Tag: BMW

BMW Further Embraces Making Basic Features A Costly Subscription Service

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

from the sorry-seatbelts-are-extra dept
Wed, Jan 11th 2023 05:22am – Karl Bode

Last year BMW took ample heat for its plans to turn heated seats into a costly $18 per month subscription in numerous countries. As we noted at the time, BMW is already including the hardware in new cars and adjusting the sale price accordingly. So it’s effectively charging users a new, recurring fee to enable technology that already exists in the car and consumers already paid for.

BMW Further Embraces Making Basic Features A Costly Subscription Service

Mercedes will unlock your $100,000 electric car’s full power — for an extra $1,200 per year

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

Let’s say you’re tired of hitting 60 mph in only 5.3 seconds and want to get to highway speed a smidge faster. Is that worth a $1,200-per-year subscription to you?

Mercedes-Benz hopes the answer is yes.

Mercedes will unlock your $100,000 electric car’s full power — for an extra $1,200 per year

H/T: Steve Lehto

At least you can get an EV tax credit on your 2023 Mercedes EQS SUV!

German lawmaker joins talks with Taiwan’s president, criticises Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s ‘unilateral’ China policy

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

German lawmaker joins talks with Taiwan’s president, criticises Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s ‘unilateral’ China policy (Yahoo)

“I think we could have avoided this if the chancellor had followed the outline that we laid down together. One year ago, we said that Germany’s China policy must be strongly integrated with the US-China policy,” he added, stressing that the “coalition contract” also supports Taiwan’s democracy against “China’s aggression” and its “meaningful participation in international organisations”.

…

Over the past two decades, business interests have heavily influenced the country’s China policy. Last year, their combined exports and imports stood at more than US$255 billion, making China Germany’s top trading partner for the sixth straight year.

Germany is dependent on China for solar panels, computer chips, rare earths and other critical minerals. The bilateral trade directly supports more than 1 million German jobs.

Germany’s top 10 listed companies are reliant on China for a significant share of their revenues. According to the Rhodium Group, a New York-based research institute, automakers BMW, Mercedes-Benz and Volkswagen and chemical giant BASF accounted for one-third of all EU investments in China in the past four years.

The Greens are idiots!

Elon Musk Is Not a Renegade Outsider – He’s a Massive Pentagon Contractor

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)1 Comment

Elon Musk’s proposed takeover of Twitter has ruffled many feathers among professional commentators. “Musk is the wrong leader for Twitter’s vital mission,” read one Bloomberg headline. The network also insisted, “Nothing in the Tesla CEO’s track record suggests he will be a careful steward of an important media property.” “Elon Musk is the last person who should take over Twitter,” wrote Max Boot in The Washington Post, explaining that “[h]e seems to believe that on social media anything goes. For democracy to survive, we need more content moderation, not less.” The irony of outlets owned by Michael Bloomberg and Jeff Bezos warning of the dangers of permitting a billionaire oligarch to control our media was barely commented upon.

Elon Musk Is Not a Renegade Outsider – He’s a Massive Pentagon Contractor