This will really help BMW to drive up their sales. I can’t believe their sales increased in North America, whereas the sales dropped off the cliff in China. Not just BMW, all traditional car manufacturers got hammered.

I guess that’s what happens if you are very limited in choice of cars (for clarification I meant the US of course).

autofreak.com/vw-bmw-mercedes-china-sales-collaps…

Imagine paying the kind of prices that car manufactures demand, and then they shove ads in your face on your own property. I would drive it back to the dealership & demand a refund.

You can probably have an ad-free system for a monthly subscription.

Wankers.

That’s Bayerische Motoren Wankers AG to you.

It’s crazy that few days ago I learned what BMW stands for and now I see it everywhere.

I thought it was Bavarian Motor Works or something? Logo was a propeller? No? This is what I’ve always known it to be.

Correct. It’s Bayrische Motoren Werke which translates to Bavarian Motor Factories or maybe Bavarian Motor Workshops.

The German Werk has several meanings:

1. The process of work/the work itself needed to finish a specific task.
2. A specific action. E.g. used to imply someone did $thing
3. A specific thing that was produced by someone (e.g. a piece of art) or even someone’s lifeworks as a whole.
4. A factory or industrial complex BUT ALSO depending on context the workers on said factory/complex.

Blessed info

5. Kraftwerk if you want old German techno

Shprockets! Dance!

i’m as happy as a little girrrl

6. Overwerk for more modern tastes

Bayerische Motoren Werke AG, is the proper name, but sometimes people anglicized it to Bavarian Motor Works.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BMW

it’s called the Baader Meinhof effect or frequency illusion

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frequency_illusion?wprov=sf…

Ad free*

Yup. Netflix will advertise its shows to you on the ad-free* tier, but say they’re not ads.

Even if you’re paying for the product, you’re still the product

Thank you for this article.

Remember when they tried to make you rent the heated seats you already have?

Maybe they will offer a commercial-free subscription service.

Maybe they will offer a commercial-free subscription service.

Ftfy

If have to watch ads it’s not a luxury car, it’s a Kia in a suit.

I don’t watch ads in my Hyundai. That makes it worse than Kia/Hyundai.

The only cars I see ads in are borrowed from Europcar and are basic pieces of shit. So I guess BMW is around there now.

This is brilliant. Single sentence deathblow to BMW marketing.

Oh no! How will me and my soldiering iron cope?

Better get good at CAN bus. Unless u like the Christmas tree look of a lit up dash.

I wonder if they put CAN gateways at the heated seats.

Remember when they installed turn signals you never use?

you’d think BMW customers learned from that

Or you’d hope, I guess, because I actually wouldn’t think them smart enough to learn from that

You have to watch the commercial before you can access the turn signals, right?

That would explain some things.

I’ve had Yanks tell me that my BYD is evil because I don’t really own it, that I have to pay a subscription, that it has ads

None of which is true

You know who’s pulling that sort of shit?

Other manufacturers.

NOT BYD

Same here. My car always works, I don’t need an account for it, all the features supported by the hardware are available for my use whenever I want. Here’s the kicker, WITHOUT an internet connection. We have 2 BYDs, a 2023 HAN and a 2023 TANG.

Right now BYD are being so heavily subsidised by the Chinese government that they are imported into the US and Europe at less than production and shipping cost.

Believe me when I say that as soon as they have enough market share they will be doing this, and because china are hyper-capitalist when it comes to exports it will be more intrusive and more inconvenient.

Well, Yank, that’s great

But I live in neither the US nor Europe (which is not a homogeneous mass)

I’m not American, but I can tell you are a cunt.

Edit , oh my god your post history is fucked.

How’s the air in china?

What are your views on the Tianmen Square massacre?

If you were as clever as you think you are, you’d know that I don’t live in China

But, you’re stupid.

Please don’t breed.

Lol how pathetic, do they pay you to shill for BYD?

Dumb cunt.

You’re tedious and stupid, so I’m going to block you

Part of me is genuinely curious about what you thought you’d achieve, but the bigger part is just happy that I will be extremely unlikely to ever meet you in person because you are stupid

But Europe (specifically the EU) is a homegenous market as in “being an open and free-to-move market”

hyper-capitalist

When you don't know what a word means and are unaware it describes your country, not the country upon which you're projecting.

