you already paid for the hardware. it already has the firmware installed. All that they’re doing is flipping a software switch that tells the system to let the firmware/hardware be functional.
it being a one-time payment isn’t the problem. The problem is that you already paid for the heated seats or whatever else. I shouldn’t have to pay to have features that are already in the car.
Manufacturer are going SDV, whether we like it out not. Software defined vehicle. They’re a computing platform on wheels.
Like a computer or a smartphone, buying the hardware does not grant you access to all software ever made for that plateform.
Hopefully one day we’ll see some computing hardware standardization across brands and openness for third party apps and subscriptions.
The current status of being at the mercy of a single vendor is terrible. Given standardized and similar computing hardware and APIs, I’d like to try Mercedes or Cadillac or Tesla’s FSD one month each and see which one I prefer and can afford.
It’s some form of heating element. You flip a switch and it runs electricity through some fairly resistive wires (iirc it’s carbon fiber; maybe NiChrome)
The most firmware you see is some kind of thermal monitoring to keep from getting too hot. It’s not a complicated system.
All this is, is a whole bunch of claptrap to sell you fully functional car, but charge you to unlock that functionality. You wouldn’t buy a house and then buy keys to use every room in the house.
You can call it what you want. I call it extortion. It should be illegal, and it’s certainly scummy.
I have to partially disagree on this point. Take the first generation of Raspberry Pi as an example.
The first Raspberry Pis came with hardware to decode certain video codecs, but this feature was protected by royalties (not by the Raspberry Pi foundation, but a third-party I don’t remember the name of). They decided to sell you the base hardware for cheap, and if you wanted to enable hardware decoding you could later purchase a license key for your specific device, which could then be used to flip a switch in the firmware.
In my opinion it makes sense: I would rather pay 35€ + optionally 5€ for that feature, rather than 40€ mandatory.
So, like. Proprietary codecs are also pretty disgusting.
But what you’re not being told- I assume this didn’t occur to you rather than you’re being dishonest- is that you didn’t necessarily need those keys- the chip wasn’t a dedicated decoder chip- it was the GPU.
And you have no idea how much I despised Broadcom for pulling that shit. (And I’m not alone. Most of us pirated the keys out of sheer irritation.)
I just shared my opinion. I didn’t need those keys because I was not interested in using their proprietary codecs.
For what it matters, if Broadcom decided to license the IP for some hardware accelerator I don’t have anything against it. As long as they don’t make me pay for it when I don’t need it.
Dedicating a small portion of the silicon to optional features is cheaper than designing two separate silicons one with and one without such features.
Except that’s not what happened in the pi and that’s not what is happening in the cars.
You’re paying for that hardware whether or not you also pay for the keys. You own that hardware. You would be offended if you bought a house and the previous owner said “oh and if you want to use the rooms, you’ll need to buy room keys”.
You should be offended at BMW. And Broadcom.
You get that, right?
R pi paid Broadcom for the chips. Then you paid r pi for the pi. Broadcom didn’t give anyone a discount there.
And you’re ignoring decades of scummy lawyering and lobbying to make the proprietary codec bullshit legal.
I think the idea is that the cost of producing standardized hardware is lower than the cost of producing a custom version without that codec just for the Raspberry Pi Foundation. The Raspberry Pi Foundation was not interested in that codec, so they didn’t buy a license. Separately, as a special agreement, they then allowed the few interested users to get a personal license directly from the IP owner. Sounds like a great solution to me.
Not sure if the same reasoning applies to BMW, though.
This was actually probably an efuse, so not really just firmware, but hardware. In any case we are not talking about a software/firmware feature to decode videos, we are talking a section in the silicon that stays dormant unless you activate it with a valid license key.
Imho it makes sense from an economical perspective: they develop, test and fabricate a single silicon that does everything, then they allow you to specialize it on demand for a fee.
Technically they haven’t paid for the feature yet, it just so happens that it’s cheaper to manufacture without having a second line of non-heated seats which makes me think “why not just include heated seats (and enabled) as standard?”
Edit: Why am I being downvoted? I’m only pointing out that if BMW wanted to have a heated/non-heated seat options it costs more to set up and operate a separate manufacturing line to support both options. That’s just a fact of running production lines.
Furthermore I’m questioning their business logic here with going with the subscription model because, as shown in the thread here, it only generates negative press, so why even bother with the subscription model and just have heated seats as standard. No subscription model for hardware BS needed, it makes the brand look more luxurious, and it’d be a great selling point in the dealerships to say “all these bad bois come with heated seats as standard”.
They can just adjust the baseline cost to include the heated seats if they need to preserve that margin.
In factual reality, you own every bit of hardware the thing comes with and every capability of it. Anybody who tells you otherwise is a goddamn liar and a thief!
End. Of.
Edit: I downvoted you because of the “technically they haven’t paid for the feature yet” part, not the “it’s cheaper to manufacture without having a second line” part. Make no mistake: everyone who buys the vehicle pays for the feature. Some are getting swindled into paying for it twice.
