BMW Feature Subscriptions are here, Heated Seats = $18/month

Yea here its a matter of if you want to do business in Australia you play by our rules whether you like it or not and if you don’t you’ll be publicly humiliated by our regulators and fined to hell.

https://www.consumer.vic.gov.au/pro...rs-and-returns/warranties/types-of-warranties

Occasionally big brands don’t know better and try to get around it but its pretty strict and they never win. Similarly No Refund signs are illegal as are most of the terms along those lines.

https://www.qld.gov.au/law/your-rig...rantees-warranties-refunds/about-refund-signs

If the warranty doesn’t live up to expectation or if the product is a piece of trash in general, you basically get three strikes and after that they have to buy it back, so its similar to lemon laws in the US only it applies to anything from an air conditioner to a pair of briefs.

Also we pretty much have a 2 year warranty on everything by default even when the manufacturer says its 1 year (like apple). Its kind of cute because after one year Apple and others will say to you “well you’re outside our warranty but we’ll fix it out of good will” or words to that effect, which is actually nonsense as they have a requirement to do it whether its 1 year advertised or not.

There’s also a requirement that large stores carry brochures and fliers explaining consumer rights in their stores near products so people can’t be misled.

Its one of the things all political factions here have done well to protect and enforce really and these strong protections have helped me many times.

Then it just gets coded back before it goes in.

Why do you ask? Would the answer somehow alter your reaction to the cartoon?

Thanks. Not well! 😁

This has generated a lot of bad press for bmw. Certain things you don’t mind paying a subscription fee if it’s some tech add on but it seems these features like heated seats even though not even brought up in the US market (to my understanding thus far) have a lot of bad press on US media.
Who knows though when apple focused on subscription services there were so many “apple is dead” articles and posts yet now we see it was a brilliant move and they have grown more under Cook than Jobs in large part to the subscriptions. Perhaps a bad comparison I only bring it up in relation to the press apple received when they moved into the subscription model.

I think it will be a while before (order a car on demand) rather than ownership is the primary way cars will be dealt with at least in the US but it’s been talked about for a while. We will probably get there, start in the cities and branch out. So many rural areas in the US and other countries to cover but I look at Tesla and two years ago they were a rare site in the northeast now it’s adoption Is at the point where we say “cool another Tesla” or nothing at all rather than “wow is that a Tesla.”
Who knows, it’s very difficult to predict the future. That’s why I always read the sports page first when I get the paper, I have close to a 50/50 chance of being right, the rest of it I have no clue what the hec is going to happen.

Yes but that was not the selling model or concept I was referring to.

Tesla makes navigation a monthly subscription after first eight years
New Tesla orders no longer come with lifetime access to satellite navigation. Instead, it forms part of a monthly subscription eight years after taking delivery of a new vehicle.

https://www.drive.com.au/news/tesla-standard-connectivity-eight-year-subscription/