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> I would guess their profit is based on some people choosing to enable the future. They would not risk breaking even or losing money if people opted out more

> I would guess their profit is based on some people choosing to enable the future. They would not risk breaking even or losing money if people opted out more than expected. The base model with the feature disabled must be profitable on its own. It's just basic business. > More choices for the consumer. It's a false choice. Creating the illusion of choice is not progress. If I stood in front of your front door with a gun in hand and asked you to either pay a small fee every time you leave, or a large one-time fee to leave whenever you want, well, before I arrived you only had one choice and now you have two. Are you better off? > What's the issue? Capitalism generally drives progress due to competition, but it should be heavily criticised whenever it stunts progress. Simple as that. Providing more features at the same or lower cost due to economies of scale is great progress. Artificially disabling those features with software to try and squeeze out more profit is not progress. No doubt they will also go after anyone who tries to bypass this software lock. This is the same logic behind printer manufacturers trying to lock out third party cartridges and refilling. It's wasteful, anticompetitive and regressive, not progressive.

chrisseaton 4y ago
> They would not risk breaking even or losing money if people opted out more than expected. Loss-leader. Allows them to advertise a low base price, but most people will pay more. > It's a false choice Lol it’s not - you can genuinely choose to never pay for it, to pay later, or pay up front. Those are all useful choices I can imagine real people exercising. Why do you think it’s an illusion? Why is not paying not an option? > If I stood in front of your front door with a gun in hand It’s a car seat heater. It’s a luxury. Nothing as dramatic.
- naasking 4y ago
  > Loss-leader. Allows them to advertise a low base price, but most people will pay more. They wouldn't risk it in this case, for such a high cost item. It makes no sense for the marginal cost of the heater, the base price would just be marked above the cost. > It’s a car seat heater. It’s a luxury. Nothing as dramatic. Way to miss the point. Thought experiments are dramatic so as to make the principle obvious: just because you've increased the set of possible choices does not mean you've added value. That's the case with the thought experiment and with subscription seat heaters. That's why it's a false choice, the value has already been added by economies of scale, and BMW is trying to profit more without any effort by removing that added value. As I already explained, we want innovation from effort that encourages progress, not profiteering from artificial scarcity. Skewed incentives that don't result in progress should be criticized and corrected.

chrisseaton 4y ago

> They would not risk breaking even or losing money if people opted out more than expected. Loss-leader. Allows them to advertise a low base price, but most people will pay more. > It's a false choice Lol it’s not - you can genuinely choose to never pay for it, to pay later, or pay up front. Those are all useful choices I can imagine real people exercising. Why do you think it’s an illusion? Why is not paying not an option? > If I stood in front of your front door with a gun in hand It’s a car seat heater. It’s a luxury. Nothing as dramatic.

naasking 4y ago
> Loss-leader. Allows them to advertise a low base price, but most people will pay more. They wouldn't risk it in this case, for such a high cost item. It makes no sense for the marginal cost of the heater, the base price would just be marked above the cost. > It’s a car seat heater. It’s a luxury. Nothing as dramatic. Way to miss the point. Thought experiments are dramatic so as to make the principle obvious: just because you've increased the set of possible choices does not mean you've added value. That's the case with the thought experiment and with subscription seat heaters. That's why it's a false choice, the value has already been added by economies of scale, and BMW is trying to profit more without any effort by removing that added value. As I already explained, we want innovation from effort that encourages progress, not profiteering from artificial scarcity. Skewed incentives that don't result in progress should be criticized and corrected.