Quote:
Originally Posted by sigmabody
Just to emphasize the totally obvious: the fact that these settings are able to be enabled locally, without any active online subscription service, proves conclusively that there's no technical or functional reason whatsoever that they imply any ongoing cost whatsoever for BMW, and shutting them off unless the customer pays the ongoing extortion fee to BMW is pure and unadulterated corporate greed.
This is in contrast to, for example, the real-time traffic information service, which probably has some marginal ongoing cost for BMW to provide, so at least in concept there's some rational justification for passing the ongoing costs along to the consumer, to continue using the feature.
Gating this feature behind the subscription service is just pure, disgusting, contemptable greed and customer-hostile product design (and dishonest product feature descriptions and marketing, as a cherry on top).
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BMW can and should charge as much as the market will bear for their products and services. That's the way it works in a free market capitalist economy. There is plenty of competition and the consumer votes with their dollars determining which companies survive or fail. That system has given us the incredible technological advances and quality of life we have enjoyed for the past 100 years in this country.