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I don't want my car to be a software platform. I want it to be like my microwave. It might have software, but software is only incidental to its operation. I do

I don't want my car to be a software platform. I want it to be like my microwave. It might have software, but software is only incidental to its operation. I do not want to tweet from my microwave. I do not want ads in traffic. This is non-negotiable for safety reasons alone. I don't care what I have to do to attain that. If that means replacing the radio. I will do it. If you brick my car if I don't have a Manufacturer Approved radio, I will go rebuild some grandfathered antique car.

lostlogin 5y ago
> I do not want ads in traffic. This is non-negotiable for safety reasons alone. I know it’s what you want but is it preventable? What’s the difference when today there are LED screens across the intersection you are trying to navigate that are intensely bright and displaying moving images? I’d argue that dimmer images in the car would be less distracting. However we appear on track to get both these dismal options. I won’t be buying a car with build in advertising, but given the frequency I change cars, this isn’t really any change.
- fridif 5y ago
  Yes, it is preventable if you buy a car that doesn't have it inside of it. As long as companies (or people) are allowed/able to make cars without ads in them, then it will be possible. If the government mandates, or market conditions dictate (due to monopolies or insufficient demand/profit incentive), that ads will be in cars, then it will not be possible, at least for new cars.
- obviouslynotme 5y ago
  It has nothing to do with flashing images, which I do not tolerate in my car either. It has to do with ads themselves, which have always walked the line between interactivity and malware. I don't want someone to be able to run arbitrary code on my car for $0.0004. No way. Could you imagine ransomware on your CAR? While you are driving in it?? No thank you.
  - BiteCode_dev 5y ago
    Cars should not be connected to internet, period. If you want some component to be able to be part of the car and connected, it should be hardware that is physically not linked to the car system itself in any way. And you should not be able to issue OTA without some manual hardware operation, like turning a key somewhere that is far from the wheel.
sz4kerto 5y ago
> I want it to be like my microwave. Yes. Plus: I want it to be like a simple microwave that does what I need: heats for a certain amount of time at a certain power level. 2 physical knobs.
- bombela 5y ago
  Yes. Definitively not like my microwave. My microwave has not only the worst interface. But it also lags. The polling rate of the capacitive touche buttons is too low. And any action also takes a second to validate. It's horrendous. Give me back my late grandma microwave. Two knobs. Nothing more.
  - fooblat 5y ago
    After much research I purchased a Samsung MWF300G[0] a modern microwave with only 2 dials. Used daily for 5 years and I love it. 0. https://www.samsung.com/levant/microwave-ovens/solo/mwf300g-k3050/ https://www.samsung.com/levant/microwave-ovens/solo/mwf300g-...
    - thraway123412 5y ago
      Does yours beep if you don't open the lid in a minute after it turns off? Mine does and that is super annoying. Annoying enough that I'm thinking of removing the buzzer or just buying another microwave. I do like the simple dual dial design though.
- tdsamardzhiev 5y ago
  I'm willing to go further. My parents' microwave has a single knob, and mine has two but I have never used it at something other than "High".
- kstenerud 5y ago
  I bought an industrial microwave a number of years ago just for this feature: Its controls consist of a single dial: how long to cook for. Also, in an industrial microwave the magnetron itself rotates, so there's no silly rotating plate business. Just put food in, turn the dial, take food out, and clean up is a snap.
tshaddox 5y ago
The microwave analogy is tricky, because those are generally not worth repairing (or even doing routine maintenance to prolong life) and are cheap and reliable enough that you wouldn’t want to pay a subscription for them unless it was a very cheap subscription. I’d love to have that situation for a car, but I don’t think it’s realistic without moving to a subscription model.
Traster 5y ago
The problem is that you're not going to have this choice. You'll be that guy insisting he wants a phone that's thicker but has better battery life - no manufacturer cares what you want because they have to operate at a scale where they can't cater for niches.
- BiteCode_dev 5y ago
  I'm not so sure. Look at the European market: manual gears everywhere. Look at the UK, South African and Autraslian market: the car is inversed, with the wheel on the right. The car market seems way different than the phone market. It's not an information platform, it moves matter. It's not virtual, it's real. It's not luxury like the phone used to be, people life depends on it already. It's not a free market, but heavily regulated. And a car is very, very expensive. Second hand is a huge thing. You don't replace your car every 2 years. The market for maintenance and service is it's own industry, and the state is deep in it. Not to mention the the huge quantity of material you need just to build one car. Finally, if a car fails, a BSOD becomes quite literal.
