Cars are about to be a software platform, subscriptions and all | Hacker News Reader

Cars are about to be a software platform, subscriptions and all

bloomberg.com

131 pointssleepyshift210 comments

I don't want my car to be a software platform. I want it to be like my microwave. It might have software, but software is only incidental to its operation. I do not want to tweet from my microwave. I do not want ads in traffic. This is non-negotiable for safety reasons alone.

I don't care what I have to do to attain that. If that means replacing the radio. I will do it. If you brick my car if I don't have a Manufacturer Approved radio, I will go rebuild some grandfathered antique car.

> I do not want ads in traffic. This is non-negotiable for safety reasons alone.

I know it’s what you want but is it preventable? What’s the difference when today there are LED screens across the intersection you are trying to navigate that are intensely bright and displaying moving images? I’d argue that dimmer images in the car would be less distracting. However we appear on track to get both these dismal options. I won’t be buying a car with build in advertising, but given the frequency I change cars, this isn’t really any change.

Yes, it is preventable if you buy a car that doesn't have it inside of it.

As long as companies (or people) are allowed/able to make cars without ads in them, then it will be possible.

If the government mandates, or market conditions dictate (due to monopolies or insufficient demand/profit incentive), that ads will be in cars, then it will not be possible, at least for new cars.

It has nothing to do with flashing images, which I do not tolerate in my car either. It has to do with ads themselves, which have always walked the line between interactivity and malware. I don't want someone to be able to run arbitrary code on my car for $0.0004. No way.

Could you imagine ransomware on your CAR? While you are driving in it?? No thank you.

Cars should not be connected to internet, period. If you want some component to be able to be part of the car and connected, it should be hardware that is physically not linked to the car system itself in any way.

And you should not be able to issue OTA without some manual hardware operation, like turning a key somewhere that is far from the wheel.

> I want it to be like my microwave.

Yes. Plus: I want it to be like a simple microwave that does what I need: heats for a certain amount of time at a certain power level. 2 physical knobs.

Yes. Definitively not like my microwave. My microwave has not only the worst interface. But it also lags. The polling rate of the capacitive touche buttons is too low. And any action also takes a second to validate. It's horrendous.

Give me back my late grandma microwave. Two knobs. Nothing more.

After much research I purchased a Samsung MWF300G[0] a modern microwave with only 2 dials. Used daily for 5 years and I love it.

0. https://www.samsung.com/levant/microwave-ovens/solo/mwf300g-...

Does yours beep if you don't open the lid in a minute after it turns off?

Mine does and that is super annoying. Annoying enough that I'm thinking of removing the buzzer or just buying another microwave. I do like the simple dual dial design though.

I'm willing to go further. My parents' microwave has a single knob, and mine has two but I have never used it at something other than "High".

I bought an industrial microwave a number of years ago just for this feature: Its controls consist of a single dial: how long to cook for.

Also, in an industrial microwave the magnetron itself rotates, so there's no silly rotating plate business. Just put food in, turn the dial, take food out, and clean up is a snap.

Fortunately, those are also the cheapest ones.

For microwaves, my ranking is inversely correlated with price.

I like to have a single button to start and add 30s and a handle where you just pull to open.

The microwave analogy is tricky, because those are generally not worth repairing (or even doing routine maintenance to prolong life) and are cheap and reliable enough that you wouldn’t want to pay a subscription for them unless it was a very cheap subscription. I’d love to have that situation for a car, but I don’t think it’s realistic without moving to a subscription model.

The problem is that you're not going to have this choice. You'll be that guy insisting he wants a phone that's thicker but has better battery life - no manufacturer cares what you want because they have to operate at a scale where they can't cater for niches.

I'm not so sure.

Look at the European market: manual gears everywhere. Look at the UK, South African and Autraslian market: the car is inversed, with the wheel on the right.

The car market seems way different than the phone market. It's not an information platform, it moves matter. It's not virtual, it's real. It's not luxury like the phone used to be, people life depends on it already. It's not a free market, but heavily regulated.

And a car is very, very expensive. Second hand is a huge thing. You don't replace your car every 2 years. The market for maintenance and service is it's own industry, and the state is deep in it. Not to mention the the huge quantity of material you need just to build one car.

Finally, if a car fails, a BSOD becomes quite literal.

>Look at the European market: manual gears everywhere.

Because "screw the fuel economy I shift when I want" is the only way to have a decent driving experience when you have 1L of displacement responsible for 4000lb of vehicle.

>The market for maintenance and service is it's own industry, and the state is deep in it.

It's pretty amazing the stuff the state trainers have to say about what the state thinks about safety emissions. It's a hot take to say the least.

>Finally, if a car fails, a BSOD becomes quite literal.

This is really over blown. Even "the wheel fell off" type mechanical failures result in the vehicle grinding to a halt, usually making it to the side of the road (AI that thinks a pole is an HOV lane notwithstanding)

> Look at the European market: manual gears everywhere. Look at the UK, South African and Autraslian market: the car is inversed, with the wheel on the right.

These aren’t really great examples of marketing to a niche. Automatic transmissions cost more money, so manuals are more popular than they are in the US in every country that has less disposable income than the US. The primary reason it’s so easy to get a left hand drive car in Australia is because the UK and Japan drive on the left.

> in every country that has less disposable income than the US

So you argue almost all country prefer manuals? It's not true at least in Japan.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposable_household_and_per_c...

I’m saying it’s quite strongly correlated. From memory the difference in price was a few thousand dollars between manual and automatic. For some consumers that price difference is enough to override other preferences. Some markets have more of those consumers than others, to the extent that an automatic car would be a somewhat uncommon luxury item in a lot of places.

> Look at the European market: manual gears everywhere

Automatic is more expensive. If they had the same price tag then most people would buy automatic in Europe too, because it's more convenient.

If that were the case, you would see most high end cars in France with automatic transmission. It's not the case here. People are quite attached to their manual gear.

Automatic transmission is also seen as more boring, and while professional drivers can get away with using them many people consider you a lesser driver if you don't drive manual.

For the record, I just had a look at the local second-hand market; cars with automatic transmission are cheaper and more available, while the demand for cars with manual transmission is higher.