No.
absolutely not.
you already paid for the hardware. it already has the firmware installed. All that they’re doing is flipping a software switch that tells the system to let the firmware/hardware be functional.
it being a one-time payment isn’t the problem. The problem is that you already paid for the heated seats or whatever else. I shouldn’t have to pay to have features that are already in the car.
Manufacturer are going SDV, whether we like it out not. Software defined vehicle. They’re a computing platform on wheels.
Like a computer or a smartphone, buying the hardware does not grant you access to all software ever made for that plateform.
Hopefully one day we’ll see some computing hardware standardization across brands and openness for third party apps and subscriptions.
The current status of being at the mercy of a single vendor is terrible. Given standardized and similar computing hardware and APIs, I’d like to try Mercedes or Cadillac or Tesla’s FSD one month each and see which one I prefer and can afford.
Heated seats, for example, are not “software”.
It’s some form of heating element. You flip a switch and it runs electricity through some fairly resistive wires (iirc it’s carbon fiber; maybe NiChrome)
The most firmware you see is some kind of thermal monitoring to keep from getting too hot. It’s not a complicated system.
All this is, is a whole bunch of claptrap to sell you fully functional car, but charge you to unlock that functionality. You wouldn’t buy a house and then buy keys to use every room in the house.
You can call it what you want. I call it extortion. It should be illegal, and it’s certainly scummy.
I have to partially disagree on this point. Take the first generation of Raspberry Pi as an example.
The first Raspberry Pis came with hardware to decode certain video codecs, but this feature was protected by royalties (not by the Raspberry Pi foundation, but a third-party I don’t remember the name of). They decided to sell you the base hardware for cheap, and if you wanted to enable hardware decoding you could later purchase a license key for your specific device, which could then be used to flip a switch in the firmware.
In my opinion it makes sense: I would rather pay 35€ + optionally 5€ for that feature, rather than 40€ mandatory.
So, like. Proprietary codecs are also pretty disgusting.
But what you’re not being told- I assume this didn’t occur to you rather than you’re being dishonest- is that you didn’t necessarily need those keys- the chip wasn’t a dedicated decoder chip- it was the GPU.
And you have no idea how much I despised Broadcom for pulling that shit. (And I’m not alone. Most of us pirated the keys out of sheer irritation.)
I just shared my opinion. I didn’t need those keys because I was not interested in using their proprietary codecs.
For what it matters, if Broadcom decided to license the IP for some hardware accelerator I don’t have anything against it. As long as they don’t make me pay for it when I don’t need it.
Dedicating a small portion of the silicon to optional features is cheaper than designing two separate silicons one with and one without such features.
Except that’s not what happened in the pi and that’s not what is happening in the cars.
You’re paying for that hardware whether or not you also pay for the keys. You own that hardware. You would be offended if you bought a house and the previous owner said “oh and if you want to use the rooms, you’ll need to buy room keys”.
You should be offended at BMW. And Broadcom.
You get that, right?
R pi paid Broadcom for the chips. Then you paid r pi for the pi. Broadcom didn’t give anyone a discount there.
And you’re ignoring decades of scummy lawyering and lobbying to make the proprietary codec bullshit legal.
I think the idea is that the cost of producing standardized hardware is lower than the cost of producing a custom version without that codec just for the Raspberry Pi Foundation. The Raspberry Pi Foundation was not interested in that codec, so they didn’t buy a license. Separately, as a special agreement, they then allowed the few interested users to get a personal license directly from the IP owner. Sounds like a great solution to me.
Not sure if the same reasoning applies to BMW, though.
Your example is a prime one that people cite against proprietary code/firmware. It’s probably the worst example you could have cited.
This was actually probably an efuse, so not really just firmware, but hardware. In any case we are not talking about a software/firmware feature to decode videos, we are talking a section in the silicon that stays dormant unless you activate it with a valid license key.
Imho it makes sense from an economical perspective: they develop, test and fabricate a single silicon that does everything, then they allow you to specialize it on demand for a fee.
In any case, we can agree to disagree.
Technically they haven’t paid for the feature yet, it just so happens that it’s cheaper to manufacture without having a second line of non-heated seats which makes me think “why not just include heated seats (and enabled) as standard?”
Edit: Why am I being downvoted? I’m only pointing out that if BMW wanted to have a heated/non-heated seat options it costs more to set up and operate a separate manufacturing line to support both options. That’s just a fact of running production lines.
Furthermore I’m questioning their business logic here with going with the subscription model because, as shown in the thread here, it only generates negative press, so why even bother with the subscription model and just have heated seats as standard. No subscription model for hardware BS needed, it makes the brand look more luxurious, and it’d be a great selling point in the dealerships to say “all these bad bois come with heated seats as standard”.
They can just adjust the baseline cost to include the heated seats if they need to preserve that margin.
In factual reality, you own every bit of hardware the thing comes with and every capability of it. Anybody who tells you otherwise is a goddamn liar and a thief!
End. Of.
Edit: I downvoted you because of the “technically they haven’t paid for the feature yet” part, not the “it’s cheaper to manufacture without having a second line” part. Make no mistake: everyone who buys the vehicle pays for the feature. Some are getting swindled into paying for it twice.
It’s not that it’s cheaper.
It’s that they’re getting away with extortion and make more money that way.