Re:Renting Horsepower
by kelnos on Thursday May 04, 2023 @05:56PM
(#35822644)
No, it's absolutely rent-seeking in the Mercedes case. Your DLC analogy doesn't hold water: when you buy the game, you are paying for the core game. The DLC costs time, money, and resources for the game studio to produce, and you're buying that separately.
In the Mercedes case, they ship the car with the more-powerful motor already installed in it. The cost of it has been paid already. They just artificially limit it through software unless you pay extra for it.
At least in this case Mercedes is offering a one-time flat fee, which would at least be somewhat sorta vaguely like paying extra at the time of sale for a more-powerful engine rather than whatever is stock. Still kinda slimy, but at least not absolute highway robbery, like the subscription plan is.
In the Mercedes case, they ship the car with the more-powerful motor already installed in it. The cost of it has been paid already. They just artificially limit it through software unless you pay extra for it.
At least in this case Mercedes is offering a one-time flat fee, which would at least be somewhat sorta vaguely like paying extra at the time of sale for a more-powerful engine rather than whatever is stock. Still kinda slimy, but at least not absolute highway robbery, like the subscription plan is.