Interesting - I (British, living in another country in Europe) have just bought a new automatic car, but if I were buying used I would most likely only buy manual because the maintenance and replacement parts for an auto will likely cost much more, and a used car would more likely need these sooner - and be less likely to be covered by any warranty.

These are of course my perceptions; maybe they're correct, maybe not, but I do think it's a common way of thinking.

Obviuosly, some people prefer that (and I guess high end car users like going fast and doing the switching up manually), but others don't. Most people who use their cars mostly in the city where the traffic is often slow, you drive in stop-and-go traffic would prefer automatic to constantly switching up and down.

I am one of them.

I can still start my engine if the battery is dead.

When I rent cars in Europe, I usually get 50/50 manual/automatic.

Hm, is it true that there’s manual gear every where in Europe? I can remember we laughed at the Americans and their automatic gears 15 years ago, but now everyone drives automatic here as well.

Yes the vast majority of cars in Europe are manual, except maybe in the high-end where there are more and more semi-automatics (not the mechanical automatics).

I get that the big automakers believe that, and boy are they going to be in for a surprise when the market rejects their plans and foreign/upstart automakers take what little marketshare they have left from the last time they decided they could shove bad products down people's throats. For some reason the automakers lack good product people, and are constantly trying to chase rents rather than compete by producing reliable, affordable, good cars that people want to buy.

All great technology will eventually suck when the masses start using it.

> I do not want ads in traffic. This is non-negotiable for safety reasons alone.

LMAO! OK, who's gonna tell him about the ads on the radio?

Radio ads can:

- be turned off by turning off the radio - are not inherent to the operation of the vehicle

Classic radio is down-only. It goes through hardware for demodulation and amplification. I can turn a classic radio off.

How long will it be until there is an ad that makes it confusing how to dismiss it and uses a police siren to get your attention? How long until someone uses the radio to ransomware your car using a remote code execution vulnerability?

> How long will it be until there is an ad that makes it confusing how to dismiss it and uses a police siren to get your attention?

When I was in high school, the local radio station played a siren as part of the intro to their traffic update segment. Being a high schooler, I naturally had my volume cranked up pretty high - leading to at least a once-a-week near-swerve on my way to school as the segment began.

LMAO fail.

Radio is optional as you can switch it off at any time, change the volume, is not imposed by the manufacturer, and you had the option to listen to your own cassetes and later CDs and digital for 50+ years.

You must not have exprienced modern vehicles. My 2013 Chysler Pacifica's factory headunit occasionally stops kicking the watchdog timer and gets rebooted. When that happens, the radio is still playing and can't be switched off or volume adjusted until the thing is done booting.

So no, you can't switch it off at any time.

This would be an example of where more complicated isn't better. Our car is from 2004 but neither it nor any car I've ever owned has ever had this problem.

I cannot imagine putting up with this. I would rather mount a bluetooth speaker on the dash.

That would be the exception, not the rule with radio (that it would need to be, to justify using it as an example of a driving nuissance as the grandparent did).

And this exception points to the current trend for manufactured control + everything as a platform, so it can be seen as a further argument towards the point we're making here against this trend.

Never understood people complaining of radio ads until I got to hear what American radio is like. They legit play ads after almost every song. Yikes!

There are options that don't have ads including satellite radio, and communication via stereo cable or Bluetooth with your phone which can play music via local storage or streamed.

Its interesting that we have created a world where the people who build software are often the most skeptical of and aviodant of the software industry.

I feel like a luddite sometimes. I want to limit as much as possible how many devices I own that have access to the internet. My computer(s), HTPC, phone, game consoles, and that's it. There's no reason anything else ever needs internet access.

You’re far from alone. I recently outright blocked all DNS traffic, including known DoH providers, on my network firewall for all my devices except my Pi-Hole.

Then, I blocklisted all Google and Facebook domains on my Pi-Hole… except for YouTube’s content servers so I can use Invidious.

In fact, I might follow your example and add an outbound allowlist to my firewall. Seems like the next logical step.

>I feel like a luddite sometimes.

Luddites were right in their own way: their point was not against technology in abstract, but about the destruction it brought to their line of work with no alternative offered.

But, Luddites aside, being enthusiastic for any application of technology is a sign of the idiot consumer or the naive futurist.

The actual technologist knows that some tools are good for X and not for Y use cases, and also knows when to cut down technology (as opposed to add for the sake of it).

(Same way we don't add features to our programs for the sake of it, and many features are put there by demand of the marketing team to get more money out of users, not to give them something better).

Many of the Luddites were successful craftsmen.

The way I would frame it is that the Luddites weren't against the technology and automation, they were against the how the gains from that increased productivity were share - with 100 % going to the owners and none going to the workers.

The reason why people think of them as of "dumb people breaking the machines" is because history is written by the victors.

i have a darker assumption: people like using software to exploit problem X, but they dont like the idea that they are problem Y needing to be exploited.

It is because we know how the sausage is made.

I keep waiting for someone to write a book about how often this is the case in different industries, areas of expertise, etc. It's a variation on the George Bernard Shaw thing: "every profession is a conspiracy against the laity".

In my own profession I'm extremely wary of my peers and the services they provide for the simple fact that I know how much and how often things can go wrong, and when I've needed those services myself, it takes me a very long time to vet people.

"People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices." - Adam Smith

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75oun5gvDAU&t=324s

I don't think that's absurd as it seems; e.g. a craftsman would avoid IKEA if they could help it.

Ikea is actually not bad. Their materials are cheap but the designs are decent for the price. Compared to comparable items from target or Walmart you typically get a better product. Obviously you aren’t going to get a finely created product out of high end material but in the bottom tier price range they are the best. You would have to pay 2-3x as much to get a minor step up in quality.

> skeptical of and aviodant of the software industry

Not really. And, Not everyone have good intentions.

Risk analysis is part of software development. And, we know where it lands once corrupt forces will take over.

Because we know how the sausage is made and the shortcuts taken to deliver it.

I don't think that is the issue. if you ever start a startup the first thing an investor will ask is what problem you are solving. Connected cars, fridges etc aren't solving any problem I have. I don't even use the inbuilt maps etc on my car. The phone is a much better device for that in every way.

I was thinking the same too. Even for myself, I just own a laptop and a smart phone. If I could get rid of the phone I would.

