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Tony Ashton's avatar

I'm reminded of a friend's comment when I traded in my old Corolla hatch for a Subaru Forester, "Scientists, they get a newer car every 18 years whether they need to or not!"

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David Maier's avatar

I will be very, very interested in hearing your follow-up reports. I have two major concerns with electric cars: 1) the software. As I'm sure you would agree, the design of the software is at least as important, if not more, to the overall experience as the design of the physical product. CF. Apple versus Microsoft. I have enough experience with phones, car radios, (insert digital gadget here) to expect that all of these electric cars being rushed to market will have you going through 10 layers of hierarchical menus just to turn on the defroster.

2) what I'm seeing in the early stages is the car manufacturers are beginning to view their electric vehicles as platforms, like the iPhone, where the physical product is simply a vehicle to sell more things. I understand that some are no longer supporting Apple CarPlay or Android Auto, insisting that you subscribe to their proprietary platform. I'm very concerned about making an investment of thousands of dollars into something which will require the continued expenditure of increasing money to subscribe to what has always been a means of transportation. At what point will you be forced to pay for software upgrades or security enhancements or simply the continued right to be able to use your car? Will you be forced after 7 years to buy a new car because the company is no longer supporting the software as with my laptop? Once you are locked into the ownership of your vehicle, how long will it be before they start charging you for checked baggage? There are so many ways the ownership of these cars can head south, metaphorically speaking.

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