  - AmericanChopper 5y ago
    > Look at the European market: manual gears everywhere. Look at the UK, South African and Autraslian market: the car is inversed, with the wheel on the right. These aren’t really great examples of marketing to a niche. Automatic transmissions cost more money, so manuals are more popular than they are in the US in every country that has less disposable income than the US. The primary reason it’s so easy to get a left hand drive car in Australia is because the UK and Japan drive on the left.
    - fomine3 5y ago
      > in every country that has less disposable income than the US So you argue almost all country prefer manuals? It's not true at least in Japan. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposable_household_and_per_capita_income https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposable_household_and_per_c...
radioooooo 5y ago
> I do not want ads in traffic. This is non-negotiable for safety reasons alone. LMAO! OK, who's gonna tell him about the ads on the radio?
- caddywompus 5y ago
  Radio ads can: - be turned off by turning off the radio - are not inherent to the operation of the vehicle
- obviouslynotme 5y ago
  Classic radio is down-only. It goes through hardware for demodulation and amplification. I can turn a classic radio off. How long will it be until there is an ad that makes it confusing how to dismiss it and uses a police siren to get your attention? How long until someone uses the radio to ransomware your car using a remote code execution vulnerability?
  - pavel_lishin 5y ago
    > How long will it be until there is an ad that makes it confusing how to dismiss it and uses a police siren to get your attention? When I was in high school, the local radio station played a siren as part of the intro to their traffic update segment. Being a high schooler, I naturally had my volume cranked up pretty high - leading to at least a once-a-week near-swerve on my way to school as the segment began.
- tdsamardzhiev 5y ago
  Never understood people complaining of radio ads until I got to hear what American radio is like. They legit play ads after almost every song. Yikes!
- coldtea 5y ago
  LMAO fail. Radio is optional as you can switch it off at any time, change the volume, is not imposed by the manufacturer, and you had the option to listen to your own cassetes and later CDs and digital for 50+ years.
Hammershaft 5y ago
Its interesting that we have created a world where the people who build software are often the most skeptical of and aviodant of the software industry.
- MrMember 5y ago
  I feel like a luddite sometimes. I want to limit as much as possible how many devices I own that have access to the internet. My computer(s), HTPC, phone, game consoles, and that's it. There's no reason anything else ever needs internet access.
  - bozzcl 5y ago
    You’re far from alone. I recently outright blocked all DNS traffic, including known DoH providers, on my network firewall for all my devices except my Pi-Hole. Then, I blocklisted all Google and Facebook domains on my Pi-Hole… except for YouTube’s content servers so I can use Invidious. In fact, I might follow your example and add an outbound allowlist to my firewall. Seems like the next logical step.
  - coldtea 5y ago
    >I feel like a luddite sometimes. Luddites were right in their own way: their point was not against technology in abstract, but about the destruction it brought to their line of work with no alternative offered. But, Luddites aside, being enthusiastic for any application of technology is a sign of the idiot consumer or the naive futurist. The actual technologist knows that some tools are good for X and not for Y use cases, and also knows when to cut down technology (as opposed to add for the sake of it). (Same way we don't add features to our programs for the sake of it, and many features are put there by demand of the marketing team to get more money out of users, not to give them something better).
    - glogla 5y ago
      Many of the Luddites were successful craftsmen. The way I would frame it is that the Luddites weren't against the technology and automation, they were against the how the gains from that increased productivity were share - with 100 % going to the owners and none going to the workers. The reason why people think of them as of "dumb people breaking the machines" is because history is written by the victors.
dghughes 5y ago
>If you brick my car if I don't have a Manufacturer Approved radio... Farmers equipment is being bricked when they try to repair their multi-$100K machinery. It's the food we all eat that is at risk over some software update or a farmer had to perform necessary repairs by swapping a tractor's ECU.
userbinator 5y ago
I will go rebuild some grandfathered antique car. The classic car community continues to thrive and the aftermarket has plenty of parts available. My daily driver (perhaps not so daily for the past year or so...) doesn't need any software to start and drive, and that's the way I like it. It doesn't have the fuel efficiency or cleanliness of a modern car, but I guess that's just the cost of freedom and comfort for which I don't mind paying. ...and every time someone brings up the "safety" argument, I tell them that motorcycles are still legal.