No smart watches, home automation devices, wearable fitness devices, none. I've used some of them at one point or another and in hindsight, while they did bring some benefit (mostly convenience), I found their privacy, financial, environmental costs to be just too high to justify the marginal benefits.

Give me a minimal Linux machine and the vibrant Linux community where we fix each others' issues and I'm a happy engineer and a human being :)

Phones have become our ever present little snitch that tells the overlords every physical place you go, every place you surf, everyone you call, and the ambient conversations it picks up from people speaking near it. How we got here is called convenience, and the overlords know how to work that angle endlessly.

You can't deny the utility of a modern phone is high despite this.

Because we know how something can be abused until there is another way to abuse it. It's an endless way to abuse it, where a PM with an even more cynical goal will introduce an even more disgusting way to monetize a product. Finally, it's to save money on production costs and make even more money. All this thanks to software scalability, pluggability, etc etc. All you need is finally the idea, and if you have a crazy idea backed up by a graph that shows you can make 20% of profit more, that's it, done.

Eventually people get used to it. That's the main selling point, always. We are commoditizing literally everything, it's happening under our nose and we just let it happen. Until finally alternatives come and we need to pay double to have something we used to have 20 years ago (conceptually speaking, not technically) for a normal/cheaper price.

Can we boycot this? Yes, by buying products whose pricing model is old and outdated. And that's typically not the shiny one...

There will also always be a horde of developers who mistake normal users' lack of understanding for what's going on and an inability to see the direction this is taking us in with consent or even enthusiastic assent.

Paraphrasing upton sinclair: It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his stock options vesting depends on his not understanding it.

See also: privacy, right to repair, app stores with 30% markups on in-app transactions, intrusive advertising, the death of journalism, internet connected lightbulbs, bitcoin CO2 emissions, electronic voting, etc.

I work on the foundations of automotive software. I live in a low-tech cabin in the woods and drive a older minimal-tech car. Enough said.

Most large industries are short-term profit-driven, to the detriment or exclusion of all else. The goal thus isn't to provide the best service or product, but to discover the best way to exploit the "customer" (the real customers are whoever owns the company.) Thus, this is probably true in many fields, not just software. People work hard to acquire skill in a field they care about and believe in, and are rewarded by a whole career of using that skill to make sub-standard or even dangerous products because that's what makes their employers the most money.

Building software pays my bills. Also, we know what makes the secret sauce (or doesn’t). Skepticism is warranted.

>If you brick my car if I don't have a Manufacturer Approved radio...

Farmers equipment is being bricked when they try to repair their multi-$100K machinery. It's the food we all eat that is at risk over some software update or a farmer had to perform necessary repairs by swapping a tractor's ECU.

I will go rebuild some grandfathered antique car.

The classic car community continues to thrive and the aftermarket has plenty of parts available. My daily driver (perhaps not so daily for the past year or so...) doesn't need any software to start and drive, and that's the way I like it. It doesn't have the fuel efficiency or cleanliness of a modern car, but I guess that's just the cost of freedom and comfort for which I don't mind paying.

...and every time someone brings up the "safety" argument, I tell them that motorcycles are still legal.

Motorcycles are legal but if you commute and carry your kids around in them 100% of the time you may be choosing poorly. You moved the goalposts from a good choice to legally allowed.

You can pick old cars which are easy to fix and barely have any software. Old Volvos come to mind. They are also very safe, not just for their age. If safety is a primary concern you might consider something ridiculously massive like an F350. Those vehicles also don't have a lot of Software and with the weight and the size most modern SUVs with sleeping drivers will simply be consumed.

Modern cars crumple so that they absorb more of the energy of the collision sacrificing the car's body for your body. Massive vehicles of the antique era had a horrific safety record. People in fact used to believe that collisions at highway speed were unsurvivable by nature. People who imagine that having the heavier more rigid car renders them safer because their car will just go through the other car leaving them safe misunderstand physics and safety.

In the context of current cars classic volves are pretty garbage too. Here is a 90s volvo being absolutely smeared by a renault 10-20 years newer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7_H_aZtLl8

See also unsafe at any speed.

A few months ago i had an accident in a "90s Volvo". A Volvo 850 to be exact. A Toyota Aygo got into my lane on a country road. A car that is 15 years newer in design and is also considerably lighter than the Volvo. It was basically a head on impact at about 70-80 km/h(where 100 is allowed, i braked quite a bit). While i didn't walk away because of the shock, i could. I had no injuries apart from scuff marks and my right leg hurt slightly but the doctors didn't find anything and the pain went away hours after the incident. The Toyota driver was not that well off. Quite a few broken bones and he was totally trapped in the car. After that incident, i surely know what car to purchase. And i did.

I think that video is about the 940 vs the modus from fifth gear. I won't watch the 15 minute video to find a few seconds of crash test buried somewhere. If that is the crash test from Fifth gear: that Volvo 940 had the engine removed. Usually cars who have crashes have engines.

Unsafe at any speed. By Ralph Nader. A guy who wrote a book about the safety of cars while not having a drivers license. The discussion the book started was good, the book itself was not. You cannot really complain about safety features being an option instead of included by default if you don't pick them. And yes, rear wheel drive requires some driving skills to master. If you don't want to learn, get a chauffeur or a car more fit to your skills.

Same. I will not ever own any car that has network connectivity. So that means older cars only. Oh well. So be it.

I, on the other hand, look forward to the day, probably not for at least 20-30 years from now, when all or virtually all vehicles are autonomous, and they're all constantly communicating with each other. Could you imagine the improvements in efficiency and traffic management? The vast reduction in accidents because someone forgot to use a turn signal or was following too closely? The marvelous freedom it would offer to the disabled?

Do you work with software? Because you don't seem to be scared one bit. I don't see this becoming a thing anytime soon. Not just because of how horrible software is and how little it improves. In the last 20 years we barely had any improvements in what cars assist us with. The Mercedes Benz W220 from 1998 had active cruise control. And today modern active cruise control systems barely work better. Some cars can sometimes change lanes for you. But even that is far from good. I look at how bad lane keep assists (which also have been around for over 10 years) detect roads, especially country roads and i don't feel like we will get anything remotely good from "self driving" cars in the next... MANY years.

