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The New Audi A3 Is Amess With In-Car Subscriptions (www.motor1.com)
submitted 2 years ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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So far there's subscriptions for cruise control, adaptive beams, various navigation options, apple/google integration and my favorite, dual-zone climate.

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[+] -21 points 2 years ago* (10 children)

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.

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  • [–] 17 points 2 years ago (9 children)

    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.

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  • [+] -18 points 2 years ago* (8 children)

    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.

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  • [–] 16 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    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

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  • [–] 6 points 2 years ago (4 children)

    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?

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  • [–] -2 points 2 years ago (3 children)

    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.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 years ago* (2 children)

    Not true. Just think about what you’re saying for five seconds and you’ll realize how absurd it is. If you buy a BMW or a Toyota that has an available heated seat subscription for example, whether you pay for it or not, they installed the heated seats. it doesn’t cost BMW or Toyota a cent for you to use your heated seats, it costs them to install them. You really think that you haven’t already paid for those heated seats that they’ve already installed in the car? are you seriously suggesting that these companies are going to to sell you these cars with heated seats in them without charging you for them? That if you choose not to pay for the heated seats, they’re just going to eat that cost? Get real.

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  • [–] -2 points 2 years ago* (1 child)

    It is far cheaper to produce a single trim with most of the features. Customization costs money. There is a reason Porsches are expensive.

    Multiple seat types is literally buildings and lines they need to construct. It's a similar scales of economy concept like binning chips. Instead of multiple lines.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago

    Even if that were true, that still means that everyone is paying for that one single trim, including all the optional features in it. By paying for the subscription, you’re just paying more money, not less.

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