4 ms·

It’s interesting to see how a lot of new gas cars have Apple CarPlay / Android Auto but all of the new EV cars are going towards custom OS which essentially le

by petarb 3y ago

It’s interesting to see how a lot of new gas cars have Apple CarPlay / Android Auto but all of the new EV cars are going towards custom OS which essentially leads to worse user experiences for manufacturers who aren’t well versed in software.

SkyPuncher 3y ago
It's honestly insane. CarPlay does everything I want and the best part is it just works. A large part of that "it just works" is the fact that it's all based directly on my phone. * That restaurant we just decided to go to. Already in navigation. AND! the maps are all current with road closures/traffic issues. * The music that I was playing, it just keeps going * The garage door opener/lock/etc that I just added to HomeKit - automatically pops us.
- lotsofpulp 3y ago
  The best part is I do not have to worry about a third party vendor getting access to my smartphone’s data. For better or worse, the smartphone is a vault of almost everything about a person, including the ability to impersonate them. Obviously, Apple and Google already have access to all of this, but I see no reason to let yet another entity have it.
  - shuckles 3y ago
    CarPlay is essentially a form of AirPlay, so the car is receiving a video stream from your phone, not data. (Of course, they could try to extract data from the video stream, but I doubt they have the technical skills to do that in the near future.)
- outside1234 3y ago
  Exactly. This is one of those terrible decisions that GM will have to retract. The only question is when. There is no way they are going to be able to compete with Apple or Google. Literally the worst software engineer at either of those companies is better than anyone GM has. Will make an interesting Harvard MBA case study.
- csdvrx 3y ago
  > It's honestly insane. CarPlay does everything I want and the best part is it just works. A large part of that "it just works" is the fact that it's all based directly on my phone. The insanity goes both ways: I refuse to use a cellphone, so I will not buy a car that has Android or Apple stuff. Hopefully I'll have other options than this $130k Cadillac, but it's good to know some automakers cater to my preferences too. > That restaurant we just decided to go to. Already in navigation. AND! the maps are all current with road closures/traffic issues Funny enough, getting a GPS without auto updates and offering a full offline experience is now a premium, but I'm happy to pay for the exact opposite of what you want: a GPS without auto navigation / user tracking / not being happy to work with old maps if I decide it should (customer is king, except for apps!)
  - gopher2000 3y ago
    > I refuse to use a cellphone Like at all? That immediately puts you in a pretty niche category.
    - csdvrx 3y ago
      > Like at all? That immediately puts you in a pretty niche category. Like at all I guess? Or at least least 99% of the time? I'm not opposed to the idea owning a cellphone: I can have one, if it's without a cellphone plan and spends most of the time powered off inside a drawer. Then, as long as I'm not forced to interact with it say more than once a month, it's fine. I guess this technically doesn't qualify for the "not at all" since I sometimes use a cellphone to run magisk to root my android ebook
  - scottyg66 3y ago
    > The insanity goes both ways: I refuse to use a cellphone, so I will not buy a car that has Android or Apple stuff. I think you are firmly in the minority here and probably not the market they are building for. I bet much less than 1% of people who will buy a car in the next year refuse to use a cell phone.
  - lotsofpulp 3y ago
    > The insanity goes both ways: I refuse to use a cellphone, so I will not buy a car that has Android or Apple stuff. FYI, a car that supports CarPlay/Android Auto and a car that does not is indistinguishable to the person who does not connect a phone to the car. It is just an interface that allows your phone to use the touchscreen, but if you do not connect a phone, it continues to work.
greenthrow 3y ago
This isn't really true except for Rivian and Tesla, which as start ups, wrote their own stack and want to fully control it. GM is moving to Google Automotive and doesn't want to enable Carplay or Android Auto, but Google is already in there deep. No other legacy manufacturers have announced plans to take away Carplay/Android Auto. Quite a few are basing their systems on Android Automotive, though (BMW, Volvo/Polestar, GM as mentioned, off the top of my head), so even if you don't use a Google phone, Google is going to have your data. There is no difference here between ICE vehiclws and BEVs, other than the two startups I mentioned.
- lotsofpulp 3y ago
  If a car with Google Automotive has CarPlay, how would Google get data from the iPhone? Is CarPlay not just an interface so your phone can display things on a bigger touchscreen?
  - hedora 3y ago
    At a minimum, it will pull location and anything the drivetrain knows about. It wouldn't surprise me at all if it also somehow ended up MITM'ing / screen scraping / OCR'ing apple services. The only solution at this point is legislation.
  - greenthrow 3y ago
    Even if the car is using CarPlay it can still report everything it knows about your location to Google. That translates to where you go at what times, etc.
elsonrodriguez 3y ago
They want a shorter revenue cycle via recurring services. What they're missing is that I don't stream my music from GMTunes, I don't store my photos on GMPhotos, I don't have my files on GMCloud, and I don't have easy access to all of this from my GMPhone, GMPad, GMBook, and GMWatch. They either fundamentally don't understand why people want Carplay or Android Auto, or have delusions that they can become a bigger ecosystem than Apple, Google, or Microsoft. If they are unsatisfied with the recurring revenue they currently get via selling car, parts, and electric charging partnerships, maybe they should start pivoting towards public transit.

