BMW is framing this as a “one-time movie partnership”
What kind of people do you think are eating that up?
“Guys, it’s just this one-time ad, we had no intention of ever doing this again! Just forget about it for a year or so!”
I hope people take that as a contract and when they inevitably do it again, sue the hell out of them.
Not that it’ll stop this phenomenon.
Get organised folks, join your local socialist orgs (provided they are sane and not Stalinists and don’t think China is socialist).
I want off this ride, and that’s only gonna happen if we get involved, all over the world.
It’s one-time in the sense that it’s this movie. Next one-time will be for the next movie
“It is a one time fee that you pay annually.” One of the best Portlandia skits.
Just the tip
One reason this type of promotion may be becoming more common is that connected cars give automakers a direct path to the driver’s screen.
Once a person purchases a vehicle it should be theirs, not shared access with Automakers and their partners.
It hasn’t been that way for a long time. Every car since 2018 has some sort of black box in it that it records your driving behaviors, and that data gets sent to or sold to insurance companies who then use it to raise your premiums.
How are these black boxes reporting back though? Do all these cars just have a free SIM card built in?
Typically a soldered on sim chip, or esim software. You can disable it on some cars, for example I was able to bypass it on my 4runner pretty easily. I lost the feature to find my car, lock doors or see its status using the Toyota app though but I am 100% ok with that.
I’m not sure about this black box, but in the EU, the e-call system is mandatory, so all new cars do indeed have a sim. Though it’s most likely not a card, but either a chip (iSIM) or just in software (eSIM).
They do in fact. It’s also how the app connectivity works in modern cars.
They do. They hide it as an SOS system. “Only used in case of emergency.” It’s connected to GPS, sim like a cellphone that has at least 4g cell service to “call emergency.” I think Chevy used their Onstar connection. That’s always on, and the data text files can be sent without interrupting that service.
OnStar is the worst for selling data. They even record your body weight.
I think cunts who drive like cunts should pay more.
However, the real reason why cars have black boxes is repeated fraudulent claims by US law firms on “sudden acceleration”.The last lawsuit ended because Toyota had black box data proving US drivers are shit and commonly hit the wrong pedal. Before that, they had to settle $1B to law firms.
Oh, I agree with that. People who drive like complete assholes should definitely have to pay higher insurance premiums, but the way that they get the data to determine who these people are is just a huge privacy concern for me.
One reason this type of promotion may be becoming more common is that connected cars give automakers a direct path to the driver’s screen.
“Wo ein Trog ist, da kommen die Schweine.”
A lot of manufacturers sell vehicles at cost price in the hopes of making it up in after sales (parts and servicing). Most EVs require very little regular expense (cabin filters, brakes and tyres), so they try to make up the difference in subscriptions and “value added” services.
Sometimes those “value added” services aren’t adding value to their customers; they are “adding value” for business partners.
You would think that a car that is sold at a premium price would be exempt from these nasty little scams.
“we are a premium brand”
my ass.
These “premium” German brands are all committing suicide. Rejecting electric cars, rejecting nuclear power, designing cars that look like puke, and doing everything to monetize your use of the car.
With incompetent leadership like this, those 8k workers being laid off from BMW is just the beginning.
German car brands are rejecting nuclear power?
I was really looking forward to my luxury German nuclear-powered car as well >:(
You don’t see them launching cars powered by their own onboard reactors, do you?
You are right!
don’t worry, they’ll keep stoking nationalist paranoia and shift to weapon production. What’s the worst that could happen?
The premium is unfortunately not in the interior and infotainment experience, at least not these days. And I guess to non car people, the infotainment is what sells cars now.
The Germans still build the best* ICE drivetrains, the best chassis and suspension setups, to give you an excellent ride quality AND sporty handling in the same 2 ton family station wagon. Nobody compares, not even Volvo. But interior layouts have been going downhill steadily for like a decade now. And when it comes to EVs, you can’t really compete without being Chinese anyway. Other countries don’t have access to the same battery pricing, nor the same labor costs (to be fair the latter applies to both ICE and EV alike).
They’ll all die slow deaths. As EVs become mandated, Chinese companies will take over because nobody else can afford to sell cars for so cheap. The Chinese cars will of course have all the same infotainment issues like unwanted ads and they’ll be similar privacy nightmares, plus the prices will go up once you can only buy Chinese cars. It’ll be fun and we’ll all love it.