I think the closer we get to the point where all vehicles are autonomous, the easier it will get. The interim is the hard part. Right now autonomous vehicles have to be able to operate alongside human operators whose ability to communicate their intent is limited to brake lights and turn signals, and there is basically no way to cooperate. Now imagine a world where it's all autonomous vehicles who are constantly communicating intent and can cooperate in marvelous ways, like with orderly zipper merging or intersection management without the need for traffic signals. There will still be a need for computer vision to detect pedestrians, obstacles, and wildlife, but it will be simpler than having to deal with other human operators.

My issue is that even today "autonomous" vehicles are far from capable of doing what they are supposed to do. The technology is decades old and barely anything happens.

And no, i like driving. I would hate a future where driving would be illegal.

> I think the closer we get to the point where all vehicles are autonomous, the easier it will get.

The last 5% of anything is the hardest, and on this particular problem it's even harder.

That's often true when you're talking about a single project with a clearly delineated end state, such as, "Build a responsive website for my coffee shop that works in all major desktop and mobile browsers."

But it's generally not true when you're talking about advances in technology and market dynamics where there are multiple inflection points. If I told you that the products Apple is planning to build over the next 3 years are going to be harder to build than anything it's built in the previous 45, simply because the last 5% of anything is the hardest, you'd probably say, "That's not what I mean!"

I think it's pretty obvious that building autonomous vehicles that can understand human driving behavior without direct communication is harder than building autonomous vehicles that only have to worry about other autonomous vehicles, with which they can communicate in data-rich ways. The fact that the former needs to happen before the latter because of market dynamics doesn't change the fact that it's a harder technological problem.

Agreed, I don't believe there will be any such autonomous coordinated cars in many decades. It is a seriously difficult problem for the general case. It's effectively AI and true AI has been just around the corner for many decades but never arrives.

For the happy path of interstates in good weather, sure, that's not too hard.

Dang I wish my microwave had good software. All the pre-set modes are crap.

Your microwave will end up as a subscription platform.

Services grafted on to various appliances and consumer articles are going to be the norm unless we push back. Hard.

My microwave will not end up as a subscription platform. Maybe if I have to buy a microwave some day, but I don't know why I would have to do that. My microwave works fine.

Microwaves don't live forever (especially newer ones). At some point the choices will be:

[ ] a connected microwave

and

[ ] no microwave

Just like almost all newer cars now have some kind of wlan connection to the factory built in.

This twelve inch cast iron skillet, on the other hand, will last forever.

Yes, it likely will (unless you drop it, or quench it). But if you're careful with it it will last longer than anybody reading this. But just like car batteries: cast iron skillets rarely die, but lots of them are murdered.

> . If you brick my car if I don't have a Manufacturer Approved radio

Every bmw, Mercedes Benz, and every luxury car does this today. Millions of them on the road.

And it doesn’t brick the car, just anything in the path of the unapproved device (which guess where your radio sits)

But this is to avoid fake parts from being installed in your car.. so catch 22?

This just feels like the latest in a long line of industries trying to build a recurring revenue model fueled by greed.

Looking at the uproar from moves by Circut[1] and others makes me question how out of touch some of these companies are.

I think companies need to realise a subscription needs to deliver constant tangible value to the consumer.

1.https://connpirg.org/blogs/blog/usp/angry-crafting-moms-blow...

This would not have been a problem (or even an option for the company) if the software was open source.

Tesla's already doing this: https://www.autoblog.com/2020/03/23/tesla-removing-content-f...

> The dealer, United Traders, bought the car directly from Tesla at an auction on November 15, 2019. At the time of that auction sale, the Model S had Enhanced Autopilot and Full Self Driving Capability options installed, which the original owner had paid a combined $8,000 for, as listed on the Monroney that Tesla gave the dealer. On November 18, Tesla ran an audit of the software in its vehicles, including the Model S now owned by the dealership, and removed Enhanced Autopilot. The automaker did not inform the dealer of the changes to the Model S, so the dealer sold the sedan to Alec on December 20 believing the car contained what was on the Monroney.

This is very, very bad.

Music and TV subscriptions? Not great (I want to buy something once and own it), but at least those are luxury purchases.

Cars? Not ok - that's critical for me (and many others) to get to my job (bad public transit in the area), groceries, etc.

> “You can easily see a major backlash to all this,” said Gartner analyst Michael Ramsay.

I wonder how one can maximize that potential backlash, so as to cut this terrible idea off as soon as possible.

You gotta start small. Boycott. Do not buy cars from companies that do this. Even if they allow you to opt out or they have offerings without these “features”.

Then tell your friends and family about it. Hopefully, at least one or two of them will understand or agree. Even if nobody follows your example, you’ve planted the idea in their heads.

If you have a blog or social media, write about this. Again, it’s unlikely people will change their minds only because of you, but this will plant the seed of doubt.

Over time, this might become big enough to be a political issue. If it affects the driver’s privacy an the car’s safety it definitely can. Then it’s time to call your representatives.

In theory, we would just send a letter to senators and they would pass a law to stop this greedy nonsense. In practice those senators get generous donations from car manufacturers.

That’s why seeding your perspective is important, unfortunately. Build leverage before you try to use your lever.

Precisely because it's so critical, it's a terribly efficient leverage over you, pretty much legalized extortion. Imagine you wake up one morning and your car happily announces that it's updated software overnight and from now on for your safety faceid is required to start the car and an always on driver facing camera will help you to stay focused on the road and arrive safely at your destination no matter where it is. Ah, also, by touching the door handle you agree to the new terms of service. The thing is you have an important appointment in 30 mins.

The FTC is considering rulemaking on 'dark patterns' being used to unfairly extract consent, and it wants to hear from you![1]

[1] https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/blogs/business-blog/2021/04/...

What if that commenter doesn't live in the US..? I find the presumption aggravating

1) Y Combinator is based in the US, and HN is hosted in the US. While the non-US participants are welcome & valuable, It’s reasonable to assume a commenter is from the US unless they specify otherwise.

2) the statement is relevant regardless of your nationality. There’s only a couple big regulators for this kind of thing worldwide, so a movement by any of them is relevant regardless of whether or not you fall under their jurisdiction directly. GDPR is very meaningful to US tech folks, for example.

