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BMW Adaptive Suspension Can Be Added via Subscription. Suspension As A Service (SAAS)
(www.bmwblog.com)
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
In what way does the suspension require regular servicing or an online connection to a server to function? That would be the only reason to offer it as an ongoing service cost.
Otherwise, you're just paying extra for something already in your car, not for an actual service, which would make no sense?
What next, paint ongoing service fees for having wheels? Not even for ensuring they're regularly replaced, serviced, or repaired, just for the ability to use them at all....
Active suspension is software, just like Photoshop is. You need to pay subscription fee for Photoshop now, and BMW wants a subscription fee for their active suspension software too. Rent seeking and Enshittification.
Except that you have to have special way more expensive shocks to have adaptive suspension compared to fixed. It's like being sold an I3 CPU for the price of an I9 cpu while being told you can pay a subscription to upgrade to the full performance
I feel like in this case it's more like everyone gets sold i9 hardware, but can choose to pay the i3 price for it with locked out features, then decide later to pay the subscription to unlock the i7 or i9 performance. It has advantages for the manufacturer in that there are fewer options to account for at build time and additional revenue later on. I still think it's a terrible model that should be summarily rejected by customers, but I see why they are trying it.
Yeah they're totally not charging you for the expensive suspension they're installing in your car in the hopes that you'll pay a subscription to use it. 100% not included in the price, clearly no one would ever do that
Nobody is giving away i9 hardware at i3 prices otherwise everyone would buy the cheapest model and part it out for massive profit.