Because they’re not lowering the initial purchase price of the car to compensate, you’re effectively paying a lot more for what are basic features in a modern car.

I wouldn’t object to a model where I was charged a lot of money for a subscription in exchange for lowering the up front cost of the car.

But nickel-and-diming me for features like heated seats forever after I have already paid a huge price for the car? It seems like a petty cash grab, especially for a supposedly upscale manufacturer like BMW. And why would I even want to have to keep track of that subscription? Yet another stupid tax on my time and attention — when I could just buy a Honda instead and pay entirely upfront and be done with it.

Should it be illegal? Probably not, as long as the manufacturers aren’t colluding and I can still just buy from a manufacturer that doesn’t do this.

Yeah they’re trying to get as much money as possible from you. They’re a business - that’s their reason for existing. When it’s a luxury good I can’t see any ethical issue in that.

When I ask for a pay rise for doing the same job from my employer am I being unethical?

> When I ask for a pay rise for doing the same job from my employer am I being unethical?

You're generally not doing the same job year over year. Your roles and responsibilities grow and evolve the longer you are there, so it makes sense that your pay would also grow with you.

What if your responsibilities/capabilities didn't change, and you merely realized that you're worth more to the business than what you're currently being paid?

Because it relies on me not having full control over something I'm the owner of, and because the markup is infinity percent.

… the profit margin is 100% no?

Whoops, you're right, I meant markup instead of margin. Fixed now. (For the curious, margin is (revenue-cost)/revenue, and markup is (revenue-cost)/cost.)

Why is the cost zero? They have to cover the cost of making the car.

The cost to them of the owner of the car using the heated seats is zero. The cost of making the car doesn't get used here because that would be double-counting it, since it was already counted in how profitable the sale of the car was.

They have to pay to put the heater into the car in the first place.

But since they paid that even if the owner never uses the heated seats and so never subscribes, it should be counted against the sale price of the vehicle itself and not against the subscription.

> it should be counted against the sale price of the vehicle itself

But why? Why should they do that?

For example a band that plays a concert counts on extras like merchandise sales to cover costs. Should the ticket price cover all their costs and is it unethical to also offer merchandise if they need it to cover costs?

I can't understand the logic in this thread.

The part of giving drivers heated seats that actually costs the manufacturer money is the seat heater hardware, which is part of the vehicles that are wholly sold.

Concert merchandise is fine because it has a cost that they only incur for people who actually buy it. For your concert example to be a valid comparison, imagine that everyone who bought a ticket to the concert were given merchandise, but told they weren't allowed to use it and had to throw it away when they got home unless they paid for it.

> The part of giving drivers heated seats that actually costs the manufacturer money is the seat heater hardware, which is part of the vehicles that are wholly sold.

And they’re recovering that cost and making some profit with these subscriptions.

> As long as you know the deal up front

I suspect this is... not always the case.

> I am altering the deal. Pray I don't alter it any further

There isn't much from stopping the manufacturers from changing the "up front" deal under this model. (Unless it becomes egregious enough to become illegal.) We'd like to get out in front of this and stop it from getting to that point.

So is all the anger in this thread based on a hypothetical that they might break their contract? If it's an ongoing payment they're actually incentivised to not do that!

No, the contract is already broken when what is purchased is not owned.

That’s not what the article says - they aren’t going back on features you already purchased. It’s for new purchases only. They aren’t breaking any contracts.

I have to wonder if that's part of the paperwork at a dealership now.

"Sign this paper that says BMW/GM/Toyota/etc still owns and retains control over hardware X/Y/Z. You may utilize this part of your car as long as you continue paying $xx subscription fee."

In the good old days, you paid a dealership for a car and you had a car. Everything in the car was yours to use within the legal system of the country in which you reside. That you're now signing away your own rights in order to buy a car is not a good direction.

The previsible absence of alternatives it's the main blackmail issue. The second is the fact that you can sell something packed with services and full of proprietary crap.

That last is not blackmail but a crime against humanity committed by politicians and citizens who allow that.

> a crime against humanity

I feel like I can't take these reactions to an alternative payment plan for the heated seats in your luxury BMW seriously.

It's not much a matter of heated sits in a car or rear wheels steering etc. It's a model problem. Did you know the famous McCarthyism-era Barkley scandal lifted by Ernst Kantorowicz [1]?

He was a German ultra-nationalist, member of hitler Freikorps who flee his country to the USA when his Jewish origins became a life-threatening issue in Germany. He became a famous UC Berkeley teacher and when the UC Regents demanded a loyalty oath against the Communism he resign stating that he surely be not a Communist, he fight them in the army, got blessed many times and decorated few times but as a historian he also see the nazi rise and see that any regime start with small low importance stuff like a simple dummy oath, an annual one, who get slightly changed at a slow peace trapping people slowly (what we all now the Chomsky's frog principle.

So far we see small things like in-car-infotainment systems ads, ads on phones, smart TVs even in some proprietary OS you pay for a EULA, connected devices who need a remote service (from Roomba to Kobo) and can't work without them etc after we start seeing ideas about legal IDs on smartphones, smart lock, ... a step at a time we will be entrapped and unable to correct the aim.

That's not a Luddite prediction and that's not a natural, unplanned evolution. Big of IT, conglomerates, financial cartels etc know very well this model and have always practiced it. And that's the crime you can't accept. The fact that we transition slowly to a society WEF/2030 alike [2] a small "innocent" step at a time.

If such kind of evolution hadn't been published here and there everywhere from WEF to G8 etc than yes, call it a crime would be a bold statement, but being published years ago and keep slowly evolving it is.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_Kantorowicz

[2] https://www.forbes.com/sites/worldeconomicforum/2016/11/10/s...