So far there’s subscriptions for cruise control, adaptive beams, various navigation options, apple/google integration and my favorite, dual-zone climate.
I mean I know all car companies are going to do this so this is a tangential point but why the hell would you buy an audi anyways?
Their reliability scores are fucking atrocious on audis.
The only thing german engineering is actually superior at is generating ultra rightwing nationalism.
I mean. America’s isn’t doing much better on the engineering front. Ford and Chrysler issued the most recalls in 2023 apparently. GM is also in the top 10.
No doubt, though I would point to the US automakers being too busy being obsessed with annihilating worker power and unions over the last 50 years as the primary reason American cars suck. Instead of paying engineers to spend time innovating and improving their designs they paid harvard business assholes to micromanage workers and strategize how to shuffle vehicle plants around so that workers organizing for better treatment would be least likely to happen effectively.
The way I look at it (as a German car owner myself), you gotta be able to afford repairs, and you have to do maintenance. Too many people wait 10k miles to do an oil change and no car should be treated that way.
I totally agree. I’ve had my 2011 2.0 TDIe Audi A6 now for about 7 years. Never had major problems, though I specifically selected a diesel engine as the TFSI engines are crap. I also do pretty much all of.my own work so only pay for parts when something happens, which of course helps keep costs down.
If anyone is repairing or diagnosing your own vehicle in the WV group, make sure you get the VCDS software as it helps a ton! I got some cheap clone via eBay but it’s worked just fine for many years for me.
that last sentence of yours had 284 charcters.
Super smash bros only has like 90, I am dominating.
Why would anyone sign up for that? Now you have your car payment AND the fucking subscription? Makes no damn sense. What happens when they inevitably shut down their cloud servers that keep your access to the features in the car turned on? You never own the thing.
Ah yes, the moment you to have to break the law to own the stuff you bought. Audi A3 jailbreak
What law do you break? I know it won’t be plausible for the general public because of warranties and all that.
And some copyright things or something else will prevent repair shops from jailbreaking it for you.
But what would prevent you legally from jailbreaking your own car?
Nothing. And if they tried, you could sue.
>But what would prevent you legally from jailbreaking your own car?
the digital millenium copyright act of 1999
That doesn’t protect corps from you doing it privately.
it makes bypassing drm a felony
No one would sign up for that, but I bet that car maufacturers will make it the only model available. As for the shutting down of servers: something something small print
dumbest fucking timeline. A subscription for a feature that requires no infrastructure and is part of the physical thing you just paid $40k for.
The logic behind the concept originally made sense, they manufacture just one car with all the features as that reduces manufacturing overhead by a ton, much more than what they would save by having one with heated seats and one without (especially when multiplied by all the possible configurations), but instead of only providing the model at the price point with all of them enabled, they disable some for the cheaper models - this is possible because car prices aren’t really based on how much they actually cost to manufacture.
This then lead into allowing people to pay to enable the features later if they wanted to, because why not, they are already there. Iirc Tesla was one of the first to do this with unlocking range, performance and “self-driving” stuff.
And finally it morphed into a subscription option because hey, if you only need heated seats a few months a year, why pay for the others? Only $10/month! And $15 for that, and $5 for that, and…
Same goes for this Audi, the subscription is an option if you buy the lower spec model and then later don’t want to pay the full price to enable the features permanently.
The logic behind the concept originally made sense, they manufacture just one car with all the features as that reduces manufacturing overhead by a ton
Yeah, at the ‘minor’ cost of the fact that the method of enforcing that market segmentation relies on using DRM to infringe upon everybody’s property rights.
Sure, that “make sense” – if you’re a capitalist sociopath trying to turn consumers into serfs. But we sure as Hell shouldn’t let them get away with it!
There is infrastructure involved with monitoring subscription status to make sure you’re not pirating heated seats. Also for taking payments to unlock your adjustable lumbar supports. They gotta pay for it somehow!
There is actually infrastructure involved… payment infrastructure, servers, modems and cell connectivity. Sure none of those things would be needed if there weren’t subscriptions, but there certainly is infrastructure used to verify your subscription and cut you off when you miss a payment.
If only we had people shouting from the rooftops for decades (100+ years?) to warn us about where capitalism inevitably leads… How could anyone have seen something like this coming??
