What happens to a car when the company behind its software goes under?
- Thread starter JournalBot
- Start date
My current car was built in 2012. It has no infotainment screen. It has no modem. Winter city driving is around 8.3l/km. It has knobs and dials. I can do most of the maintenance myself, and the local garage can handle the rest. It shows no signs of failing any time soon.
When it finally does come time to replace it, I'm going to want to validate that the replacement functions with the modem disconnected at a bare minimum.
Upvote
30
(32
/
-2)
It's very real for online gamers when the servers get shut down and the game you paid for no longer works.
Upvote
24
(29
/
-5)
I think at that point I'd run 12V across some wires and get on with it. John Deere has the most infuriating hardware DRM this side of Hewlett-Packard.
Upvote
19
(19
/
0)
The first part of this article seems to be a reheat of:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14622205/fisker-ocean-ev-stuck-company-bust.html
And it's out of date - there are now garages with access to Fisker's diagnostic software that are able to do some repair procedures.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14622205/fisker-ocean-ev-stuck-company-bust.html
And it's out of date - there are now garages with access to Fisker's diagnostic software that are able to do some repair procedures.
Upvote
8
(8
/
0)
The term used to refer to DRM-encumbered software, such as valve's library, is "defective by design." Now, instead of a piece of entertainment, we've DRM affecting automobiles. Does this not mean that many "sustainable energy" autos on the market are rolling e-waste?
For instance, I've read on Ars that if you purchase a tesla secondhand but don't receive digital ownership, the vehicle is speed limited. Who would ever settle for that? Meaning, if tesla are ever no longer a going concern, then consumer demand for any of their vehicles will be effectively zero.
This isn't to say that reliance on servers is required of the concept of electric motorcars but many manufacturers have purposefully intertwined them.
Just as you should never waste money on valve's DRM-laden software versions if you can find the title at a competing DRM-free shop, one must consider what happens to your transportation vehicle...miles down the road.
For instance, I've read on Ars that if you purchase a tesla secondhand but don't receive digital ownership, the vehicle is speed limited. Who would ever settle for that? Meaning, if tesla are ever no longer a going concern, then consumer demand for any of their vehicles will be effectively zero.
This isn't to say that reliance on servers is required of the concept of electric motorcars but many manufacturers have purposefully intertwined them.
Just as you should never waste money on valve's DRM-laden software versions if you can find the title at a competing DRM-free shop, one must consider what happens to your transportation vehicle...miles down the road.
Upvote
6
(10
/
-4)
At this stage, your vehicle is essentially a printer on wheels, with all the headaches that entails.
Upvote
26
(26
/
0)
We had a VW Bus when I was a kid. Going to Ohio was a treat. barely make it up a hill as the car is overheating. Crest the hill and the gauge just plummets. Another hill barely make it.
and it wasn't even the cool model with the pop up tent,
Upvote
17
(18
/
-1)
My '05 Lexus is approaching this point. When the independent Japanese auto repair shop I took it to closed, some places I called up said that they only had one or two techs that could work on it, so turnaround times could be rather long. Apparently the younger folks aren't trained on it and are busy enough that they don't care to pick up the skills. The local Lexus dealer's service department will still take it, but their prices are stupidly high, with major repairs likely exceeding the value of the car.
So I am slowly becoming an expert at repairing it myself, with a few pointers from my neighbor who is a diesel engine repair tech. And I am starting to acquire a nice collection of tools for doing the job.
Upvote
27
(27
/
0)
I drove my brother's once. Didn't even have a gas gauge. When the engine started dying, you reached under the seat and flip the valve to the reserve tank.
Upvote
21
(21
/
0)
Yeah, I fucked up something with the seat on my 2005 LS430 and they wanted $17,000 for a replacement seat. Needless to say I figured out how to rig the seat up to be functional without paying that.
Upvote
19
(19
/
0)
While that's true of games, the article follows that with:
It seems like the scenario IS still hypothetical, no? The opposite of that would be that it's happening to specific cars. If so, to which ones?
Upvote
11
(12
/
-1)
Upvote
10
(10
/
0)
My father would disagree. He said cars peaked in 1969 or so. He could fix anything short of an engine blowing up with a couple of hand tools. I hated carbs, points, and all those adjustments and think cars peaked in the early 1990s. Enough computers for fuel injection and electronic ignition so you don't need a tune up every 6 months. My daughter disagrees with me, she won't tolerate a car without bluetooth and a backup camera.
Only slightly kidding.
Upvote
60
(60
/
0)
If you think this is bad for cars, how do you think non-US military feel about software for fighter jets? https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/f-35-software-could-jailbreaked-223532479.html
Upvote
22
(22
/
0)
The solution is just not connecting it at all. You do that by not buying anything that requires any kind of connection. If enough people did that, they'd stop making the fucking things connected.
You don't NEED a connection to drive and safely operate a motor vehicle. I know, I've done it for 50 years without ONCE relying on any kind of connection. I STILL do it that way today.