* Toyota Supra A90 used BMW’s B58 engine. That should tell you everything you need to know. TOYOTA didn’t bother coming up with their own engine for the chassis they also got from BMW. It’s been heralded as the modern 2JZ.
Plenty of non Chinese brands are on the EV train now.
I can buy an Alpine that it is, in every conceivable way, better than the cheapest VW EV (while being a bit cheaper, or the same price). How is this not a problem with German manufacturers specifically?
What are all the conceivable ways to you? Anyway, the Renault 5 is almost as much as the bigger id.3 neo here and we don’t have anyone selling the Alpine version as it’s more expensive than the 5 and thus too expensive for such a tiny car.
And all of these cost at least 4x as much as a similarly sized but lower power BYD does in China. That’s how much cheaper the Chinese can build their cars. When they sell the same batteries to Renault or VW, the batteries alone likely cost about as much as BYD’s entire car. And we can’t really produce these batteries at such scale here in Europe because of pollution regulation. China processes most of the world’s lithium and cobalt. Only hope we have is coming up with a magic battery chemistry that doesn’t come with a ton of environmental issues, but unfortunately Donut Labs is more than likely a scam.
Nothing says luxury car like trashy ads on your dash
I’m willing to bet that these cars do not get software updates wirelessly though. You gotta take your car into the stealership for those. But ads? Instant wireless transmission.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Walk like an Egyptian…
I’m sure this will help beat the Chinese automakers
This sounds like something that should be illegal.
I’ve never exactly been in the market for a bmw anyhow, but this is a great way to guarantee I will never want one.
If this works in any way, shape or form for BMW then you can bet that any other manufacturer selling “connected vehicles” will sit up and take notice.
If my brand new car started pushing dashboard ads to me, it would be rejected and returned to the dealer immediately. That is the only kind of pushback they would pay attention to.
What do you mean by “returned to the dealer”? Like you would trade it in and take whatever lowball offer they give you, or you would break the lease and pay the $3000 penalty, or you would just leave it there and ??? Profit?
Is there another potential outcome I’m not thinking of?
You and me… same page
I’m guessing the long term plan is to significantly increase the price of maintenance and updates then offer a cheaper plan with dashboard adds.
Anytime a corporation or a politicians says they aren’t going to do something, it means they’re thinking about that subject, and they are definitely going to do it.
We make far more decisions to NOT do something, and if someone doesn’t want to do something, they just don’t do it, they don’t tell everybody. We don’t talk about the things we aren’t going to do, we talk about things we ARE going to do.
Years ago, I was in a national managers conference call meeting, and HQ started it by saying “If there are rumors of lay-offs in your office, shut them down. There are no plans for lay-offs at this time.” I don’t remember what the rest of the meeting was about, but we all walked saying “Lay-offs are coming.”
Sure enough, within two months, I was out of a job, along with a bunch of others. Within a year, several branch offices were closed. We weren’t worried about it at all, until they brought it up in the meeting.
If they’re bringing it up, they’re softening us up for it, even if they’re saying No.
Same happened to us at my job. Boss gave a big nervous speech recently about how we’re doing fine and not to worry and how the industry is suffering but we’re staying strong… yada yada going to retain everyone … have no reason to fire yada yada and the literal next week fired two employees for the stated reason of “not busy enough to retain”.
Everyone knew it was coming when he started the speech off with “I don’t want anyone to feel insecure about their jobs here”
Curious, what IS the best new car brand for privacy? Especially in the EV sector?
I’m waiting to see regular reviews of those slate trucks and maybe a second model year/iteration. And maybe waiting to see if they eventually get better range. Sure not having a radio or infotainment is overkill, and only hand crank windows is overkill, but for $25k-30k and no big screen, it seems quite reasonable if all I want is a reliable box that moves around.
That’s the allure for me. I can choose to buy what I can afford and then at a later date add other options myself as I want them or need them. But the range is an issue for me as a rural person where a trip to a clinic is 100 mile round trip. And if I need more, then it becomes a 200+ mile trip.
Right, the Ford focus I bought for $17k in 2018 goes 350 or so miles on a full tank. I want at least that much range to consider a replacement.
Plus yeah, we’re rural enough chargers aren’t everywhere. Hopefully the range will be better and more chargers in a few years… And probably will keep the focus for the long cross county road trips.