- michaelmrose 5y ago
  Motorcycles are legal but if you commute and carry your kids around in them 100% of the time you may be choosing poorly. You moved the goalposts from a good choice to legally allowed.
  - Laarlf 5y ago
    You can pick old cars which are easy to fix and barely have any software. Old Volvos come to mind. They are also very safe, not just for their age. If safety is a primary concern you might consider something ridiculously massive like an F350. Those vehicles also don't have a lot of Software and with the weight and the size most modern SUVs with sleeping drivers will simply be consumed.
    - michaelmrose 5y ago
      Modern cars crumple so that they absorb more of the energy of the collision sacrificing the car's body for your body. Massive vehicles of the antique era had a horrific safety record. People in fact used to believe that collisions at highway speed were unsurvivable by nature. People who imagine that having the heavier more rigid car renders them safer because their car will just go through the other car leaving them safe misunderstand physics and safety. In the context of current cars classic volves are pretty garbage too. Here is a 90s volvo being absolutely smeared by a renault 10-20 years newer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7_H_aZtLl8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7_H_aZtLl8 See also unsafe at any speed.
jjav 5y ago
Same. I will not ever own any car that has network connectivity. So that means older cars only. Oh well. So be it.
- jawns 5y ago
  I, on the other hand, look forward to the day, probably not for at least 20-30 years from now, when all or virtually all vehicles are autonomous, and they're all constantly communicating with each other. Could you imagine the improvements in efficiency and traffic management? The vast reduction in accidents because someone forgot to use a turn signal or was following too closely? The marvelous freedom it would offer to the disabled?
  - Laarlf 5y ago
    Do you work with software? Because you don't seem to be scared one bit. I don't see this becoming a thing anytime soon. Not just because of how horrible software is and how little it improves. In the last 20 years we barely had any improvements in what cars assist us with. The Mercedes Benz W220 from 1998 had active cruise control. And today modern active cruise control systems barely work better. Some cars can sometimes change lanes for you. But even that is far from good. I look at how bad lane keep assists (which also have been around for over 10 years) detect roads, especially country roads and i don't feel like we will get anything remotely good from "self driving" cars in the next... MANY years.
    - jawns 5y ago
      I think the closer we get to the point where all vehicles are autonomous, the easier it will get. The interim is the hard part. Right now autonomous vehicles have to be able to operate alongside human operators whose ability to communicate their intent is limited to brake lights and turn signals, and there is basically no way to cooperate. Now imagine a world where it's all autonomous vehicles who are constantly communicating intent and can cooperate in marvelous ways, like with orderly zipper merging or intersection management without the need for traffic signals. There will still be a need for computer vision to detect pedestrians, obstacles, and wildlife, but it will be simpler than having to deal with other human operators.
chrischen 5y ago
Dang I wish my microwave had good software. All the pre-set modes are crap.
marsven_422 5y ago
You have no choice, someone somewhere did a business canvas that showed that turning your car into a software platform will be profitable
jacquesm 5y ago
Your microwave will end up as a subscription platform. Services grafted on to various appliances and consumer articles are going to be the norm unless we push back. Hard.
- jakeva 5y ago
  My microwave will not end up as a subscription platform. Maybe if I have to buy a microwave some day, but I don't know why I would have to do that. My microwave works fine.
  - jacquesm 5y ago
    Microwaves don't live forever (especially newer ones). At some point the choices will be: [ ] a connected microwave and [ ] no microwave Just like almost all newer cars now have some kind of wlan connection to the factory built in.
    - phs 5y ago
      This twelve inch cast iron skillet, on the other hand, will last forever.
      - jacquesm 5y ago
        Yes, it likely will (unless you drop it, or quench it). But if you're careful with it it will last longer than anybody reading this. But just like car batteries: cast iron skillets rarely die, but lots of them are murdered.
o-__-o 5y ago
> . If you brick my car if I don't have a Manufacturer Approved radio Every bmw, Mercedes Benz, and every luxury car does this today. Millions of them on the road. And it doesn’t brick the car, just anything in the path of the unapproved device (which guess where your radio sits) But this is to avoid fake parts from being installed in your car.. so catch 22?