Of course, my car is 24 years old. The stereo died and I've not bothered to replace it. It doesn't have GPS, blind spot warning lights, AEB, lane keeping, auto-steer, rental payments to use features my car came built with, or power ass wiping, but I never have to worry about some fuckwit in a corporate office ten thousand miles away having a bad day and bricking my car because it's old and they don't want to support it anymore.
The fallacy is that a connected car is better than one that has no connections to anything. It's demonstrably not. It's JUST more lucrative for the auto maker. ALL of the cool safety shit can sit in a car that is connected to NOTHING and still function perfectly well. Do they offer something like that to the general public? OF COURSE NOT.
The corporations are having too much fun monetizing the data they collect about you as you do it.
Upvote
16
(26
/
-10)
Software is fine and has been in cars for decades. Using the same tech as the game companies to keep the car running as long as it can phone home now and then is the issue. SaaS as a vehicle is a terrible idea for consumers. Boon for mfrs since they can just obsolete the car tomorrow so you can buy a new one.
Upvote
16
(16
/
0)
Under no circumstances should your car not start because that damn software developer went belly up. Nothing that mission critical should require a fucking phone home. Not getting future UI/nav updates is not the same as my $50,000+ car not being able to do the bare minimum: safely drive.
Upvote
27
(27
/
0)
Ask the Navy about repairing the ovens on their brand new $13 billion Ford-class aircraft carriers.
TL;DR: The ship has eight ovens that cook over 15,000 meals a day. Six of them broke. The service contract won't let the crew fix the ovens. Instead, the manufacturer's technicians have to make a house call. To a ship at sea. Possibly in combat. And hopefully he brought the right parts.
Upvote
37
(37
/
0)
There are dozens of Fisker Ocean cars driving around NYC on TLC plates (Car service/cabs/ubers etc). I guess they're reliable enough to be used commercially as taxis.
Upvote
5
(5
/
0)
That's clearly explained in the EULA you agreed to when you first started the car. It's right under the section on agreeing to allow the executives of motoCo® to harvest your children's organs for personal use. (You didn't read 34 pages of 4 pt white gray type on a light gray background?. Tsk, tsk…)
What happens when a corporation finds customers are no longer profitable or relevant is that they throw them out with the trash, with no more regard to the long term consequences than gave to developing the product in the first place. In late stage capitalism, "corporation" is a reverse Robin Hood tool for transfer resources from the Have Barely Enough to the Have Way Too Much.
The rest is – quite literally – advertising.
Upvote
11
(15
/
-4)
Under the bankruptcy, the entire lot of unsold inventory of Oceans was liquidated to an NYC taxi company. These are probably the ones you're seeing.
Upvote
27
(28
/
-1)
Yes, but the mfr doesn't have to go out of business, and the car doesn't have to be old. I have a 2025 Kia EV6, and I can't use the car's maps while driving because the voice dictation software can't handle numbers. The map software can be updated OTA, but my defective STT (speech to text) software apparently can't be updated; my dealer has never heard of it. And from EV6 forums, this is not a problem on most EV6s. And I have several lesser software glitches, none of which can be addressed by the dealer. I'm up to date on the main software modules, according to the visible version numbers.
Upvote
5
(6
/
-1)
How do insurance companies respond to this? If I had a Fisker Ocean with full coverage and it bricked due to a software glitch and bankruptcy, do they total it? If they total it, is the value given the commercial value of the dead brand's unit, so significantly less than a comparable vehicle from an extant company, so no chance of being made whole?
I ask all these questions as someone who has been following Telo for some time.
I ask all these questions as someone who has been following Telo for some time.
Upvote
13
(13
/
0)
"As vehicles become platforms for software and subscriptions, their longevity is increasingly tied to the survival of the companies behind their code. When those companies fail, the consequences ripple far beyond a bad app update and into the basic question of whether a car still functions as a car."
Hard pass on that, thanks.
I'm in the old car club with other posters on here. I own two vehicles; one is 22 years old and the other 18. I doubt I will ever purchase a newer vehicle. I'm very mechanically inclined, take excellent care of my cars, and I am old. So, if they last another 20 years I'll likely be dust and they can rust. Should my vehicles fail before my need for independent mobility has arrived maybe the robotaxis will be here. Then I will only have to worry about them being bricked for the duration of my ride.
Now that I think of it, this reliance on a corporate server really dovetails with future plans for us plebians to own nothing. (I recall Cory Doctorow referencing an economist who uses the phrase techno-feudalism. A sad future indeed...)
Hard pass on that, thanks.
I'm in the old car club with other posters on here. I own two vehicles; one is 22 years old and the other 18. I doubt I will ever purchase a newer vehicle. I'm very mechanically inclined, take excellent care of my cars, and I am old. So, if they last another 20 years I'll likely be dust and they can rust. Should my vehicles fail before my need for independent mobility has arrived maybe the robotaxis will be here. Then I will only have to worry about them being bricked for the duration of my ride.
