Dear Car Manufacturers: It's Time to Choose Planet Over Profit
An open letter to the auto industry: We need synchronicity, not subscriptions
I know you see the dollar signs and it makes your heart swell. But, can you think for a minute about the end user?
I decided nearly 15 years ago to use Apple Products, largely because of the synchronicity (and also fewer dramatic software changes and problems compared to its largest competitor) (though I prefer the idea of Linux (aka Ubuntu), but it too has too many changes). So, I use Apple Products. And eventually, one day, many years ago, they introduced a way to listen to all your things in a car. They had their own after-market set of software. At the time it was introduced, I had a car purchased for $1,200, and the stereo with the software cost $600. It doesn’t matter if it was affordable or not, I couldn’t justify buying a radio for my car that was roughly half the worth of my car.
(Eventually the market became more competitive, and I did secure a radio for about $210.)
The idea, though, of having this slick software integrated into my car was quite appealing. Slowly, starting around 2015/2016, car manufacturers started to integrate this software with new models. Though I wasn’t in the market for a new car, it swelled my heart that my tech preferences were integrated into all new car models if I were in the market. My synchronous dreams were coming full circle!
And this year, they are stopping, starting with GM, one of the early adopters of the integration, because they want to get their own subscription services.
I don’t want your stupid software, GM. I want the software I’ve chosen for myself - the Apple Suite. It generally gets the synchronicity. My podcasts and music will sync between devices, remembering where I left off. My mapping and guides are accessible no matter what tool I’m using, allowing me to have that weaving between jobs or tasks. It remembers what files I was looking at, so no matter the computing device, I can keep up. And, now, because you, dear car manufacturers, see dollar signs, I will lose my synchronicity. My counting songs. My integration on where I left off on that audio book. My sanity.
You are missing the concept of close-the-loop design, choosing instead your fetish with late-stage capitalism. We must move beyond capitalism. Sure, make money. It’s a common form of trade that makes exchanging goods and ideas modestly easy, but our fetish with money, our love of money, is putting us and our planet in continued peril. We have a climate crisis. Your subscription service with lithium batteries is doing nothing good for our climate crisis. You should be leading the way in thriving wages and work-life balance, environmental stewardship, and how to manage corporate profits where average folks aren’t splitting crumbs.
I suppose I’ll stop looking for new cars and renew my search for a narrow range of vehicles that support Apple CarPlay. I wouldn’t have to take a car note out that way anyway. Let’s just pay cash and be done with it. And, as long as I live in a rust-free climate, I don’t need to dance on your treadmill like the rest of the country.
Dear car manufacturers, do better not just for my love of tech ease but for the love of our planet.
Signed, a frustrated customer who wants a planet to leave for their kid.