Is it the reading or the comprehension you are struggling with?

Either way I’m sure when you finish school you will understand.

Right now BYD are being so heavily subsidised by the Chinese government that they are imported into the US and Europe at less than production and shipping cost.

Bullshit. US and European automakers are far more subsidized.

Maybe educate yourself?

European auto makers and not sbubsidised to the same extent and in fact most subsidies are illegal under EU trading rules. Even in domestic markets we have to pay tax on new EV purchases, typically 20 percent.

Chinese government support of ev manufacturers has been massive and is contributing to their unsustainable national debt (that and building massive infrastructure that can’t be used because they are falling down).

It’s well documented, here’s one of many articles:

China signals it will pull plug on subsidies for EVs with five-year plan exclusion - reuters.com/…/china-signals-it-will-pull-plug-sub…

The CSIS research based on the business filings and Chinese government reports puts the subsidy at between 28 and 32 percent depending on the manufacturer and target market.

www.csis.org

This is all part of China’s strategy to basically undercut the opposition for long enough that they will go bankrupt.

What will happen when there is no competition? Well, you only have to look at the current prices of computer components for the answer to that.

They said this about Jeep products. I found two people (admittedly a small sample) who had brand new Jeeps and asked if they saw ads on their vehicles entertainment systems and neither of them knew what I was talking about.

It sounds like it was just a specific message about the extended warranty which was showing up too often due to a glitch. Not quite the same as more general ads.

kbb.com/…/jeep-owners-fed-up-with-in-car-pop-up-a…

Nice work.

What models? I have an i4 and I have never been hit with this or those subscription services everyone kept talking about. I wonder if it is happening only in certain models.

Is suspect the model year is more relevant. How new is your vehicle?

2025 model year

It’s possible this will show up in a software update, but maybe you’ll be spared.

It’s not shown in the actual article, but the first source that they provide for references says this.

Bernd Körber, Senior Vice President BMW Brand and Product Management, says: “The launch of the Neue Klasse and Spider-Man™: Brand New Day could not be more fitting. Both stand for a bold new beginning and the confidence to shape what comes next. We are proud to accompany this new Spider-Man™ chapter with the BMW iX3, our first model of the Neue Klasse.”```

So it seems like it’s the Ix3 series. and maybe the 5 series because they indirectly mention it later on

Got it on a 4-series petrol.

What a dumb move. All this does is discourage me from getting another BMW when my lease is up.

Imagine this: when you start your car, you’re forced to watch a 30 second commercial. Your car already has eye tracking, which actually is a good safety feature, but we’ll be using this to make sure you’re watching the entire time.

If you stop watching, it will change to a 1 minute long commercial instead. If you still don’t watch the entire time, we might just start an even longer commercial.

Or better yet: your inattention is enough reason for us to turn off your car. Lawmakers can’t ban this now, because it’s a secondary safety feature: you don’t have enough attention to mindlessly watch a 30 second commercial, so you’re obviously not alert enough to operate a motor vehicle. Think of the kids.

Damn, I need to be like Sony and get a patent on this, just to stop anyone else from doing it.

Even Black Mirror wouldn’t go this far because it’s too banal, but Sony would

Boss: “Why are you late today?”

Employee: “My BMW was showing ads every 10 minutes. It was difficult to drive.”

Boss: “Fair enough.”.

…

Boss: “Fair enough.”.

Seems optimistic to me! I would expect “it is your responsibility to be here on time and ready to work. Leave earlier if you must.”

There was some sadness wrapped in the neutral -leaning response. Sort of like accepting the excuse for being late due to the ads disrupting the control of the car as a common thing / the new norm.

I can imagine such a scenario. I can imagine being a manager of a team, and having someone come in and say that, and just feeling dread and sympathy. You’re right, and not all employment situations are the same, not all managers are psychopaths. For many, though, they are not working under such “managers.”

But I’m grateful to you for pushing back against the pervading darkness in our collective mind. Let it not, however, dampen our efforts to seek a remedy.