Now that I think of it, this reliance on a corporate server really dovetails with future plans for us plebians to own nothing. (I recall Cory Doctorow referencing an economist who uses the phrase techno-feudalism. A sad future indeed...)
Upvote
22
(22
/
0)
Unconnected cars still have tons of software in them, and oftentimes that software is buggy because automakers by and large are not good at software. Software is not going away, especially for EVs. The problem with the Fisker Ocean mentioned in the article wasn't because of some issue related to connectivity, it was because of major bugs in the software that have now turned that vehicle into a very large paperweight.
Upvote
12
(13
/
-1)
Indeed, some airbags have multiple charges that can be independently detonated to control deployment velocity/timing. It’s not a given that they are on CAN bus, but seems likely.
Upvote
6
(7
/
-1)
The question unasked in the story: What happens when the software in the car is created by AI and the testing is done by the users?
Upvote
0
(7
/
-7)
What cars absolutely need to reach a server in order to drive, out of the box? Hopefully none. Hell even computers don't absolutely need the internet to boot up and function. To fix glitches, add features and maybe run some unusual things like sensor recalibration ok sure, but every car should by default drive the way it did on day one without a server. No?
Upvote
12
(12
/
0)
For better and worse, the ship has sailed and connected vehicles / software-defined vehicles are here to stay, if only because the supply chain has shifted that way and no amount of wailing will move it back. Given that future, we probably need to focus on standardization as the article notes as well as workable consumer protections like minimum 10+ years of free software support, the requirement to open source key software modules if support is discontinued by the manufacturer or they go bankrupt, etc.
Upvote
1
(5
/
-4)
Deposit the source code at a trusted repository and make law that the code must be released in case the manufacturer stops supporting the car. A third-party can then pick it up from where the manufacturer is leaving it. The code is protected by copyright (ugh) anyway. If competition steals the code, let them sue each other.
In case of crap like phones, make the manufacturer unlock the bootloader so we could take an old smartphone/tablet and boot linux and use the screen for something else or whatever.
Done.
Phone are already bad enough as ewaste. But cars???
In case of crap like phones, make the manufacturer unlock the bootloader so we could take an old smartphone/tablet and boot linux and use the screen for something else or whatever.
Done.
Phone are already bad enough as ewaste. But cars???
Upvote
7
(9
/
-2)
What we need is robust right-to-repair laws.
We also need the manufacturers to release the source code for things that they will no longer support. Or at the very least put it in some sort of escrow in case that happens for whatever reason.
We also need the manufacturers to release the source code for things that they will no longer support. Or at the very least put it in some sort of escrow in case that happens for whatever reason.
Upvote
25
(25
/
0)
The "high technology" part I refer to is when it's implemented in a more systemic way. It's fine when it's compartmentalized and used in non-system-critical like infotainment systems. (Well, sorta of fine. It's not fun to have those things wind up bricking but at least it doesn't make your car stop being a car.) Or in areas where it is used (battery conditioning, engine performance, etc.), it's only as complex as it needs to be and isn't reliant on updates or connectivity beyond the outside of the car's body.Software is fine and has been in cars for decades. Using the same tech as the game companies to keep the car running as long as it can phone home now and then is the issue. SaaS as a vehicle is a terrible idea for consumers. Boon for mfrs since they can just obsolete the car tomorrow so you can buy a new one.
Many car companies have gone beyond that, and have started stuffing in high tech stuff where it's detrimental to the long term use of the car. Hence this article.
Upvote
8
(8
/
0)
I can imagine a future where the air is generic, but you must use an authorized air pump. I wish I was joking.
Upvote
22
(22
/
0)
For the car companies, this is all a feature, not a problem - now they can force you to buy a new car every 5-10 years, or permanently lease one.
Upvote
4
(5
/
-1)
Especially for the "smart home" concept.
How long before a home you buy from someone else with smarty-pants tech you were not aware of bricks your front door and now you have to break a window to get in?
Upvote
9
(9
/
0)
If you think getting a security update for your 5 year old consumer grade router is hard, imagine trying to get a security update for your 20 year old connected car in 2040.
Upvote
21
(21
/
0)
hah!
I guess it depends on how much things like Occupant safety, rollover protection, crumple zones and airbags matter to you. of if you don't mind smelling like fumes, HVAC that works etc
but as you said those cars were relatively high maintenance, valve lash, greasing your ball joints, points, plugs, carb tuning, re-jetting plus rudimentary suspension design(torsion beam), they make a great Sunday morning cruise car, but I wouldn't want to Daily one
Things like a Bluetooth head unit and backup camera are easy to retrofit.
(90's JDM cars are my personal favorite as well)
Upvote
6
(6
/
0)
I know that the LS was never a high volume vehicle, but I'd assume that some of them are sitting in salvage yards somewhere. So if neither your fix nor some sort of fabrication/welding could fix it, at least a second-hand replacement could be sourced...
Upvote
2
(2
/
0)