In the end, the KIA car company made its cars into subscription models, I really hate this because in the end the car we buy with our own money doesn’t feel like it belongs to us. Should we finally buy an old school car ? so as not to be affected by this subscription models or is there a way to crack the software installed in it ?
How is unlocking your car over the internet a basic feature?
Your oxygen subscription expires in 2 weeks. Please take note that absence of oxygen leads to hypoxia. Due to the detrimental effects of the war in Ukraine we have been forced to increase prices by 420%. Would you like to extend your subscription?
How is that related to unlocking your car from your phone?
Both are, or at least should be, ridiculous.
Yes, an app costs money. Yes, servers do cost money. But do they need to use servers? No. For example, self-hosting. Or just connecting the car to the cellular network (which they already do, mind you) and just let the phone talk to it directly, no manufacturer server required. Just pay an ISP for cell service and you’re set. Are there problems with such a solution security-wise? Yes. And while I’m not an expert in cybersecurity I think the risks are about the same for this and a server model.
Hell, they might not even use servers for anything other than checking if you’ve paid your subscription in order to lower costs already (as if a few thousand unlock requests a minute couldn’t be managed without a problem on a Raspberry Pi). They don’t need some huge, expensive and power-hungr supercomputer for that, so I don’t see a need for such a steep price.
Are the features useful? Absolutely. Would someone be willing to pay this price? Also absolutely. But the festures objectively don’t cost that much to maintain and competition should and could put an end to it.
It’s just corporate greed, and it feels to me as if we’re getting closer and closer to the fabled oxygen subscription, and we have to call manufacturers out on their bullshit while we still have air to breathe.
Just don’t buy their cars or at least their subscriptions. Get your car ‘jailbreaked’. What will they do, remote disable it? I think we’re still not that far down the dystopia plotline that a boycott couldn’t work.
You want to selfhost your own server that communicates with your car so you can ulock your car from your phone? Are you dumb? Do you want to lose your car in a week?
Delusional.
Because the cost of the app to do that isn’t $60 a year.
No the cost of the Servers and the maintenance and the work required to have all that kept online and secure is.
Do you think admins and security guys work for free?
I’ll refer you to unexpctedkeg’s comment
will refer to my already posted answer to that comment
Why do I need to unlock my car over the internet? What is the use case over a FOB?
Nice strawman.
Dont get the subscription if youre fine with a fob.
How is asking you a follow-up question a strawman exactly? What do you think a strawman is?
Because the question was answered in my original question. You don’t. That’s why it’s an additional subscription feature.
My question was why the guy claimed it was a basic feature when it never was.
And then you came along and asked “well hurr durr why do i need to unlock my car from my phone”
You don’t. So you don’t need the subscription. Done.
So why is it worth a subscription? You’re defending it as something that is not a basic feature that validates the subscription, but asking what the feature actually provides is somehow a strawman?
Oh you were seriously asking? It allows me to unlock the car from my couch when my wife wants to get something out the car real quick. Or i don’t wanna carry my keys around.
I can also start the A/C 30 minutes before i leave so i dont have to freeze to death in winter.
I don’t know what makes you think I wasn’t asking, and I still don’t understand what you think a strawman is, but thank you for actually answering the question.
Personally I can think of better uses for $150 a year then “I don’t like having keys in my pocket/near the door” but I guess there’s a reason we keep seeing more companies trying to profit off subscriptions…
It’s a basic convenience/status in exchange for money.
You wanna control your house from your phone? Sure, pay me for the effort of keeping all that shit secure.
I like convenience, that’s why i eat out 6 days a week.