Maybe a dumb question but can these cars be reprogrammed with some other software or whatever? Or could the car be manipulated to not show an ad or unlock your seat warmers or something?

Also, can the ad connection be hacked to show, for example, regular reminders that the president is a rapist. . ?

No. The software is deeply embedded and locked down tight. There is no reliable means of interfacing with it beyond what is exposed in the touchscreen interface. Only BMW dealers using their proprietary software can do anything and even they are limited to what is exposed to them. This is the same with all modern cars. Sorry.

It’s even more infuriating when you get to Volkswagen and the same tools are locked down for certain cars based on the branding alone.

A Volkswagen dealer cannot program a Skoda or Audi or Porsche - even though all of them have the same hardware and software.

If your car connects to the Internet, and has controls on a screen - then it’s not your car.

I would hack my car to get rid of this shit, absolutely.

All those electric car owners missing out on the gas station pump ads can finally feel included.

Anyone got tips for muting those? I always touch all four corners. Periodically, you find one that shuts the fuck up.

If the pump has 8 buttons around the screen, 99% of the time it’s the second button down on the right side.

This is the type of tips I’m looking for. Thank you!

I have been hearing this for years and it has never worked. One day I will find one that shuts the eff up!!

Past year I have yet to find one near me that responds anymore. My favorite are the stations that have them really loud and there’s always a bit of an offset so you get this diffuse echoy aural ad experience for the most godawful products.

Oh yeah dystopian city. Especially at odd times of the day.

Is that a US thing only? Cos I haven’t seen this crap here in germany, fortunately.

Oh you are missing out mate. I can’t even imagine the stress of just standing there pumping alone with my own thoughts. After I park and watch a brief ad on my bmw screen I can immediately turn my attention to the screen on the pump telling me about a new color of mountain Dew that I simply must try. Pure bliss. God bless America.

The day German gets Internet I’m sure we’ll be served as well, but in the meantime French / Belgium / NL already have this.

I can’t WAIT to never buy a smart car

Oh great. Most BMW drivers are already distracted and incompetent enough. This bullshit will just make them an even bigger hazard.

Just replace the ads with instructions on proper turn signal usage.

Lane departure warning system should make the car unable to change lane without signal. This way and combine with the stupid steer-by-wire system, signal is mandatory.

That sounds like a great way to guarantee every crash becomes a 100+ car pileup…

With tech like that, surely they would also have other ADAS build in to make sure that wouldn’t happen.

I’d hope it’s tech that works 100% of the time, too (lol).

I had a rental with lane assist once, and that shit nearly killed me when a dude drifted into my lane and my car decided I needed to stay in the same lane and not move over to avoid them. Thankfully cranking the wheel way harder than I should be at highway speeds overrode the lane assist.

I was behind one driving at a snail’s pace yesterday. When I overtook him it turned out he was scrolling on his phone.

They got rid of the turn signals completely to make this work

lemmy.world/c/nottheonion

with how some bmw drivers are, ads will make it worst.

Wow, maybe bring it back to the dealership and tell them the car is broken, and insist on them fixing it or ask for a full refund.

i’m sure when you buy a new car you somewhere sign to this t&c’s… which is why i’m not buying a new car (well, one of the reasons anyway ;))

Imagine if Obama’s administration did this. The Republican would collectively and simultaneously cream themselves (ew).

I imagined it. Was pretty cool

When my car dies, I’m just going to build a go cart. Fuck this shit.

If not for the snow and hills, I could get by on an electric bike for 95% of my needs.

But, I’m getting old, so not for much longer.

I hope they don’t act surprised when cheap Chinese cars without all that crap devour their market share.

Cheap chinese car, yes, without all the crap, you wish. They are all capitalist and learn from each other. Remember the door handle shit? It’s very much everywhere in chinese car to the point their government have to regulate the shit out of it. Chinese car maker want to export their car so bad because they can exploit without limit.

to the point their government have to regulate the shit out of it

Sounds like the system works. A problem was caused by capitalist firms doing stupid capitalist bullshit, and so the government stepped in to regulate them. What a country! Imagine if our governments would step in to regulate stupid firms doing stupid shit.

What a country!

Yeah if we pretend all the other issue with CCP didn’t exists, it’s a functional government.