You’re not going to want to hear this but… Tesla. It’s always been Tesla. No ads, no subscriptions for seat heaters, no selling your driving data.
I beg to differ, see Mozilla’s “Privacy Nightmare on Wheels” report for Tesla
In short: currently all options suck
Hey, did you actually read that article you linked? It clearly states Nissan’s the worst offender, and Tesla’s privacy issue was that 2022 data breach where employees shared videos. I’m not defending Tesla, but let’s stick to the facts here.
Did you only read the summary or the full report on Tesla? I linked 2 different pages so you can have your facts straight
- Tesla absolutely sell software locked heated seats as DLC, as well as subscriptions for “self driving” packages.
- They will advertise/upsell their own services in their app, including free trials of their “premium” features.
- If you think they are using your driving data (including camera feeds) in any responsible way then I have a bridge to sell you. There have been documented cases of Tesla employees watching their customers fuck on the interior cameras.
For context - I used to own one.
Are people seriously this ignorant.
Nazis lie.
Read up. Elon is not your friend: https://consumerrights.wiki/w/Tesla
You’re talking about the brand that is paywalling the auto drive after saying they never would ?
Users see the word “Tesla” and hit the down arrow without considering context or data. Tesla is a terrible company, and Musk is an egotistical, racist manbaby; those aren’t the only reasons why I won’t buy a Tesla, but they are a big part. The truth is that every big automobile manufacturer is bad when it comes to infotainment user experience and data privacy.
I won’t buy a Tesla, and most people I know won’t either. But when it comes to the US auto market, Tesla is consistently rated as one of the best user infotainment experiences, specifically because of the things you mentioned. I know someone who bought the 2026 Nissan Leaf, and they love it. I’ve ridden in it a lot and I think it’s a great car… except for the user experience. Every time the car is turned on a pop up covers most of the console advertising satellite radio subscriptions. There’s no way to disable it. Nissan is widely known to be the worst when it comes to user privacy, too.
Slate has my attention and I want them to disrupt the market. I’m considering buying one for my next vehicle, with the range being the only thing that hasn’t locked in my decision yet. I take several long (500+ miles) trips each year, and I would prefer to avoid having to use Tesla superchargers as there aren’t any other fast DC chargers along the route.
Yeah 100%. Ever since Elon went Republican everybody wants to hate him. I don’t blame them. It’s sad and IMHO short-sighted, but these days nuance doesn’t seem to be a big part of popular decision making. So something like ‘he’s a weird guy who works his people to the bone and he has shitty politics, but he’s overall doing things that are good for our society’ is too much to ask from most popular discourse.
It’s pretty clear that the other automakers really do not understand vehicle computing on a fundamental level. Even the supposedly connected modern cars are still using old infrastructure with tons of little can bus modules everywhere each doing one thing. And they are all supplied by the usual handful of companies like Delphi and Bosch.
If any of the automakers took a page out of Tesla’s playbook, namely design your own hardware and software, and focus on flat out building a better vehicle rather than figuring out how to nickel and dime every user, they would make a killing.This could also be solved with regulation. And probably should be solved with regulation. Basically say that automakers are prohibited from extracting any personal data from a vehicle including driving data or location data, unless a. The user explicitly opts in (and an opt-in may not be required for any other functionality), and b. Extracted data may not be sold or shared or used for any purpose other than providing services to the user (such as navigation). And that in-car screens may not be used for any sort of advertising or promotion, unless a. The user opts in (and an opt-in may not be required for any other functionality), and b. Any advertisement on the display must include a clear way to permanently disable advertisements in two clicks or button presses.
The fact is nobody wants advertisements on their car and they know that
We’re heading straight towards a cyberpunk future.
And not even a shiny, pretty, exciting one, ours is still half boring for some reason. I can’t even pin down what’s missing. It still feels like ours has wood paneling or something, but even that would be too '70s, which would still be a little cool. Maybe ours is too '90s? Our cyberpunk somehow still feels too analogue and not enough.
We live in a boring, ugly, stupid universe.
Its not a time period or quality issue but an ownership one. You can buy a new car but you don’t ever really own it fully.
And software, and movies, and books, and…
“Your” dashboard?
When my wife bought a new Mazda, the dealer made her sign a form that said the remote start app would only be free for one year. He told her it was just boiler plate; the remote start app would be free forever. I knew when she bought the vehicle the remote start app would be a monthly charge starting in precisely one year. lol!