I mostly disagree on TV and movies. They have a lot less replay value than songs, so there isn't much sense buying. Sure, there are exceptions, but season 1 of Two and a Half Men is not worth $35.

I agree; even before the internet, I rented movies, I didn't buy them. The movie/tv industry has always been massively overcharging for the privilege of owning the content, which is why the business of selling them never even really took off the way it did for music and video games where the value of ownership is much higher.

A friend of mine bought new BMW and the whole thing just shut down half way into the journey, he said he was happy he could get out of it. The more complexity the higher the chance of failure.

If you're like me you just want a car that get's you from point A to point B reliably and safely. You're probably thinking they will always be an option for a straightforward mechanical machine.

But that may not be the case. Regulators are increasing demands for more and more electronics and a lot of that is driven (I assume) by car industry lobby.

Essentially, the best thing a car industry can achieve is to turn your car into a computer or iphone. This way they can release new models every year and increase the the pressure to buy more.

Right now a 20yo car is still good to drive around and not that much has improved, but what are you going to do it the new software update is no longer compatible with your car? :)

And obviously, more higher complexity.higher failure means more profits on component sales.

The only thing that constantly improves and is really worth considering is safety. I am not even saying about active safety features but the passive ones. They are also in constant development.

But these are sometimes making it safer for the occupants at the expense of the rest of the environment (think smaller windows and fatter A pillars making children harder to see, or strengthened soundproofing making children harder to hear.)

But are children harder to see than from older cars? It isn't like the windows were huge nor the beams small.

Are children really harder to hear? Old cars were louder. How much sound did they cover up just with noise? How much more could you hear in an old car compared to a modern electric car?

I don't think this is a very good argument... I want my car to be as quiet as possible, on terms of the noise it makes and it's soundproofness. That making people harder to hear outside is irrelevant, as I mainly use my eyes to scan the environment for people, not my ears.

Also I think we've done enough damage to the world with the (British accent) "what about the children" arguments...

I think this one in particular ticks me off personally because people I meet are all moralistic about me listening to podcasts while bicycling in traffic, telling me I "shouldn't block the sounds of the environment."

And I'm left wondering: have these people ever been in a modern car? Just sitting in it blocks out more of the environment than my open-backed earbuds. If I can drive one of those without causing an accident, surely I can listen to podcasts on my (much slower) bicycle without causing an accident too!

Isn't that advice about your own safety?

I see it now where people bellyache about headphones and runners and don't really get it. I don't have the volume jacked up and I know where to look for traffic.

On a bike I don't want headphones just because I'm mixing with so much more traffic and want that awareness.

>A friend of mine bought new BMW and the whole thing just shut down half way into the journey, he said he was happy he could get out of it.

That's more o an issue of the big German car manufacturers having outsourced their HW and SW development to suppliers who compete on cost so UX was never in the budget.

Still, I do prefer having physical switches for the critical functions of a car regardless of how polished the touch UX is.

Cars have a lot more components and electronics than they had 30 years ago, and yet they are very significantly more reliable.

It is not the complexity at fault, it's BMW cutting corners hitting quality. Even assuming the higher complexity part, there is no reason a software nice-to-have like navigation to make your entire car unusable, if you keep the ECU separate from the rest of the car it will still drive.

It is only a matter of time before there are jailbreaks and free / open source car operating systems.

For related 'food for thought', see Cory Doctorow's "Car Wars" which combines car software hacking with self-driving vehicles for a unique near-future sci-fi story.

Edit: downvotes? Instead, you could respond with why you disagree and we can have a discussion.

Do you think there will not be jailbreaks? It has been happening with John Deere tractors: https://www.vice.com/en/article/xykkkd/why-american-farmers-...

Yes, but that's a losing game - the manufacturers will continually tighten security until it's infeasible - see how difficult it is to jailbreak current-generation iPhones and game consoles, for instance.

The only ways out are social (consumers acting en masse to exert market pressure) or legal (regulation). You can't hack your way around this issue - as the attacker, the strong crypto that exists (and enables things like firmware signing) is not on your side.

Sadly, you are right.

One of the themes in "Car Wars" is that laws are created which make it illegal to run unapproved software on the self-driving cars.

The reasons cited for the laws are "for safety", but it seems like a thin veneer over the car manufacturer having complete control of the car's software, and by extension the car itself.

> laws are created which make it illegal to run unapproved software on the self-driving cars.

Enforcement impossible.

But the thing is, those things will be broken in the future.

Even if unfeasible now, they will be in future.

Not everyone cares about regulations :-)

My country has (since fall of USSR) been one of the biggest used car markets in Europe, and as cars have added more and more electronics people have started figuring out how they work and developing tools to work around them.

I recently came across (randomly browsing) a device developed here that plugs into the OBD port and disables the AdBlue system (an extra fluid you need to fill up often, which reduces emissions on newer diesel engines, if you don't the vehicle refuses to start). The advertising was targeted at commercial vehicles. It's not illegal for the manufacturer to make, and if the driver of the truck is ever stopped by police they just pull it out. Nobody is any the wiser. But saving ~5% of the fuel costs definitely affects the bottom line of the company.

Does AdBlue comply with some sort of legal regulations on emissions?

Honestly, I hope people who disable the emission control systems on their cars get the book thrown at them.

That's a tricky comment. For disabling something that is perfectly functional I agree, but if it's broken then what to do?

Since the late 2000s all diesel vehicles sold in Europe have had a diesel particulate filter (DPF) that helps reduce NOx emissions. After 150,000 - 200,000km these end up becoming blocked up and need replacing. If you don't you'll have reduced engine power and could even damage the engine. Except you can't get a replacement, these parts are designed for that specific car, often have complicated electronics, etc. You can sometimes get remanufactured or used parts from salvage, but they probably aren't going to last very long and are still expensive (€1500+ for parts and labour). So you have a car that is perfectly functional, except the emissions system is broken. Replacing it may cost a significant fraction of the value of the car.

What pretty much everyone does (even in Western countries) is have it removed. Of course you aren't supposed to, and this is supposed to be checked when the vehicle is inspected (visually, note that car inspections do not test NOx emissions in Europe), but everyone turns a blind eye.

The manufacturers are the ones who are really to blame here. Why make something that can't be replaced on the car?

