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Comment by pempem | Hacker News Reader

This ethos "if its important to you bring your own" is literally the opposite of user-first development. We've strayed deeply and meaningfully into premiumization and only the consumer (human beings, like us) will suffer.

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If different users want different features, should the product include them all and charge each user for all the features? That also doesn't sound like user-first development.

I've not used AM in a car in decades. I'd guess Ford has looked at their customers and reached this decision based on evidence.

So it may be likely that their users prefer spending money on feature X instead of AM.

What's wrong with offering an AM radio as an option, though?

It's the exponential SKU proliferation problem. There's good reason why manufacturers like VW bundle most feature choices into a small number of trim tiers.

If the cost to get them working properly in EV is more costly, then it's not worth it.

I suspect Ford doesn't want to throw money away, but to optimize sales and profit. Unlikely they'd do this without some pretty good reasons.

If there's a world in which emergency information is shared with the populous using AM radio, then it should be considered a bare minimum because human beings, buying the cars and selling the cars, require access to this information.

Its literally information that can lead to connection + survival as indicated by the comments below and so I'm gonna say MVP worthy until the body we say governs all of us provides a reliable alternative.

There is a reliable alternative, it's already where such items are broadcast, and more people use it than AM by orders of magnitude. Next you'll tell me we need HAM radio and Morse code.

Having AM radio is a safety feature not unlike seat-belts. In case of sever weather, thunderstorms, etc cell-phone service can be disrupted and UHF coverage is not great in rural areas. AM radio is the only way to get information in these cases. Not having AM radio by default is like making seat-belts optional.

Since 1975, seatbelts are credited with saving hundreds of thousands of lives. Try as I might, I can find zero deaths attributed to lacking AM radio in a car.

These two things are no where near alike. No one will take this line of argument seriously.

> Since 1975, seatbelts are credited with saving hundreds of thousands of lives.

It is much easier to attribute outcome of a car accident to presence or absence of seat-belts. It is much harder to determine why a certain car ended up in the path of an active hurricane or twister. So yes, comparing seat-belts to AM radios is somewhat of a stretch, indeed. But if you heed FIMA recommendations and warnings they always tell you to have AM radio handy to receive important and potentially life-saving information. You are encouraged to have battery powered AM radio at home. And if you are in the car it is no-brainier to have AM radio, preferably already built-in.

>It is much harder to determine why a certain car ended up in the path of an active hurricane or twister

Around 100 people in the US die in a twister per year, including those with AM radios, and these are extremely rarely in cars. So quite reasonably there are less than 3 people killed in cars by twisters per year, and likely zero would have been changed by AM radio or not in the car.

Around 40k people are killed in cars per year, including some with seatbelts. Around 15k lives are estimated saved by seatbelts per year.

So, you're really trying to compare on order of 0 lives saved per year in a car for AM versus 15,000? And then to invoke yet more ridiculous fear you're now throwing in twisters, which adds around, let's see, 0 deaths to the equation?

Again, making such outlandish comparisons as if they're at all equivalent will make people ignore your argument. As I now will since you seem hell bent on claiming somehow AM radio is a safety issue yet have twice made honestly innumerate arguemtns for it.

The opposite of user-first development sounds pretty good then. Finally, cars built according to how an automaker wants instead of as a checklist of things to attract as many customer dollars as possible.

Yeah, an it'd be great if it was also the automaker who paid and drove the cars, right?

AM radio is a niche use case. I've never used AM radio in my life. User first development means that you need to include every niche feature a user may want.

I’ve never used a wheelchair ramp but don’t mind that buildings that I use have them.

This move is just laziness by automotive manufacturers not wanting to address their negative externalities (spewing RF into the local environment), disguised as efficiency/progress.

Right?! Gimme AM, keep your SIM/WiFi away

My state (Washington) actively uses specific AM stations for traffic and weather alerts.

Phones (carplay / android auto) have replaced this. Google maps can show a much better picture of the current traffic conditions than a radio broadcast.

> Google maps can show a much better picture of the current traffic conditions than a radio broadcast.

There is no cell phone signal in many areas.

That's great when you never leave a 10 square mile bubble in the Bay Area.

There's a > 40 mile stretch of state route 542 (mt baker highway) in WA where there is no cell signal. Zip. Nada. No matter the carrier. And this road can carry nasty rapidly changing weather conditions in the winter. Your iPhone 26 will continue to proudly display "No Service." So, no, it has not replaced this.

iPhone 14 has satellite connectivity for emergencies, other handset makers are doing this too. in 10 years the picture will look much different, and i doubt any phone will ever have truly “no service” again.

So it'll be unnecessarily dangerous for just 10 years?

No, I don't think $200 phones are getting satellite connectivity.

T-mobile's claim is that by 2024 their customers will get emergency satellite connectivity on their existing handsets, even cheap $200 ones. They might need to be new $200 handsets in order to get the software support, but the hardware support is supposedly there already. The specific language T-mobile uses is the "vast majority of smartphones already on T‑Mobile’s network" which sure sounds like it includes $200 phones. With the help of Starlink, T-mobile is going to put cellphone towers in space, pointed down, and your existing cellphone will be able to pick up the signal and the satellites will be sensitive enough to hear the cellphone's transmissions.

T-mobile's service will be limited to various forms of texting and possibly also Twitter, which is used by many emergency departments to broadcast information, which is slightly different than the iPhone's offering of dire emergency service coverage. Still doesn't replace AM radio use cases though.

https://www.t-mobile.com/news/un-carrier/t-mobile-takes-cove...

Satellite connectivity for emergencies will be just that, for emergencies. Technology will have to progress greatly (which, 10 years could do it) before "for emergencies" will include "you get data connectivity to tell you details of the road conditions" like you're imagining. In the interim, AM radios are still necessary.

By the time iPhone 26 comes out there will be a cell tower or two out there.

Same with large stretches of Highway 50 in California - which is exactly where you need the weather alerts most, due to snow. No cell signal.

> Google maps can show a much better picture

'Can' is putting in a lot of work, there.

Google insisted on showing roads continuing to be closed well after e.g. CalTrans issued a statement otherwise and reopened them, after the last bout of winter storms in early March.

The response time to displaying or ending closures related to wrecks on less well traveled roads is abysmal as well.

Only if you have an internet connection.

California too. Google may show that traffic jam, accident stuff, but AM frequency has repeated goverment or official information.

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