A Subscription for Horsepower

The WEF’s slogan that we will own nothing and be happy is not a new thing. Bill Gates pioneered the concept decades ago when his Microsoft operation began selling people licenses to use the software, which remained the property of Microsoft.

Previously, you bought a box that contained a CD – some will remember – and the software was on the CD. You got something physical in return for your money. It was yours once purchased. The CD could be passed along to a friend or family member, much the same as any other thing you actually own such as a music CD, for instance.

It was thus something under your control. You didn’t have to keep paying a subscription in order to be allowed (by Microsoft) continued use of the software.

Gates decided it wasn’t enough to make billions selling people software CDs. It would be much more extractive to charge them recurrent fees to use (license) the software. This would also eliminate the problem – from Microsoft’s point-of-view – of friends and family members getting Microsoft software for free via hand-me-down CDs.

Tesla was the first vehicle manufacturer to take that ball and run with it. Buyers of used Teslas found out that the vehicle they’d bought – which came with Tesla’s much heralded full self-driving feature – lacked that feature. The capability was still there, but to “unlock” it, the new owner had to pay a subscription to Tesla.

BMW decided to try the same with heated seats. The hardware was built into the car but software controlled it. BMW did not need to install buttons to turn the seat heaters off – or on – because its cars (like all new cars) have antennas that do much more than receive radio signals. That part is almost incidental, just as a smartphone only incidentally makes phone calls. It is primarily a tracking device and data aggregator (about you).

The sharkfin antenna that perches on the roofs of all new vehicles is primarily there to send and receive data. It is the means by which your vehicle is invisibly connected to the manufacturer you thought you purchased it from as well as – at least potentially – the insurance mafia and the government. Yes, it’s your name on the paperwork. But who has access to your vehicle’s systems, without your knowledge or consent or any way to block such access? Entities other than you is the point.

You are the owner of your vehicle in the same way that you own “your” smartphone. The real owner allows you to hold onto the thing but the real owner controls the thing.

VW’s horsepower subscription is the latest elaboration of this thing. Customers who buy a new ID.3 (this is the name of the “electrified” iteration of the Golf) can “choose to pay extra if they want to unlock the full power,” according to the BBC. That’s not quite accurate – because it’s not a one-time “extra.” That would be like the purchase of a larger (or more powerful) engine, after which the larger/more powerful engine would be yours to keep.

The BBC piece explains:

“The ‘optional power upgrade’ will cost £16.50 per month or £165 annually,” which amounts to about $222 annually. Factor that out over a decade and it’s another $2,220 extracted by VW after you’ve already paid for the vehicle. 

VW says this is nothing new, much less extractive: “Historically many petrol and diesel vehicles have been offered with engines of the same size, but with the possibility of choosing one with more potency.” That’s true – and false. It is absolutely true that “diesel and petrol vehicles” have been offered “with engines of the same size, but with the possibility of choosing one with more potency.” For example, Chevrolet offered the 350 (5.7 liter) V8 that was available in many of its cars in more (or less) potent iterations. The high-performance LT-1 350 V8 that was standard in the 1970 Z28 Camaro was much more “potent” than the nothing-special 350 that was available in other (non-Z28) Camaros that year. And the 2.0 liter four cylinder engine that VW currently offers in most of its vehicles is offered in various different output levels (i.e, “potency”).

The lie is contained in the fact that people (historically) bought a given engine that made whatever power it touted and that was it. If the owner wanted more power later on, he was free to modify (or replace) the engine. And – this is really important – the vehicle’s manufacturer had no way to lower the output of the engine. That has changed. It is implicit in being to “upgrade” the output of a device’s battery pack/motors via some over-the-air “update.” What can be added to can be subtracted. Tesla has already done that, too – in the form of range/charging capacity, which is adjustable at Tesla’s pleasure.

That means it is potentially adjustable to zero.

Oh, but they’d never do that! It’d be illegal!

Once upon a time, Americans believed they were protected from being stopped/searched without probable cause by the 4th Amendment, which made such stops/searches illegal. How’s that working for you?

Americans never imagined – once-upon-a-time – that they’d be “locked down” because someone sneezed. Etc.

The issue isn’t so much whether a thing is done as much as it is whether it can be done. If it can be done, then the only thing preventing it from being done is the grace of whoever/whatever has the power to do it electing not to.

For the present.

As people become used to this business of paying to use things they used to pay to own they will get used to owning nothing. There will no longer be such a thing as a hand-me-down car a parent can give to a teenaged first driver – because the parent doesn’t own the thing. The kid will have to pay sub to use the thing. Just like mom and dad did.

Whether they will be “happy” about it has yet to be determined.

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