I'd really like to see the EU taking a harder line on diesel engines (petrol is much less polluting), but it's probably not going to happen because of the big car manufacturers who are all heavily invested in diesel. In most of Europe petrol is taxed more than diesel, which from an environmental viewpoint really doesn't make any sense. With hybrid technology petrol can be just as fuel efficient, and is mechanically much simpler. At least EVs seem to be set to take over both for light vehicles.

There's a worry that insurance won't cover you if the car manufacturers say "Oh he hacked the software". Accidentally hit someone? Now you have to pay the full damage. Got into an accident? Sorry, pay your own hospital, your coverage has been cancelled.

A neater hack would be for the jailbreak to delete itself and restore the original software when it detects that the car crashed, e.g. do it on airbag deployment.

>> There's a worry that insurance won't cover you if the car manufacturers say "Oh he hacked the software". Accidentally hit someone? Now you have to pay the full damage. Got into an accident? Sorry, pay your own hospital, your coverage has been cancelled.

You bring up a good point, but that assumes that there are problems with the replacement car software.

People repair and modify their own cars today and most insurers do not object unless their is some kind of gross negligence / unsafe modifications.

Perhaps we need a version of FOSS for insurance then. However there is far too much legal red tape in the insurance industry, and it is certainly not a free market where disrupters can enter easily...

Voiding the warranty of your phone is one thing, but on your car? What if it voids the insurance?

That depends on the terms of the insurance.

Does car insurance prevent car owners from doing their own maintenance or modifications?

Does the car insurance require the car owner to only go to specific shops / dealerships for repairs?

That's unrealistic. A car contains several ECUs. Each ECU has one or more MCU/CPU. Every core runs its software, 99% of the time documentation is available only under NDA. Reimplementing the software for just one MCU/CPU is challenging even for who is part of the industry.

If you wanted to go for "replace everything", sure. But that's not what you need for unlocking features and maybe some UI stuff. (I still suspect it won't be that common, but I'd assume it to be much more in line with other jailbreaking projects)

There have been 3rd party ECUs for decades, "piggyback" fuel and spark controllers which take over functionality of the main ecu, devices to disable rev/speed limiters, custom transmission controllers, and so on. I wouldn't discount the aftermarket's ability to develop something that fulfills owners' needs. (Post-warranty)

I believe this will happen too. It might be happening now - there seem to be tesla folks who have messed with their cars.

But it will be a struggle back and forth.

Can't wait for the deaths during bushfires when the phone network is down but your car won't start because it's time to check the licensing server.

There have already been examples where hire cars are stuck in parking garages because of no signal to reach their servers.

IMO the right to repair movement is our best defense against this sort of rent seeking. You can't repair and maintain anything yourself if a subscription is required.

Living in a city and having street-parked "rent-a-car" vehicles for infrequent trips while using trains to get to work is an incredible lifestyle.

I went camping recently, so I rented a 4x4 for a few days. I needed to pick up family from the airport, I'll just rent a car for a few hours. Want to go for a hike up north, rent a car for a day.

All I have to do is Lime-style, book one on the app, tap my car on the windshield to unlock and it's mine.

Parking? No problem, the government has designated parking spots for rideshare vehicles.

It could be cheaper, but with my frequency of use, it's cheaper than owning a car.

This. Wife and I sold both our cars and moved to Oslo. We can get almost anywhere with public transportation and rent a car/van when we need to move stuff or get away to the cabin.

In my city I have lived through multiple waves of this model.

The main drawback is that it requires a bit of planning: on the weekends, everybody wants a car.

I can count with one finger the companies that have survived multiple waves of this model over the last 15 years. They have "poor" cars, but enough of them, parked in "centralized" locations to ease maintainance, but enough of these locations spread out, great prices for a day, a weekend, etc.

Most other companies that tried this have ended up defaulting the moment they had to repair their first wave of cars.

The ones that still "survive" have gone through defaults, mergers, and have "infinite" amounts of money (e.g. owned by car manufacturers that use them as a way to get people "try" their cars as opposed to a "profitable" business). These are kind of "gimmicks" that you use when you pick somebody from the airport to show them around in a nice car. For everyday stuff, these are expensive enough for competing with Uber, and at that point, I just take a Uber. For one day trips they are also expensive enough that, if you take 3 days per month, owning a cheap car is actually cheaper and more practical than using these....

For this to work you need a pretty good public transportation system. In the US for example, I don't know of any city other than NYC that have that kind of infrastructure.

Works well in Chicago with the CTA. Havent owned a car in years, and just rent when I need one.

I've heard the US has poor public infrastructure but haven't seen it so I can't comment. I live in Sydney, Australia and it's quite capable.

15 years ago I lived in DC a few months and I did not need a car, I used the sub a lot and buses a few times.

Good solution if one doesn't care at all about cars they drive. I could save 500€ a month with this solution but I'd much rather drive a 20l/100km V8 than a sweaty public ecobox.

For what it's worth, my 2012 Chevy Volt had a subscription plan for starting my car via a phone app. So the subscription model has already been present for some years. What will be offered via subscription will drastically change however.

I'm finding it increasingly difficult to avoid purchasing, and therefore tying myself to, 'connected' platforms. I recently decided to purchase a new washing machine. It was difficult to find one that did not feature some form of wireless connectivity. I know from other discussions on this forum around so-called 'smart' televisions[1][2] that simply not connecting the device to your home wi-fi network, or implementing DNS filtering measures such as a PiHole, may not be effective ways to restrict the access of these devices. Not to mention the various security implications of giving these devices access to your network.

The idea of a car having the same connectivity is just a minefield of privacy, security and generally anti-consumer issues. I am not optimistic either that pushback against such concerns will force manufacturers to amend these practices.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25934286 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25313480

I think legislation is the only way to fix this :(

Require owner's/user's consent to connect. If no consent, no connect. Device's offline capabilities must still work and it must not nag you or otherwise use dark patterns to force a consent out of you.

That would be a relatively minor extension to gdpr.

> It was difficult to find one that did not feature some form of wireless connectivity.

As long as you don’t have to connect it… I couldn’t find a decent toothbrush that didn’t have Bluetooth, but it doesn’t matter, I just ignore it.

I was looking for a coffee mug that could keep my coffee warm.

