Otherwise they wouldn't be buying BMWs in the first place, now would they?
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@anonymous234 said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
Otherwise they wouldn't be buying BMWs in the first place, now would they
BMW's are fun to drive.
Not all cars are created equals
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@timebandit Yeah, that would be nice, but there isn't a universally accepted standard for that, so I'd rather use SD/USB or Bluetooth to feed the car music to play. No built-in satellite navigation, my phone does a thousand times better job at it and I don't have to pay the dealer ridiculous money for "up to date" (haha, not really) maps.
One thing I'd like to see is some kind of adjustable universal phone mount located within the driver's reach but outside the field of view, with a space at the bottom to plug whatever charging cable your phone uses, and a Qi charging pad in the back of the holder. If your phone supports Qi, just put it in, if not, plug in a cable with whatever connector you need. That plus streaming music over Bluetooth and I'd be in heaven. But noooo, that's too reasonable...
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@blek You can do all this (if your car is Bluetooth enabled) with third-party add-ons
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@timebandit I know, but in most modern cars, even if I do that, I still have to buy their shitty fucking "infotainment" system, and I'd prefer to avoid that.
Also finding a decent phone holder with Qi is surprisingly challenging. I want a vent-mounted, adjustable one that doesn't rely on magnets to hold the phone and that's apparently impossible...
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@dcon said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
@timebandit said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
@blek The one-time fee was $300 from what I've read.
Since a lot of BMW drivers just rent the car for a couple years, they will save by just paying the yearly fees.
Because, of course, if you have enough money to buy a BMW, you can't pay the $300
My boss was just telling me he had an BMW for a while. Idling on the freeway (you know, that's what we do on highways here) would actually drain the battery because of all the electronics. With newer BMWs, they added something to prevent that. But if you changed the battery, you had to go in to the shop and pay (of course!) to get the system reset - or it would drain the battery again.
Or the car of your boss simply had a bad alternator.
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@timebandit said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
@blek At least, they could just have a touchscreen that connect to your phone and use whatever software you have on it.
That’s pretty much what Android Auto is. Quite useful for getting Google Maps on the car’s display.
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@blek said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
my phone does a thousand times better job at [sat-nav]
I've tried out various services on exactly that, running them against each other at the same time (yes, there were multiple phones plus the car's built-in system). The car's system (on a fairly recent high-end Volvo) flat out won because it knew where it was consistently, whereas the phones tended to lose their shit whenever there was a GPS black spot. We have quite a few of those round here. (I'm guessing that the car had an advantage with being able to cross-correlate the patchy GPS with dead-reckoning based on its other sensors.) It also had good display of routes through complex junctions, with the exception of one (a simultaneous three-way split) which just wasn't something the designers had considered.
The systems in the phones had better UI for route entry, and the voice directions were occasionally a little clearer, but their tendency to get completely lost within a hundred yards or so when the road dropped in a curve round a steep hill was a real downer.
The routes chosen by all the compared systems were not meaningfully different.
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@blek Really, it's almost exactly like M$ and Sony charging you monthly for online gaming provided by other people.
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@pie_flavor Not really, MS and Sony provide their own infrastructure - their stores. BMW provides nothing like that.
@dkf The problem with built-in sat nav is the maps need updates, and as far as I know manufacturers charge ridiculous amounts of money for updates and only publish them in long intervals. Waze gives me always up to date maps and immediate traffic info, I have never seen a built-in navigation software that could do that. Or can they do that with built-in too nowadays? My car is an 11 year old Peugeot where the stereo can't even play MP3s off a CD, so I don't have a whole lot of experience.
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@blek said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
Car manufacturers are unbelievably retarded when it comes to user interfaces
Seems like they're cheaping out on design by just slapping a touchscreen console down and calling it a day (c.f. new Prius). It's shitty and the worst part is that these fancy systems only seem to be capable of animations at 4fps.
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@blek said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
@dkf The problem with built-in sat nav is the maps need updates, and as far as I know manufacturers charge ridiculous amounts of money for updates and only publish them in long intervals.
For the record: my less-than-5-years-old Volkswagen's software only rarely has updates but at least they're free and can be installed by simply copying files to an SD card.
So just as with smartphones, those updates depend a lot on the manufacturer.