If they keep doing it is because it keeps working
Because gullible consumers keep paying
Or they just all decide to do it, and you have no choice.
See also: “smart” tvs
For real dude.WTF.
Weird that across many industries they keep adding things consumers hate but get away with it because everyone else is doing it. How do people still believe in the premisis of capitalism when consumer choices range from ineffective to flat out impossible.
Thank you Audi for making my car purchase this year just that much easier.
This title is Amess
Amess is actually a word.
It means, to ruin (something) or to make many mistakes in doing (something).
I made sure I got it from an American English dictionary, Merriam Webster, anticipation of those who say that it doesn’t belong to American English. 🤷♂️
Welcome to Lemmy.
Living in an Amess Paradise
Reposted once or twice
I don’t find that Lemmy has particularly poor titles, on average.
If people don’t just say no to this garbage, it will continue. Honestly I think I’m gonna go to an Audi dealership this weekend and crank the salesguys up before walking out on principle.
You should go yell at the McDonald’s cashier next. That’ll really stick it to the man and definitely not fuck up some dude just paying rent.
Is there a way to ‘jailbreak’ these cars?
You bet there is, and will be a whole industry doing it.
Man starting a car hacking company would be fun.
Good, I don’t see a problem then, companies can go fuck themselves
Edit: wanted to clarify that I don’t think it’s not a problem in itself, it certainly is, but it is a direct consequence of people being dumb, even announcing a plan like this should cause a complete boycott, but I don’t think most people cared
Yeah until it requires some sort of decryption to do, and people get sued for that, etc.
Hmm, I am no expert, but how can they sue me for hacking my own car, I should be able to do whatever I want, atmost they should be able to cancel my warranty
DMCA violation.
You will own nothing and be “happy”.
Headline is enough for me to never consider purchasing an Audi.
Toyota is out. Mercedes is out. Audi is out. Who else?
IIRC, Hyundai is out.
Are they?
They charge for the stuff that actually requires server infrastructure after 3 years, I believe. Which is the one case that seems reasonable to me as long as it’s not gouging. But I hadn’t heard about anything else.
Sweats in Apples “Courage” to remove the headphone jack
Anyone…? Hello?
Toyota is doing the subscription thing too? I didn’t hear about that one. I only heard about BMW, Mercedes, and now Audi.
If Toyota/Lexus is out, then I guess my plans of buying an AWD coupe as my next car are truly dead.
Toyota was gonna do it for remote starters, I believe.
Subaru is an AWD option.
I get a subscription for remit stats that use cell. I don’t want that, why would I want that, when conventional remote start works great.
Best part, remote start for Toyota is about a $100 thru party add-on that takes 10 minutes to install. Put one im a friend’s Taco last year.
Remote start through an app I guess? At least that conceivably requires an ongoing cost on their side to justify it (although I’d be willing to bet there’s a 10,000% markup on it). Will be annoying if they are using a 3G chip for the data connection and 3G gets shut down like 2G did.
As for the AWD thing, it’s the coupe part that’s hard. The Germans all make a coupe with AWD available, Lexus has the RC, and that’s about it (since the challenger is end of production), other than supercars that are out of my price range.
Looks like all they do is: Music streaming directly from your infotainment ($15), live navigation + new voice commands + 24/7 agent in case you need support ($15), both above ($25, wow, such sale), and some AT&T specific bullshit where you can apparently make your car a hotspot ($25).
https://www.toyota.com/connected-services/
All in all, all of them useless, and absolutely not required. All of them are covered by having a phone with Android Auto or Apple CarPlay.
None of that is at all required, they include all the usual Apple/Google phone link systems so all of that is very easily ignored. The only real problem with Toyota is the DCM sim modem, which you can get removed, and their data collection which you can opt out of.
Mazda is still good I think.
But they’re kinda expensive and they gatekeep features to their higher tiers, that other manufacturers keep to their lower ones.
Hyundai perhaps, but they’ve also had other issues.
Mazda no, they are harassing the app developers who use their API https://www.home-assistant.io/blog/2023/10/13/removal-of-mazda-connected-services-integration/
Yeah but the only thing Mazda charges a subscription for is the extra unnecessary bullshit that is coordinated through their servers. Thats a fair value proposition, even though I’d never pay for it. Heated seats, radar cruise control, shit like that still just comes with the car.
Hyundai perhaps, but they’ve also had other issues.