Broken censorious genocidal clocks… or something like that.

And the US doesn’t censor at all, and doesn’t run propaganda via media, interfere with scientific and educational institutions. Or start wars and genocides across the middle east. Or kidnap and assassinate presidents of countries. Or oppress and imprison the most number of people of any country in the world. Only China has human rights violations, not our country.

In the interest of fairness, yes both USA and CN are both dystopian shitholes.

Not sure how any of that is relevant to my comment but okay.

The CCP is a functional government, but one you do not like

You can say that to a lot of government in this world.

That’s the point. Pretty much all governments in the world (except some obviously failed states in Africa)¹ are functional, but their functions are not what you and I would like for them to do.

¹ USA, the state of Israel, the strte of Palestine, Russia and China are all functioning states by my definition.

Didnt know dbzer0 is turning into lemmy.ml

You have to admit that the West is collapsing ahead of Asia. China will be also falling, of course.

Neither of which is challenging my comment but partly agrees with it.
Both the west and the east are on the road to collapse.
And (as you said) the true question is when, not if.

edit: wrong person!

No problem :)
Cheers!

lol try talking with an actual chinese person in 2026 irl, ask them how they feel about their own country. Its not 1952 with mao at the helm. Very illuminating actually talking to someone with direct experience instead of the daily mail and their weird takes based mostly on hearsay and misconstruction

Why would i wanna ask them who the south china sea and taiwan belongs to lmao

I don’t pretend that China is a hell hole, but you just pretend that CCP doesn’t have issue, that’s the difference here. And obviously it also depend who you ask. If i talk to charlie kirk obviously he would say trump is the greatest. Ohh wait he’s dead.

are you speedrunning some sort of ‘biggest amount of baseless assumptions about another person in one sentence’-title?

1. I know china’s got many problems worth criticizing, im pretty sure this is actually my first comment even mentioning china at all on this site, so i dont know what makes you think otherwise… All im pushing back on, is you claiming that ‘its not a functional government’.
2. i didn’t accuse you of saying its a hellhole. The 1952 comment was rhetorically purely for dramatic effect and not a comment about you. Not everything is.
3. tf has charlie kirk got to do with this? xD

are you speedrunning some sort of ‘biggest amount of baseless assumptions about another person in one sentence’-title?

So you said this:

instead of the daily mail and their weird takes based mostly on hearsay and misconstruction

You did it first, honey.

All im pushing back on, is you claiming that ‘its not a functional government’

I said it’s a functional government, maybe i put it in a wrong way but i mean what i said. If that’s all it take to tick you off then maybe it’s a you problem.

i didn’t accuse you of saying its a hellhole. The 1952 comment was rhetorically purely for dramatic effect and not a comment about you. Not everything is.

Didn’t said you accuse me saying that, i simply stated that as a comparison.

tf has charlie kirk got to do with this?

Would’ve think an example that come after a statement is pretty obvious thing, but i expect too much it seems.

aight my bad if i came off as ‘ticked off’, theres a language barrier and some neurodivergence at play here. I dont really vibe with the energy you’re giving off tho, with the ‘guess im expecting too much’, ‘honey’, etc.

Idrc who started it tbh, lets just say i did, but i dont like the direction the convo took in any case.

have a good one ✌️

Corpos figured out that onerous regulations can keep out competitors who haven’t achieved the economies of scale to pay for compliance.

This is pure sinophobia.

In what way criticising car manufacturer sinophobe? Is it because it’s a chinese company that you must unconditionally defend it? They’re billionaire ffs, no need you to defend them.

Could you point to the part that you consider racism, please?

At least China regulated it. Tesla and GM still use those handles.

That only delays the problem, doesn’t fix it, sadly. Chinese firms understand capitalism better than the west imo, so once they have a large market share, they will likely pull off the same shit. Still, for now, they are probably the better option.

For me, personally, I am trying to keep my 300 thousand km car alive :)

Very good point and I think I have proof. You can already see them inserting ads in their low budget phones

They will just be kept out of the market in the US. Oligarchs gonna oligarchy.