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@pie_flavor said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
Really, it's almost exactly like M$ and Sony charging you monthly for online gaming provided by other people.
I don't know what company "M$" is, but Microsoft and Sony both do revenue-sharing with the games they provide for "free" to consumers. As does Amazon Fire.
If BWM pays Apple, this makes a bit more sense. Do they?
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@blek said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
Waze gives me always up to date maps and immediate traffic info, I have never seen a built-in navigation software that could do that. Or can they do that with built-in too nowadays?
No idea. The area I was testing hasn't had significant changes to road layouts in recent years, and it was on a Sunday so the traffic was negligible from the perspective of travel times.
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@blakeyrat Good question, actually. And M$ is an abbreviation for Micro$oft.
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@pie_flavor said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
@blakeyrat Good question, actually. And M$ is an abbreviation for Micro$oft.
Microsoft isn't spelled with a "$", what are you talking about?
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@dcon said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
My boss was just telling me he had an BMW for a while. Idling on the freeway (you know, that's what we do on highways here) would actually drain the battery because of all the electronics.
That sounds like bullshit.
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@blek said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
I really don't think in-car systems provided and maintained by third parties are any solution to the problem, it just adds another potential headache. I know it's unlikely but what if Android just dies? What if Apple decides to stop making iPhones? Or what if either company decides to completely overhaul the current system without preserving backward compatibility? We can all go fuck ourselves, that's what.
Or just listen to the radio or use Bluetooth.
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@anonymous234 said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
That's precisely the reason why they do it. BMW buyers are willing to spend excessive quantities of money to have small details that others don't. Otherwise they wouldn't be buying BMWs in the first place, now would they?
We are talking about BMWs. Not Bugattis. BMWs are not that expensive.
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@blek said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
One thing I'd like to see is some kind of adjustable universal phone mount located within the driver's reach but outside the field of view, with a space at the bottom to plug whatever charging cable your phone uses, and a Qi charging pad in the back of the holder. If your phone supports Qi, just put it in, if not, plug in a cable with whatever connector you need. That plus streaming music over Bluetooth and I'd be in heaven. But noooo, that's too reasonable...
The Yukon Denali we rented on vacation last year had a little depressed area in the top of the console that kept your phone from sliding off and hitting the floor and also did wireless charging. Pretty simple solution. Toss your phone in the console and it just charged it automatically.
Also, the Bluetooth connection allowed me to come troll the phone's basic functions from the steering wheel controls. Track forward and back and volume is all I really need.
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@dkf said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
I've tried out various services on exactly that, running them against each other at the same time (yes, there were multiple phones plus the car's built-in system). The car's system (on a fairly recent high-end Volvo) flat out won because it knew where it was consistently, whereas the phones tended to lose their shit whenever there was a GPS black spot. We have quite a few of those round here. (I'm guessing that the car had an advantage with being able to cross-correlate the patchy GPS with dead-reckoning based on its other sensors.) It also had good display of routes through complex junctions, with the exception of one (a simultaneous three-way split) which just wasn't something the designers had considered.
The car doesn't have a big metal Faraday cage around its antenna like the phones did. It also knows which way it is pointed with a high degree of precision. I tend to hold my phone 45 degrees off the line of travel when using GPS and it can really mess up my phone's nav sometimes.
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@polygeekery BMWs are ridiculously expensive when you consider the fact that if you buy one, you'll become a BMW owner. It's a downside you need to include in your price/performance calculations. They should be paying people to take them off their hands, especially the X series. God I hate those.
The Yukon Denali (I googled that and I have a question: what the fuck is wrong with you Americans?! That's clearly a railway locomotive with tires on) solution sounds alright but I'd really prefer a holder that allows me to see the phone's screen. My phone's navigation software will almost always be superior to whatever is in the car, so I'd like to be able to see it if I need to.
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@lorne-kates said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
@pie_flavor said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
@blakeyrat Good question, actually. And M$ is an abbreviation for Micro$oft.
Microsoft isn't spelled with a "$", what are you talking about?
What are you, some kind of Micro$hill?
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@blek said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
BMWs are ridiculously expensive when you consider the fact that if you buy one, you'll become a BMW owner.
Fair enough. They are driven almost exclusively by cocks.
@blek said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
They should be paying people to take them off their hands, especially the X series. God I hate those.
