BMW’s terrible heated seats subscription didn’t even make it to a second winter::BMW is one of several automakers that have been nickel and diming customers, including with a monthly subscription for heated seats in certain models and territories. The company has dropped that controversial practice to focus on paid software services — it doesn’t plan to charge drivers extra to use hardware features that are already in their cars anymore.
Good thing they abandoned this. Rare case where consumer won. And this is getting more and more rare!
Its worrying we’re fallen so far into consumerism that they dared even try. Unless we put a big stop to the damn subscription trend, they will try again. And again. Until we one day accept it.
There was a big outrage in the music production community a few months ago when Waves, one of the most popular plug-in companies, announced they’d be switching to a subscription-only model. That meant you could no longer outright buy and own their plugins, you had to pay for a monthly subscription. This pissed everyone off so much that Waves decided not to go forward with it lol.
I guess the lesson is: make your opinion clear to these greedy companies, vote with your wallet and maybe we can make them become less shitty. They will always do what makes them the most amount of money.I’m just sad this anger didn’t work on Adobe.
Well, what are you going to do? Use a competing product? Commercial practices aside, Adobe’s products are top of the line.
Idk about others but I’ll happily use a slightly sub par product if it means sticking it to a shitty company. It’s called spite!
Never let them forget this.
“BMW. Wait. Didn’t you want to charge a subscription to activate heated seats already in the car?”
“IBM? Don’t you guys ship dark hardware you then charge a fee to activate after it’s been purchased?”
“Oura. Don’t you ship a sleep tracker at a premium price, and then charge a monthly grift just to use the information it’s already sampling?”
And, with each one, laughter. Teasing, laughter and then shunning. Followed later by a recommendation to join a better company.
Next up: BMW puts turn signals behind a subscription.
Nah, why would they try to charge for something no one uses?
found the bmw driver at heart
Haven’t even topped up my blinker fluid
I thought they already were and thats why no one used them
Next -> AirBags+
Boeing did it with the Max8. These hideous airframes and their cruel seating configurations were grounded not by consumer hate but by boeing charging a value-add fee for what was discovered to really be a safety requirement after two budget customers lost aircraft, staff and passengers in fiery crashes.
Now they fixed that part, and we’re still left with an embarrassingly badly compressed cabin with seats so badly made and badly spaced that I’m sure it’s a huge factor in air passenger problems.
It’s a money grab because it doesn’t cost BMW anything additional. They already spent the money to put the heated seats in the car, so anything they gain from the subscription is profit.
Where subscriptions are justified is when there is an on going service provided that requires maintenance and upkeep on behalf of the service provider. Already installed heated seats don’t meet that standard at all.
It’s a money grab because it doesn’t cost BMW anything additional. They already spent the money to put the heated seats in the car, so anything they gain from the subscription is profit.
IBM has been pre-loading hardware with extra gear they can activate on subscription but is otherwise dark, and been making bank on it, for decades.
How are heated seats not standard? It’s basically a couple of wires and a switch. I bet it cost them close to nothing to make.
If BMW was a super cheap bare-bones car, I could understand it. but even a basic BMW is expensive.
This subscription is a blatant money grab, there is simply no question about it, and their excuse that it’s cheaper to built it into all cars, is basically admitting as much. It’s so cheap, it’s more expensive to make the exception and not include it.
“We thought that we would provide an extra service to the customer by offering the chance to activate that later, but the user acceptance isn’t that high," Nota said. "People feel that they paid double — which was actually not true, but perception is reality, I always say. So that was the reason we stopped that.”
How passive aggressive is that response?! Fuck that guy.
It’s not only passive aggressive, but also a lie. People are paying double.
Thanks
But fuck you still, bmw.
It’s annoying that most things are behind a subscription now. Who wants more bills, surely everyone would rather save up money and pay outright? Then I suppose the companies would make less money smh. Hopefully subscriptions don’t become more popular to the point where you can’t own anything or at least hold a permanent license.