lostlogin 5y ago

> I do not want ads in traffic. This is non-negotiable for safety reasons alone. I know it’s what you want but is it preventable? What’s the difference when today there are LED screens across the intersection you are trying to navigate that are intensely bright and displaying moving images? I’d argue that dimmer images in the car would be less distracting. However we appear on track to get both these dismal options. I won’t be buying a car with build in advertising, but given the frequency I change cars, this isn’t really any change.

fridif 5y ago
Yes, it is preventable if you buy a car that doesn't have it inside of it. As long as companies (or people) are allowed/able to make cars without ads in them, then it will be possible. If the government mandates, or market conditions dictate (due to monopolies or insufficient demand/profit incentive), that ads will be in cars, then it will not be possible, at least for new cars.
obviouslynotme 5y ago
It has nothing to do with flashing images, which I do not tolerate in my car either. It has to do with ads themselves, which have always walked the line between interactivity and malware. I don't want someone to be able to run arbitrary code on my car for $0.0004. No way. Could you imagine ransomware on your CAR? While you are driving in it?? No thank you.
- BiteCode_dev 5y ago
  Cars should not be connected to internet, period. If you want some component to be able to be part of the car and connected, it should be hardware that is physically not linked to the car system itself in any way. And you should not be able to issue OTA without some manual hardware operation, like turning a key somewhere that is far from the wheel.

sz4kerto 5y ago

> I want it to be like my microwave. Yes. Plus: I want it to be like a simple microwave that does what I need: heats for a certain amount of time at a certain power level. 2 physical knobs.

bombela 5y ago
Yes. Definitively not like my microwave. My microwave has not only the worst interface. But it also lags. The polling rate of the capacitive touche buttons is too low. And any action also takes a second to validate. It's horrendous. Give me back my late grandma microwave. Two knobs. Nothing more.
- fooblat 5y ago
  After much research I purchased a Samsung MWF300G[0] a modern microwave with only 2 dials. Used daily for 5 years and I love it. 0. https://www.samsung.com/levant/microwave-ovens/solo/mwf300g-k3050/ https://www.samsung.com/levant/microwave-ovens/solo/mwf300g-...
  - thraway123412 5y ago
    Does yours beep if you don't open the lid in a minute after it turns off? Mine does and that is super annoying. Annoying enough that I'm thinking of removing the buzzer or just buying another microwave. I do like the simple dual dial design though.
tdsamardzhiev 5y ago
I'm willing to go further. My parents' microwave has a single knob, and mine has two but I have never used it at something other than "High".
kstenerud 5y ago
I bought an industrial microwave a number of years ago just for this feature: Its controls consist of a single dial: how long to cook for. Also, in an industrial microwave the magnetron itself rotates, so there's no silly rotating plate business. Just put food in, turn the dial, take food out, and clean up is a snap.

tshaddox 5y ago

The microwave analogy is tricky, because those are generally not worth repairing (or even doing routine maintenance to prolong life) and are cheap and reliable enough that you wouldn’t want to pay a subscription for them unless it was a very cheap subscription. I’d love to have that situation for a car, but I don’t think it’s realistic without moving to a subscription model.

Traster 5y ago

The problem is that you're not going to have this choice. You'll be that guy insisting he wants a phone that's thicker but has better battery life - no manufacturer cares what you want because they have to operate at a scale where they can't cater for niches.