I saw one in the store - it would keep the coffee heated and... bluetooth + app required. gah.

I just want a dumb radio with wireless CarPlay. I want to bring the smarts to the car. It shouldn’t have smarts of its own.

You think this is interesting, wait until the CEO of your car subscription company wakes up in a bad mood and decides to "cancel" your car. That whole "In the future, you will own nothing and you will be happy" thing is going to keep you gloriously in-line and silent when not.

Now is the right time to buy a pre internet car and relevant consumables (belts, alternator, starter etc) of your choice before this becomes an issue. So long as you keep the suspension in good shape, and maintain the drive train properly you will be in good shape to avoid the rentier surveillance culture looming.

Buy a Dacia. In the latest models they have an official phone holder. As in: you can make your car as smart or as dumb as you want.

1000% don’t want a car subscription, that’s called a lease.

I de-computered my older mechanical diesel,led lights all round,modifications to the wireing and removed the alternator and added solar panels. And there are no beeps in my house, mostly older equipment. Also have managed my online life by going wireless with two phones,#1 has lots of data and is de-guggled doesnt send or recieve texts and has no social media,etc. #2 has no data and is wide open ,accessing the internet by wifi from phone number 1 The idea of a car that beeps and wimpers and whines for handouts gives me the cold grue and shudders.

You don't own your cellphone, you don't own your tv and now you won't own your car too.

I'm pretty sure I own my cellphone, same with TV.

I own my cellphone, because it doesn't run iOS or Android.

I own my TV, because the house's DNS is forced through pihole and the apps can't upgrade unless I want them to.

I own my car, because it's the kind with no touch screen, no untouchable black box running it. (I miss my first car, released the same year as the C64.)

Those EULAs are not legally binding in the EU. You do own you cellphone and TV (and apps, movies and music files if the button said Buy). If the US goes down this route the car industry will crash (even more).

"You will own nothing and be happy"

Imagine the fun when you give gas and the display shows that your subscription can only reach 100km/h, if you want to go faster, please subscribe to the PRO subscription :)

This is/was inevitable. I really think that we will be able to buy a car whose basic features can be locked/unlocked on subscription, and I am not talking about fancy features, but basic ones like speed, types of brakes, etc. It might not be a bad idea to reduce the price of a car considering you produce only one type and customize it at "runtime". And BTW, it's somehow already the case. I bought a Ford with 100 HP and the seller told me that with "some external help" I can get up to 125HP because the engine is the same as the one for the 125HP model. I was like "what the hell?". Of course the downside is that if you get into a bad accident and the insurance finds out, you're on your own. But that's another story.

A pay as you go model would also be fun. The more you press the pedals the more you pay:)

Software updates require approval in the EU just like hardware changes if it significantly changes the car. Tesla is already on thin (or rather close to nonexistent) ice by just updating. This won't be allowed in the EU unless new laws are made (and I personally doubt it will be allowed and good riddance!).

We will rent everything, and we will love it.

https://medium.com/illumination/in-2030-youll-own-nothing-an...

We certainly will not love it.

correct. We will definitely not love it

The only things I rent currently are Utilities, Internet Access, Standby servers for my business, Auto Insurance and Netflix. No SAAS / PAAS / MyAss etc.

So no I will not love any further encroachment and actively resist it.

How about a bank account and a credit or debit card tied to it?

I am not anal and would not put those into the same category as Car As A Service.

'we will love it' is the expectation that companies hope for, but I cannot imagine permanently renting such essential products (for a significant proportion of people) like cars.

Fingers crossed, but realistically one can only expect the worst.

I'm not so sure. People rent music now.

Smartphone already brought a kind of connection burden, now transport is next.. sociologically it's super weird.

Can't wait to submit my new business idea to the next YC round: selling isolation.

So...executive real estate agent?

an improved version who ensures sound proof walls

Tangentially: does anybody knows good dumb all-electric cars ?

Dacia Spring https://youtu.be/zD8NUtn5BGE

It's an open question about how good it is.

Cars have been a software platform for well over a decade. We've been cursed with horrendous UX, such as the electronic throttle body and steering, since the late 2000s.

Every time someone puts a computer between the user and the real world is an opportunity to extract more control and revenue from the user. The incentives to make your life experience shitty are far in excess of the incentives to make it enjoyable.

"Tesla is updating your software. Please don't stop the car while your software update is in progress."

So when will we get a car running a user-installed open source operating system like postmarketOS for smartphones?

Wait till you see the NFT licence numbers.

I'd actually prefer a leased EV. Battery degrades, customization is impossible and privacy is not very relevant, so why own it if they re going to stuff it with in-app-purchases? The EVs worth owning will be custom made/converted cars.

I hate subscriptions as much as the next guy, but I also see the flip side of this coin: the legacy auto companies don't have OTA updates, and this affects their incentives in negative ways.

I have considered getting a Subaru Outback, a Toyota RAV4, and a Honda CR-V. All of them have 'lane-centering' features, but none of them are good at present. And none of the companies say that they will allow OTA (or any other periodic) updates, even though presumably it would be possible to improve performance without upgrading the hardware.

Why do they do this? Because their business model is to keep selling/leasing new cars. They don't want you to have the newest tech on your older car.

If they had subscriptions for features like these, it would give them a different incentive, which could be good in some cases. It might still be bad on balance (like if they charged huge amounts for these features), but there could be some significant upsides.

I think you're putting way too much faith in these companies.

Just going off of your example, they're most likely just going to provide support for 2 years ( if that ), and then say "sorry, the newest version of lane keep assist isn't available for your model". A la Apple.

We'd be lucky if auto manufacturers supported cars with updates as long as Apple supports hardware (5 years+ in some cases). It'll be more like Android hardware support - you get the version your car shipped with and maybe the next one.

I’d certainly not trust them right out of the gate. But after several years of seeing their practices, I could have a decent expectation of what would be supported and for how long.

Macs from 2012 got the latest security update four days ago.

Macs from 2013 are supported by the newest macOS.

iPhones and iPads from 2013 got the latest security update a month ago.

iPhones and iPads from 2015 and 2014 respectively are supported by the latest iOS and iPadOS.

Classic Apple, right?

Did you see the article today saying they run the Apple Store at a 78% profit margin?

Their raison d'etre is keeping you trapped in that cage.