by petarb 3y ago

SkyPuncher 3y ago

It's honestly insane. CarPlay does everything I want and the best part is it just works. A large part of that "it just works" is the fact that it's all based directly on my phone. * That restaurant we just decided to go to. Already in navigation. AND! the maps are all current with road closures/traffic issues. * The music that I was playing, it just keeps going * The garage door opener/lock/etc that I just added to HomeKit - automatically pops us.

lotsofpulp 3y ago
The best part is I do not have to worry about a third party vendor getting access to my smartphone’s data. For better or worse, the smartphone is a vault of almost everything about a person, including the ability to impersonate them. Obviously, Apple and Google already have access to all of this, but I see no reason to let yet another entity have it.
- shuckles 3y ago
  CarPlay is essentially a form of AirPlay, so the car is receiving a video stream from your phone, not data. (Of course, they could try to extract data from the video stream, but I doubt they have the technical skills to do that in the near future.)
outside1234 3y ago
Exactly. This is one of those terrible decisions that GM will have to retract. The only question is when. There is no way they are going to be able to compete with Apple or Google. Literally the worst software engineer at either of those companies is better than anyone GM has. Will make an interesting Harvard MBA case study.
csdvrx 3y ago
> It's honestly insane. CarPlay does everything I want and the best part is it just works. A large part of that "it just works" is the fact that it's all based directly on my phone. The insanity goes both ways: I refuse to use a cellphone, so I will not buy a car that has Android or Apple stuff. Hopefully I'll have other options than this $130k Cadillac, but it's good to know some automakers cater to my preferences too. > That restaurant we just decided to go to. Already in navigation. AND! the maps are all current with road closures/traffic issues Funny enough, getting a GPS without auto updates and offering a full offline experience is now a premium, but I'm happy to pay for the exact opposite of what you want: a GPS without auto navigation / user tracking / not being happy to work with old maps if I decide it should (customer is king, except for apps!)
- gopher2000 3y ago
  > I refuse to use a cellphone Like at all? That immediately puts you in a pretty niche category.
  - csdvrx 3y ago
    > Like at all? That immediately puts you in a pretty niche category. Like at all I guess? Or at least least 99% of the time? I'm not opposed to the idea owning a cellphone: I can have one, if it's without a cellphone plan and spends most of the time powered off inside a drawer. Then, as long as I'm not forced to interact with it say more than once a month, it's fine. I guess this technically doesn't qualify for the "not at all" since I sometimes use a cellphone to run magisk to root my android ebook
- scottyg66 3y ago
  > The insanity goes both ways: I refuse to use a cellphone, so I will not buy a car that has Android or Apple stuff. I think you are firmly in the minority here and probably not the market they are building for. I bet much less than 1% of people who will buy a car in the next year refuse to use a cell phone.
- lotsofpulp 3y ago
  > The insanity goes both ways: I refuse to use a cellphone, so I will not buy a car that has Android or Apple stuff. FYI, a car that supports CarPlay/Android Auto and a car that does not is indistinguishable to the person who does not connect a phone to the car. It is just an interface that allows your phone to use the touchscreen, but if you do not connect a phone, it continues to work.

greenthrow 3y ago

This isn't really true except for Rivian and Tesla, which as start ups, wrote their own stack and want to fully control it. GM is moving to Google Automotive and doesn't want to enable Carplay or Android Auto, but Google is already in there deep. No other legacy manufacturers have announced plans to take away Carplay/Android Auto. Quite a few are basing their systems on Android Automotive, though (BMW, Volvo/Polestar, GM as mentioned, off the top of my head), so even if you don't use a Google phone, Google is going to have your data. There is no difference here between ICE vehiclws and BEVs, other than the two startups I mentioned.

lotsofpulp 3y ago
If a car with Google Automotive has CarPlay, how would Google get data from the iPhone? Is CarPlay not just an interface so your phone can display things on a bigger touchscreen?
- hedora 3y ago
  At a minimum, it will pull location and anything the drivetrain knows about. It wouldn't surprise me at all if it also somehow ended up MITM'ing / screen scraping / OCR'ing apple services. The only solution at this point is legislation.
- greenthrow 3y ago
  Even if the car is using CarPlay it can still report everything it knows about your location to Google. That translates to where you go at what times, etc.

elsonrodriguez 3y ago

They want a shorter revenue cycle via recurring services. What they're missing is that I don't stream my music from GMTunes, I don't store my photos on GMPhotos, I don't have my files on GMCloud, and I don't have easy access to all of this from my GMPhone, GMPad, GMBook, and GMWatch. They either fundamentally don't understand why people want Carplay or Android Auto, or have delusions that they can become a bigger ecosystem than Apple, Google, or Microsoft. If they are unsatisfied with the recurring revenue they currently get via selling car, parts, and electric charging partnerships, maybe they should start pivoting towards public transit.