I can’t find an article about it right now, but I could’ve sworn they tried to pull some subscription bullshit (other than “Bluelink” or “Evolve+,” which are relatively legit) a while back, too.
At the very least I believe the only thing they’re currently doing is Bluelink (remote find your car, start car over the Internet, etc). But maybe there’s something they started in the last 6 months I haven’t heard about.
Tesla, certainly. BMW also.
Subaru still seems to be okay.
Tesla was one of the original pioneers with FSD subscriptions. BMW had heated seat subscriptions but walked it back. They do have a subscription for the “drive recorder” camera but you can pay a one time fee to permanently unlock it so that’s at least acceptable.
They do have a subscription for the “drive recorder” camera but you can pay a one time fee to permanently unlock it so that’s at least acceptable.
Edit: incidentally the permanent price is the same as if you bought it on your car new.
I disagree: if the physical hardware came on the car, the owner is entitled to use it (that’s how property rights work). Therefore, BMW should be forced to either charge everybody for it as a standard feature or physically not include the hardware for the people who aren’t getting it.
Hardware that’s artificially locked behind DRM – which is what being “activatable” by even a one-time fee after the fact really is – is and a a direct attack on property rights and therefore entirely unacceptable!
I have a 2022. It’s not terrible, but there’s definitely a subscription for remote start and a few other connected type features. Nothing related to actual driving once you’re in the car though.
Bicycles and feet, if you can.
Man… What’s Toyota doing?
Depends on how easy it is to jailbreak.
I have an Audi, it is a great car. I dont lioe subscriptions so I wouldnt get into that type of deal but there are workarounds also.
I use Linux and Lemmy, if they think they are going to get me to buy a subscription for cruise control they are out of their mind.
BMW was the first I think to announce subscriptions but they backtracked after negative feedback. Hopefully they stay that way, as I do love my bimmers. All it takes is one holdout.
I’d rather drive around an open source rustbox than buy a sub.
I’ve kinda been looking at the price of used cars and have started thinking – I’m an engineer, I can probably learn how to replace my Subaru’s engine myself. I’ll just ride it til the wheels fall off.
As an engineer with a Subaru that needs a new engine (among other cars in various states of disrepair) I can tell you that, at least for me, the problem isn’t necessarily knowing what to do on a conceptual level. The problem is the physical difficulty of removing and installing parts (contorting yourself to reach a thing deep in the engine bay and then having the strength to break free rusted bolts, etc.). If you go for it, I highly recommend having an actual garage with a roof and a door you can close instead of trying to do it in your driveway, so that you can walk away from it and come back later without having to worry that your tools will get stolen or rained on.
Hey that sounds like building a PC only with rust as a bonus challenge!
Yeah for sure. I get frustrated and walk away a lot. But then I get frustrated with giving up and go back. Actual garage is a must lol. I’d probably get a car friend to come help where Im struggling.
It’s like 2k for an engine swap in an easy vehicle.
By the time you purchase tools, a half ton lift, etc you’ll be halfway there.
Unless you hate life I’d save up for the professional swap. You’re already find to attend 3-4 on a used engine.
Hey that sounds like building a PC only with rust as a bonus challenge!
Rust, grime, heavy shit, bending over/crawling under, and weather, yeah. It’s much more physically challenging than building a PC (and a little more technically complicated too, since you have to worry about torque specs and such).
I’m not trying to discourage anybody from doing it, just saying not to underestimate it.
As someone who is seemingly constantly working on computers and has done a ton of engine building and other deep car stuff, in addition to the garage mentioned previously, I’d recommend buying a buildable engine core for your subaru, getting that built (either do it yourself - recommended, or by a machine shop - will probably work well, but will cost a lot of $$) and having it ready to install rather than trying to pull the existing engine out and rebuilding it - especially if the current engine still runs.
Unless your plan is to make a hobby of having exploded cars in the yard, this’ll go a long way towards putting an end in sight for an engine rebuilding venture.
Also fuck all car subscriptions - that’s some gross profiteering right there…
I’d recommend buying a buildable engine core for your subaru, getting that built (either do it yourself - recommended, or by a machine shop - will probably work well, but will cost a lot of $$) and having it ready to install rather than trying to pull the existing engine out and rebuilding it - especially if the current engine still runs.
How do you feel about those 60k miles used engines from Japan?