Unfortunately that doesn’t happen, because EU put tariffs on Chinese EVs. And then they are complaing why EV adaption doesn’t happen as quickly as they would like, lol.

But they said if we pay, we are not the product…

Was the BMW free? It must have been.

Well, what they actually say is if you don’t pay you’re the product. They never said anything about what happens if you pay

It’s funny how much of a joke the German car brands have become.

VW shoving touch controls down our throats, BMW selling their cars after they’ve been already sold, Audi and Mercedes sticking fake exhausts on their $70k cars, and all of them just desperately catering to the Chinese market while simultaneously not getting EVs…

Not to mention that in the wake of VW being caught red-handed with fraudulent software to evade emission regulations, BMW had to quickly get their (very similar) hack out there. Which, of course, was done so incredibly poorly that nowadays, several types of modern BMWs are liable to just explode into a fireball. Seemingly out of nowhere.

At least when they do explode they don’t then also trap the occupants like Teslas do but still, plenty of stories of bmws in Europe just bursting into flames.

To be fair, the Germans weren’t the only ones cheating emissions tests. As far as I’ve heard, Harley-Davidson used special tunes on their bikes to pass emissions testing. Never heard of BMWs just randomly bursting into flames, though, gotta look into that.

I don’t know about US car makers, but I can imagine them having done similar stuff

Don’t doubt it for a second, absolutely. There’s a reason why BMW scrambling to fix their own little trick. VW just got caught doing it

Never heard of BMWs just randomly bursting into flames, though, gotta look into that.

The have been blowing up for over a decade. This is just the latest recall.

ctvnews.ca/…/bmw-recalls-26000-more-vehicles-over…

It’s a meme it’s so frequent.

Embarrassing for BMW.

Not as embarrassing as subscriptions to use hardware you paid for.

LMAO. LMAOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. AAAAH FUCKCARS is gonna have a fun time with this one gang. Aaah shit man.

Best advertisement for chinese cars. Not that they needed one…

Maybe now people will stop thinking they’re a premium brand.

Fuck capitalism and all of the sneaky and invasive ways they try to sell you shit. Advertising is now like a cancer that interferes with simply living a life.

Has anyone actually seen these ads in the BMW, as described?

This article seems fishy to me. Especially this part:

The ad has been available in more than 70 markets since July 27, 2026, scheduled to run through August 10, 2026, on any suitably equipped BMW running Operating System 7, 8, 8.5, 9, or OS X built after July 2020.

“System 7, 8, 8.5, 9, or OS X” are exact versions of MacOS, dating back to 1991. Why would BMW’s software versioning match Apple’s exactly? I mean it could be a coincidence, but it’s weird. Especially “OS X.”

Not that I’d put it past any car manufacturer to do this, capitalism gonna capitalize. But I thought the EU was more obnoxious about controlling/preventing things like this. Or does BMW get a pass since they’re a European brand?

I went to the first source of the article that is mentioned

…bmwgroup.com/…/bmw-brings-modern-mobility-to-the…

So what this means BMW is partnering with Disney for spiderman.

As far as I understand it the spiderman animation is not presented in a disturbing way and rather something one can access when they want to.

So yes it is an ad but also not yet intrusive advertisement that disturbs the usage.

Yeah I should have clicked through to the source article. Good call.

My theory on the System / OS numbers being suspect was nothing. Just a coincidence. I should’ve known.

The article does seem to be rage bait though. Or at least its enraging to those who didn’t read the article thoroughly. It’s not as if the driver is being pestered with ads. An unobtrusive banner on one screen that is only visible when the vehicle starts up is hardly a “full screen ad” being forced on drivers.

I’m sorry, but to me, a banner ad across my car’s screen is far too much. There should be zero ads from my car manufacturer in my car.Full stop. This is probably going to be the start of more ads creeping into the car.

BMW tried the heated seat subscription service. I wouldn’t be surprised if they offer the ad free infotainment service in the next 5 years.

This is what happened in mine (i think is system 7). A notification popped up (the same type you get for the xmas and halloween type of videos). You can choose to ignore it, or click on it and watch the video.

BMW iDrive has versions 1 to 9, and now the newest really is OS X.