I admire your optimism. Here are some reasons I don't want to see car makers selling software:

1. There is a huge power imbalance between a car company and a car "owner" (licensee?)

2. The incentives on the car company side are not aligned with the desires of the car owner.

3. The will be incented to lock you in, a la the google/apple store.

4. You now have sunk costs in a hardware platform. What if you want to change from Honda to Toyota?

5. Almost no one is good at making software, and that includes car companies. One year marketing driven turnarounds won't help with safety.

I'm not an optimistic person! I just see there being different ways to innovate here. Right now, Tesla is pretty much the only one offering OTA updates, and they don't charge extra for it. It's just built into the price of the vehicle (as far as I understand).

I think a healthy market would have more OTA offerings, which could be purchased outright (if you planned to have the car for many years) or paid year-to-year. Basically, there has been very little innovation/competition in this space, and Tesla is shaking things up. I see that as a good thing, since innovation and competition will make things better for customers on balance.

> the legacy auto companies don't have OTA updates

That's a huge feature.

OTA updates means:

1. An attack vector that will (when, not if) be exploited by bad guys.

2. An attack vector that will (when, not if) be exploited by the manufacturer itself to make your car worse (Tesla already doing this sometimes).

A secure and reliable car must not be modifiable remotely.

Yeah, I'd probably prefer hard-wired updates, rather than OTA. That way you know precisely when you're getting it, and it's harder (though still not impossible) for a bad actor to cause harm.

Take your meds.

This future is already starting to play out in certain countries in Europe. Total Car Ownership is quite a bit more expensive than in the US and for people living in a city this seems like a fairly obvious cause and effect development.

still super super super wondering what we do with Android Auto in 4 years, in 5 years.

will car manufacturer's have replacement brains, such that the car can get security updates?

will we just keep running Linux 4.12 in the year 2038?

Android Auto will remain crippled because:

1. It requires some level of support from the car makers and they typically don't make significant functionality changes in software updates (eg: my car as a wide-screen aspect ratio but Android Auto displays in a smaller portion. The car probably needs an update to fix that but it's been 1.5 years so that's not gonna happen.)

2. Car makers do not want to give Google even more data and will lobby/restrict access as much as needed so theh control user data and sell it themselves to profit.

CarPlay has a better shot since Apple can strong-arm people into doing what they want but Google is not in that position position car makers since everyone saw what happened to Android OEMs battling to differentiate.

I'm of two minds about this. On the one hand, I certainly don't want to be held hostage by my car.

On the other hand, a pricing model that makes the sale price cheaper and loads more of the profit into optional add-ons is great for me. So long as I can get from A to B, I'm happy with zero options and a cheaper car.

My family recently got a new car, and as part of the sale, the dealer activated trial subscriptions for all sorts of things, blah blah this, blah blah that. I don't even remember.

I do like some of the software features, but they're the ones that are not by subscription, such as the thing that keeps me from driving off a cliff. I'm not getting any younger, and don't mind a little bit of help.

The problem with optional add ons is that greed eventually makes even necessary ones optional, or worse, add ons with subscription and remote kill switches.

A car is a huge investment for many. It is better to own one outright than rent it out.

I'm with you there. Hopefully legislation will keep up.

Remember when DLC was just house armor? Now it’s the entire game

Remember when you didn't have to crack your car to drive it?

People buy apps and pay for upgrades to extend the capabilities of their phones. I don't see how this is different. Maybe they should just call them apps for cars.

> buy apps and pay for upgrades

updates are usually shoved in with no alternative, and they often lead to the need for further purchases down the line

When are we going to create a world we actually want to live in, rather than one that profits a tiny minority at the expense of .... life?

My car? I no longer want to own and maintain a car. I want ubiquitous availability of transportation. On demand. But I don't necessarily want Uber / Lyft either. I don't mind driving.

As it is, my car lost value the day I drove it off the lot. Most of the time it sits doing nothing at all, sans getting older and losing more value.

If ever there was a life pain that screams subscription + pay as you go it's personal transportation.

That's a zipcar or similiar. Rent by the hour. It seemed attractive but drawback is you have to get to a free car first.

That's where autonomous comes in. If the car can self-drive to me that's significant. The alternative is the subscription includes $X in Uber / Lyft per month. That is, I reserve a vehicle and the service handles the rest.

https://archive.is/bEiqn

Time to buy a ‘72 travel all.

To unlock the fuel efficent 6th gear - pay us x $$$ per month.

if this is the case its not going to end well for them.

You have more faith in the average consumer than I do.

How about big NO!

So you have to keep paying regular subscription fees to use the full capabilities of your car? LOL sure, I can totally see how that's going to work out.

First off, the companies daft enough to try this without enough subtlety would get quickly knocked off the market, and if it doesn't naturally die out, expect a huge Jailbreaking community to arise in the near future. Either way paywalling critical utilities from a car will never work.

Thanks, but no thanks.

Noooooooooo

Nooooooo

I think its totally fine for a car maker to charge for OTA updates in a Saas/subscription model. The reality is that software requires long term maintenance and charging subscriptions is the only way to get a lot of the features to work out for the life time of the car. What I am NOT ok with is charging for normal things that do not need to be OTA updated or are not upgrades, like apple carplay (the example in the article). The way I see this working out is that if I buy a MY 2021 car, I should not have to pay a subscription to maintain the features I bought it with, but if I then want upgrades in subsequent model years, I should pay a monthly fee for those upgrades.

If the software in a car requires long term maintenance beyond the extremely rare bug fix update, then it does too much imho. That's the point, keep it very simple. I don't need an entertainment system, maps, games, or any of that crap. Just an aux port or bluetooth with audio output. Maybe an am/fm radio at most.

> charging subscriptions is the only way to get a lot of the features to work out for the life time of the car.

No, no, no. I'm purchasing a car for upwards of $30,000 (and it's always more, between dealer fees, the cars just happening to only have the priciest interiors, salesmen and their pushy pitches, interest on loans, etc.); they don't need another $5 a month for fucking software updates.

They can mange it today just fine (my car desires a wi-fi connection so it can get these updates), they're just being greedy if they charge.

All the manufacturers will seek innovative ways to milk users, and whenever any of them succeeds, all the rest will follow suit.

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