BiteCode_dev 5y ago
I'm not so sure. Look at the European market: manual gears everywhere. Look at the UK, South African and Autraslian market: the car is inversed, with the wheel on the right. The car market seems way different than the phone market. It's not an information platform, it moves matter. It's not virtual, it's real. It's not luxury like the phone used to be, people life depends on it already. It's not a free market, but heavily regulated. And a car is very, very expensive. Second hand is a huge thing. You don't replace your car every 2 years. The market for maintenance and service is it's own industry, and the state is deep in it. Not to mention the the huge quantity of material you need just to build one car. Finally, if a car fails, a BSOD becomes quite literal.
- AmericanChopper 5y ago
  > Look at the European market: manual gears everywhere. Look at the UK, South African and Autraslian market: the car is inversed, with the wheel on the right. These aren’t really great examples of marketing to a niche. Automatic transmissions cost more money, so manuals are more popular than they are in the US in every country that has less disposable income than the US. The primary reason it’s so easy to get a left hand drive car in Australia is because the UK and Japan drive on the left.
  - fomine3 5y ago
    > in every country that has less disposable income than the US So you argue almost all country prefer manuals? It's not true at least in Japan. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposable_household_and_per_capita_income https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposable_household_and_per_c...

radioooooo 5y ago

> I do not want ads in traffic. This is non-negotiable for safety reasons alone. LMAO! OK, who's gonna tell him about the ads on the radio?

caddywompus 5y ago
Radio ads can: - be turned off by turning off the radio - are not inherent to the operation of the vehicle
obviouslynotme 5y ago
Classic radio is down-only. It goes through hardware for demodulation and amplification. I can turn a classic radio off. How long will it be until there is an ad that makes it confusing how to dismiss it and uses a police siren to get your attention? How long until someone uses the radio to ransomware your car using a remote code execution vulnerability?
- pavel_lishin 5y ago
  > How long will it be until there is an ad that makes it confusing how to dismiss it and uses a police siren to get your attention? When I was in high school, the local radio station played a siren as part of the intro to their traffic update segment. Being a high schooler, I naturally had my volume cranked up pretty high - leading to at least a once-a-week near-swerve on my way to school as the segment began.
tdsamardzhiev 5y ago
Never understood people complaining of radio ads until I got to hear what American radio is like. They legit play ads after almost every song. Yikes!
coldtea 5y ago
LMAO fail. Radio is optional as you can switch it off at any time, change the volume, is not imposed by the manufacturer, and you had the option to listen to your own cassetes and later CDs and digital for 50+ years.

Hammershaft 5y ago

Its interesting that we have created a world where the people who build software are often the most skeptical of and aviodant of the software industry.

MrMember 5y ago
I feel like a luddite sometimes. I want to limit as much as possible how many devices I own that have access to the internet. My computer(s), HTPC, phone, game consoles, and that's it. There's no reason anything else ever needs internet access.
- bozzcl 5y ago
  You’re far from alone. I recently outright blocked all DNS traffic, including known DoH providers, on my network firewall for all my devices except my Pi-Hole. Then, I blocklisted all Google and Facebook domains on my Pi-Hole… except for YouTube’s content servers so I can use Invidious. In fact, I might follow your example and add an outbound allowlist to my firewall. Seems like the next logical step.
- coldtea 5y ago
  >I feel like a luddite sometimes. Luddites were right in their own way: their point was not against technology in abstract, but about the destruction it brought to their line of work with no alternative offered. But, Luddites aside, being enthusiastic for any application of technology is a sign of the idiot consumer or the naive futurist. The actual technologist knows that some tools are good for X and not for Y use cases, and also knows when to cut down technology (as opposed to add for the sake of it). (Same way we don't add features to our programs for the sake of it, and many features are put there by demand of the marketing team to get more money out of users, not to give them something better).
  - glogla 5y ago
    Many of the Luddites were successful craftsmen. The way I would frame it is that the Luddites weren't against the technology and automation, they were against the how the gains from that increased productivity were share - with 100 % going to the owners and none going to the workers. The reason why people think of them as of "dumb people breaking the machines" is because history is written by the victors.

dghughes 5y ago

>If you brick my car if I don't have a Manufacturer Approved radio... Farmers equipment is being bricked when they try to repair their multi-$100K machinery. It's the food we all eat that is at risk over some software update or a farmer had to perform necessary repairs by swapping a tractor's ECU.

userbinator 5y ago

I will go rebuild some grandfathered antique car. The classic car community continues to thrive and the aftermarket has plenty of parts available. My daily driver (perhaps not so daily for the past year or so...) doesn't need any software to start and drive, and that's the way I like it. It doesn't have the fuel efficiency or cleanliness of a modern car, but I guess that's just the cost of freedom and comfort for which I don't mind paying. ...and every time someone brings up the "safety" argument, I tell them that motorcycles are still legal.