(My engine appears to have that “spun bearing caused by cornering-induced oil starvation” problem that’s apparently common to EJ205s.)
You will never get sprayed in the face with hot poison fixing your PC. You will never have to apply a torch to your siezed up cpu. Your PC falling on you won’t kill you. You will never have to replace your PC component in -15° weather.
Building a PC is something like .1% the effort IMO.
Edit: in fact, what about it do you find pretty hard? I can’t think of anything I’ve ever done that made me frustrated enough that I felt like I needed to walk away. Or even took particularly long. Maybe I’m just building crappy machines or something.
Doors this apply to Europe too?
Has this been cracked, so people using these features bypassing the paywall?
From the article:
It should be noted that this subscriptions-for-features model applies to the European-spec A3. An Audi spokesperson declined to comment on whether these in-car subscriptions will also make it to the US when the car goes on sale for 2025.
Seems like this practice is banned in the EU, yeah.
The Dutch article that they look to doesn’t say what they think it says. In Netherlands there are legal implications to change the amount of power of engine after it is sold.
The article doesn’t is solely about engine power. Not about any other subscription option to enable something.
I also wouldn’t see how a stupid subscription would be banned by some EU law. Aside from e.g. engine power.
Absolutely insane to me that you’d pay $35k for a car, and then pay a subscription for basics like cruise control and phone connectivity. The free market free marketing again. Legislate against this now.
A fifth of users in the US rent the car itself via lease mechanisms. You aren’t the target.
Assuming there are discounts the folks leasing will use these options.
A fifth
Surely their target would be the four fifths, then?
Have they excluded that audience? As far as I know you can still purchase the vehicle or feature instead of lease.
Only by upgrading to the MMI navigation system do you get access to the app store. From there, Audi forces you into add-ons like adaptive cruise control or Apple CarPlay and Android Auto for a one-month, six-month, one-year, or three-year subscription. Or you can just purchase any of those features permanently—although Audi doesn’t say for how much.
Sounds like you’re right, but people are still right to be wary of this scheme, as the additional market segmentation will likely push up the cost of buying the feature outright. Audi is incentivized to push as many people toward the subscription model as possible to decrease the value of used vehicles.
I will worry when it happens. The car market is very competitive and vehicle reliability, safety, and feature set has improved significantly in the last 15 years.
Why are you all over this thread shilling for a predatory subscription model by a multibillion dollar corporation? Very strange behavior.
Because this thread is an echo chamber. I know pointing out the target use case is very problematic and odd. I’ll be quite and you all can continue to ignore that a fifth of buyers rent the entire vehicle for 3 years and haven’t been doing it for 50.
I’m not even saying you’re wrong necessarily, but it’s just very weird behavior to take this aggressive of a pro-corporate stance on something I think everyone should agree is a shitty, unnecessary practice. Regardless of the use case, locking features behind a paywall is always a shitty thing for a multibillion dollar company to do.
People like the option. It’s not weird at all to believe that having different options for owning, leading, and renting allows more access to the vehicle and products. The original comment is about limiting how I pay for a car. Leasing+ subscription works for many customers.
A leased car with those options 5 years ago didn’t cost you a subscription, and now they will. You want the option to what? Pay more for something that you didn’t have to before?
Again, on both the Toyota and BMW, it was less expensive than purchasing the options. You did pay for them before. They were never free.
People like the option to have already installed equipment just not work if they don’t pay the subscription? Like the car already has the features and the company is saying “we included this equipment in the price of your lease/purchase already but if you’d like to use it you have to keep paying more.”
Even in the case of a lease, this is just anti-consumer bullshit
With BMW and Toyota it was cheaper to sub for 3 years than purchase outright. Yes, that’s an attractive option.
You’re worth blocking
I’m so fucking sorry I pointed out the reality of people purchasing these cars. I’ll promise to never point out any data to you again if you just don’t block me!
You haven’t provided any data, just you talking.
Oh here, let me go find that very available data with a 2.5 second Google search since you don’t understand the car market, have probably never in your life purchased a new vehicle, and just want to argue.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/453122/share-of-new-vehicles-on-lease-usa/
This is trash I have to register and by the looks of it pay just to view the “statistics”.
No why would I need to buy a new car when my current one is fine
Then as stated, you are not the fucking customer here. Not sure why that’s so hard to accept.
