Comment Re:You're dying off (Score 1) 287
When you buy CASH (money) a vehicle, you can ask for the Manufacturers Statement Of Origin (MSO), and the dealer is obliged to surrender it to you. THIS is the actual Title. You own the car, free and clear.
OK, I stand corrected. I also stand by my statement that none of this is relevant to the discussion at hand.
And yes, there ought to be a standard for in vehicle systems such as this. But it is also in the interest of the Car Companies not to provide a standard, so that they can upsell you on the initial purchase rather than having you go to a customizing vendor to have it installed.
Yeah, that's likely true. They'd love to use the car electronics as a way to compete with other brands and they'd love to sell me a $2,500 nav system instead of letting me easily use my (already purchased) phone. But they can't upsell too much or I'll just use my phone instead and be annoyed. I'm sure marketing departments debate this all the time.
I wonder if a good system to tether a car to a phone will show up in low-end cars first. There the customers are far less likely to pony up for an expensive electronics upgrade. There might be more of a market for a phone connection.
It probably also matters how long one plans to own the car. I believe the trend is to own cars longer than in the past. They're so much more reliable people tend to hang on to them longer rather than trade them in every two to four years. If I'm going to hang onto my car for a decade, I kinda care that phone technology is going to make huge advances and my in-dash system is going to seem really clunky and ancient long before the car wears out. OTOH, lots of people lease cars so they can easily stay on the latest and greatest tech. Those people won't care about upgrading anything in the car because they won't own it that long.