Yeah. They tried to make an SUV that would handle and they ended up making a vehicle that is rubbish on-road and off.
@blek said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
The Yukon Denali (I googled that and I have a question: what the fuck is wrong with you Americans?! That's clearly a railway locomotive with tires on)
We like larger vehicles. I had the wife reserve the vehicle and that is what she rented. We actually needed something pretty large. We were vacationing with some friends and they dropped us off in Asheville, NC where we picked up the vehicle. We spent a few days in Asheville visiting with friends and taking the kids to Biltmore. Then we met back up with our friends in Charleston, SC and my mother-in-law met us there. So, 3 adults and two kids, plus luggage and such and all the crap that comes with kids (stroller, pack-n-play, folding high chair, etc) and even that Yukon did not seem too big.
@blek said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
My phone's navigation software will almost always be superior to whatever is in the car, so I'd like to be able to see it if I need to.
I thought that also, but after nearly two weeks with the Yukon I never needed to use my phone's GPS. I would say that Google Maps is marginally better, but nothing that ever was worth switching over. The only real annoyance was that the voice recognition was not quite as good as on Android. I found that I had to talk to the Yukon as though it were retarded.
and it would work. If I just talked normally (I talk sort of quickly) it would screw up at times. Other than that it worked perfectly well.
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@polygeekery said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
allowed me to come troll the phone
You troll even your phone ?
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@timebandit To prevent the AI singularity you need to keep your devices on their toes at all times.
Failure to do so will have them label you as sheep.
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@blek said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
Well, yes, I don't want any touchscreens or large color displays in my car, I want a primitive computer that can play MP3s from an SD card or USB drive and display a few stats like current/long term fuel consumption and estimated range.
I like my Ford SYNC system. The fuel stuff is not on the touch screen in my Fusion. It's a part of the regular driver's dashboard stuff. I have two customizable displays, left and right, that are controlled by buttons on the steering wheel. Basically, this:
The main screen is handy for controlling the radio, phone, etc. We use thumb drives for music. We don't really use the in car navigation since it doesn't know about traffic (and the maps are several years out of date and I'm too cheap to pay $150 to upgrade it). It doesn't do that thing where the screen will integrate with a phone app or whatever.
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@dkf said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
The car's system (on a fairly recent high-end Volvo) flat out won because it knew where it was consistently, whereas the phones tended to lose their shit whenever there was a GPS black spot. We have quite a few of those round here. (I'm guessing that the car had an advantage with being able to cross-correlate the patchy GPS with dead-reckoning based on its other sensors.)
It probably also has a much better antenna. But also the other stuff. My car will track our progress through a tunnel that goes underwater.
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@lorne-kates said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
@pie_flavor said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
@blakeyrat Good question, actually. And M$ is an abbreviation for Micro$oft.
Microsoft isn't spelled with a "$", what are you talking about?
He meant Mi¢rosoft, of course.
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@boomzilla said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
the maps are several years out of date and I'm too
cheapintelligent to pay $150 to upgrade itFTFY
$150 can buy you a whole GPS unit
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@timebandit said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
@boomzilla said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
the maps are several years out of date and I'm too
cheapintelligent to pay $150 to upgrade itFTFY
$150 can buy you a whole GPS unit
We considered buying the maps for my daughter, who just started driving. The rules say that under 18 year old drivers aren't allowed to use phones even hands free. Though we later talked to a police officer and he said that it really doesn't mean no navigation, so long as they aren't doing anything with it other than following directions while driving.
But a GPS unit would be a clunky extra thing and so it's inferior to the in-car solution for that reason.
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@boomzilla said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
But a GPS unit would be a clunky extra thing and so it's inferior to the in-car solution for that reason.
I agree, but $150 for map updates
Do they at least provide the lubricant for free ?
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@boomzilla said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
the maps are several years out of date and I'm too cheap to pay $150 to upgrade it
I have a Ford, and I've updated the maps twice now, for free both times. You're getting ripped off!
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@masonwheeler said in BMW to charge a subscription fee for a free service provided by Apple:
I have a Ford, and I've updated the maps twice now, for free both times
How? They want to charge me $120+ also.
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@blakeyrat No idea. The dealership said it was still covered under warranty, I think. (The car was 4 years old the second time.)
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@masonwheeler Oh. I haven't had any problems bad enough to take it back to the dealership.