Why? Who is going to buy it?
You when the only other option is to use public transport in a country with the worst public transportation of any western nation because instead of calling on the government to do something you said “it doesn’t effect me so why should I care?”
Bold to assume anyone has the money for an audi
If it’s profitable and they get away with it you know every other car company will do the same.
I come back to my question. Who is going to buy it?
I wish they had a remind me bot here because I think that this comment will age like milk over the next 5 years.
The answer is: enough people to make it profitable.
Lol. Bold prediction.
I predict you won’t come back to admit you were wrong.
But that’s not the only other option. So why would anyone buy it? No reason to create laws for a non-issue.
This shit should be illegal. When you buy a device, you own all the hardware and have every right to use it to the full extent of its physical capabilities. Audi has no right to hold your property hostage!
Nope.
If you are leasing subscriptions it makes sense. Or for certain features.
I couldn’t care less as long as the option to buy remains. I’d almost certainly end up subbing though on my next lease.
Why do you hate property rights?
Mans dad is the regional manager at Audi of Greater Akron
Assistant to the regional manager.
Yeah, that’s what he said. Assistant regional manager.
On the other hand, my car has a cell connection that allows me to find its position, remotely start, un/lock doors, call for emergency, and detect an accident. That’s not free. It ends up being around $160/y—which I think it a little spendy.
I don’t pay for it, because the only thing I really wanted was the gps position, and I just got an Apple tag for that haha.
Things that legitimately rely on an outside service are different. You understand how those are different, right?
Cruise control doesn’t require Audi to maintain a fucking server for you.
I am ok with a charge for things that require the manufacturer to run a server. But only if that charge is related to the actual cost , and that cost is unavoidable. Regarding that last point: my Garmin satnav lets me use my own mobile data to get live traffic information. Car makers don’t give you that option.
Car makers don’t give you that option.
Except they do if you have Android Auto. Literally none of that has any bearing whatsoever on subscriptions for cruise control though.
According to the article, apple car play and android auto also require a subscription. So no, they don’t give you the choice.
Subscription to a cell carrier maybe? I’ve used Android Auto in particular a bunch. It connects to my phone and uses Google maps, which is non subscription. Admittedly it’s been a bit, I suppose Google could have crippled it since I last used it, but I have my doubts. My mother uses it regularly and I guarantee she’d be throwing a fit if she needed to pay to do so.
Nope. Read the first line of the article. Apple CarPlay won’t work unless you pay Audi a subscription fee. I’m not surprised, I had an A3 a few years ago and that already had subscriptions built in. But they came with a 3 year license and Audi UK would extend that for a year at a time, free of charge as they had not worked out how to charge for it. They have worked it out now.
I have a different look on this, but it’s just the way i see it: if a manufacturer puts a function in your car that requires them to run a server then that server is on them, they put the function in there not me.
I buy the car, it’s mine in all it’s functionality. If they don’t want that, then don’t put it in.
My car has a 4g cell connection that allow me to find its position, check the battery level, lock it, unlock it, call for emergency, play online music, check for update, set up the interior temperature or seat heating and use it as a WiFi hotpsot in the car.
I’m would have prefered no connection but I’m not paying a dime for it.
How else am I, a humble car artisan (cartisan, if you’re feeling naughty), supposed to continue to generate obscene levels of wealth for my shareholders if I can’t continue to milk customers?
That’s the neat part: you’re not!
I was considering an A3 for my next new car. Nope. Not anymore.
Same. I have an a3 tfsi-e and the adaptive cruise control is subscription based ( which i learned after i started leasing ).
Last audi i will have.
No vw brands, no bmw, no tesla. Who will i go to in 3 years? :/I’m in my second Audi but it will be my last. This subscription shit should be boycotted.
This subscription shit should be prohibited by law.
The real problem here is that the FTC is failing to do its goddamn job.
Not only ftc, the eu is as well…
In the US we used to at least be able to reply on CA to pass laws to prevent a lot of this shit, which ended up benefitting most of the rest of the country. But they’ve been real tolerant/lazy too.
And, well, Congress mainly.
and so the enshittification continues…
That’s not what that word…you know what, fuck it. I give up. Enshittification now just means “becoming worse” and I won’t be able to stop that.
i guess the enshittification of enshittification is part of the enshittification then?!