michaelmrose 5y ago
Motorcycles are legal but if you commute and carry your kids around in them 100% of the time you may be choosing poorly. You moved the goalposts from a good choice to legally allowed.
- Laarlf 5y ago
  You can pick old cars which are easy to fix and barely have any software. Old Volvos come to mind. They are also very safe, not just for their age. If safety is a primary concern you might consider something ridiculously massive like an F350. Those vehicles also don't have a lot of Software and with the weight and the size most modern SUVs with sleeping drivers will simply be consumed.
  - michaelmrose 5y ago
    Modern cars crumple so that they absorb more of the energy of the collision sacrificing the car's body for your body. Massive vehicles of the antique era had a horrific safety record. People in fact used to believe that collisions at highway speed were unsurvivable by nature. People who imagine that having the heavier more rigid car renders them safer because their car will just go through the other car leaving them safe misunderstand physics and safety. In the context of current cars classic volves are pretty garbage too. Here is a 90s volvo being absolutely smeared by a renault 10-20 years newer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7_H_aZtLl8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7_H_aZtLl8 See also unsafe at any speed.

jjav 5y ago

Same. I will not ever own any car that has network connectivity. So that means older cars only. Oh well. So be it.

jawns 5y ago
I, on the other hand, look forward to the day, probably not for at least 20-30 years from now, when all or virtually all vehicles are autonomous, and they're all constantly communicating with each other. Could you imagine the improvements in efficiency and traffic management? The vast reduction in accidents because someone forgot to use a turn signal or was following too closely? The marvelous freedom it would offer to the disabled?
- Laarlf 5y ago
  Do you work with software? Because you don't seem to be scared one bit. I don't see this becoming a thing anytime soon. Not just because of how horrible software is and how little it improves. In the last 20 years we barely had any improvements in what cars assist us with. The Mercedes Benz W220 from 1998 had active cruise control. And today modern active cruise control systems barely work better. Some cars can sometimes change lanes for you. But even that is far from good. I look at how bad lane keep assists (which also have been around for over 10 years) detect roads, especially country roads and i don't feel like we will get anything remotely good from "self driving" cars in the next... MANY years.
  - jawns 5y ago
    I think the closer we get to the point where all vehicles are autonomous, the easier it will get. The interim is the hard part. Right now autonomous vehicles have to be able to operate alongside human operators whose ability to communicate their intent is limited to brake lights and turn signals, and there is basically no way to cooperate. Now imagine a world where it's all autonomous vehicles who are constantly communicating intent and can cooperate in marvelous ways, like with orderly zipper merging or intersection management without the need for traffic signals. There will still be a need for computer vision to detect pedestrians, obstacles, and wildlife, but it will be simpler than having to deal with other human operators.

chrischen 5y ago

Dang I wish my microwave had good software. All the pre-set modes are crap.

marsven_422 5y ago

You have no choice, someone somewhere did a business canvas that showed that turning your car into a software platform will be profitable

jacquesm 5y ago

Your microwave will end up as a subscription platform. Services grafted on to various appliances and consumer articles are going to be the norm unless we push back. Hard.

jakeva 5y ago
My microwave will not end up as a subscription platform. Maybe if I have to buy a microwave some day, but I don't know why I would have to do that. My microwave works fine.
- jacquesm 5y ago
  Microwaves don't live forever (especially newer ones). At some point the choices will be: [ ] a connected microwave and [ ] no microwave Just like almost all newer cars now have some kind of wlan connection to the factory built in.
  - phs 5y ago
    This twelve inch cast iron skillet, on the other hand, will last forever.
    - jacquesm 5y ago
      Yes, it likely will (unless you drop it, or quench it). But if you're careful with it it will last longer than anybody reading this. But just like car batteries: cast iron skillets rarely die, but lots of them are murdered.

o-__-o 5y ago

> . If you brick my car if I don't have a Manufacturer Approved radio Every bmw, Mercedes Benz, and every luxury car does this today. Millions of them on the road. And it doesn’t brick the car, just anything in the path of the unapproved device (which guess where your radio sits) But this is to avoid fake parts from being installed in your car.. so catch 22?