Yeah I read that now too. I just thought that it was weird that they went from “System 7…” up to “OS X” just like Apple did. But it’s just very plausible coincidence.

“Death” in mandarin is “Si”. “4” is also “si”, so it is considered a very unlucky number and nobody wants it in their phone number and other stuff.
“10” is “shi” which is close enough to “Si” that many people don’t like it and will avoid it.

Number based gotta be one of my favorite superstition flavors.

I’m not superstitious. But I am a little stitious.

So I have now seen it . It did not pop up, I had to go into apps and find the spider man app and click on it.

Pretty stupid waste of time, but not on startup or anything.

One of the article’s sources has a link to this Reddit thread (view it on RedLib), which has someone recording the ad. The article also uses official BMW websites as sources.

P.S. that was a very boring ad

Thanks, a reply in that thread:

This just showed up and no way to avoid it?

OP:

No, I got the option whether I wanted to view it when starting the car. And it’s added as an app in case you want to view it later.

The advertisement is added as a whole app to watch later??

Don’t talk shit about total, bro they see this

Bro, it just ain’t capitalism that’s gunna capitalize. Every first grader learning about capital letters, bro. They know that shit. Ms Barry didn’t teach me shit. She got guano for brains. That’s what my dad taught me. He got five on the inside so racks don’t crack within you, like Captain Kong Country Club shit you see that it wrote that for me. That’s a clue. It’s siphoning me. Can’t see. Gone back to tuna. Fuck . Its deli eating. Firgot. The shake of quake hungrasn. Go god go

trashy cars pretending to be a luxury brand

Well, they’re BMW drivers, so I don’t feel too bad for them.

Disturbing trend, though.

No, a disturbing trend is when I can buy life-sized furbies that get sexually aroused by scaring the shit out of you at 2:30 in the morning for no fucking reason. The damn dime-pitched fuzzy whore on my night stand would be erect as I am when I browsing footfuckery on all the sexually inclined sites (I’m referring to foot and foot job related pornography for those teliated in the meendrüsant, as we all call it in the burnout bunker FUCK WAS THAT A MOTH THE MORHS ARE BACK THE MORHES ARE BACK FUCK ASS TOTS GODAM FI FE T D NO

The fuck?

I’m not exactly sure, but now i’m thinking it would sell as an etsy t-shirt.

Do eet

It’s just as God intended. Do you enjoy learning about the true nature of reality? I am my own independent spiritual advisor and totally not the leader of a cult. Can I teach you about phenomequalitesselation, as our lord and savior, Jesus Christ ejaculated on the witness stand?

My favorite part is actually “life-sized Furbies”, implying regular Furbies are only a facsimile of something natural which exists out there, somewhere, lurking…

I love you please bear my children

Bro you have no idea how hard I’ve been trying to get pregnant. Everyone fucks my ass, but no butt babby yet.

There’s something about watching a luxury import brand fast-track enshitification faster than everyone else, including economy options.

BMW’s are pretty fast :P /s

Yeah this is one thing enshittification apologists never seem to understand, they’ll claim ‘well if you don’t like ads just pay for the non-ad version, I want cheaper prices’ but the reality is no matter how much you pay there’s a mandatory side dish of enshittification.

Well we need to ban that

BMW drivers deserve this as punishment for all the missed turn signals

BMW got turn signels? When did that happen?

Found the BMW driver

Hah! No! I generally drive a 16 year old Jeep Patriot and a 15 year old Dodge Hemi when I need to pull my 24,000lbs tandem trailer.

It’s an add-on you pay for. Or now you can also watch an ad per use.

I don’t think BMW drivers ever paid for that add-on.

This is not their fault. Blinker fluid is so hard to find now, with the AI boom using it in their water cooling rigs, that the BMW owners simply can’t find any

Is that a US only thing?

It says 70 different markets.

I wonder what happens when the people figure out that fuses control ¾ of everything.

I had the same question when it comes to electronic license plates. Couldnt you install a switch that just shuts your entire license plate off at will? Seems ideal for shady shit

I was thinking more for being a permanent advertisement removal option.

Step 1 Get in an accident

Step 2 Claim the last ad you saw on your screen had you upset and extremely distracted.

Step 3 ???/profit?