alt Hacker NewsHow involved is the software in the car, any while driving features? I'd be a little bit afraid of getting in that car even with the best efforts of the community, maybe it's not really for driving, i'd be even more nervous to get in a car with no updates, but still.
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A few days back, the breaks of my car suddenly stopped working. By stopped-working I mean they just got jammed. No matter how much I press, they just wouldn't budge. The reason: my car had abruptly turned-off by itself, jamming the breaks with it. HOW TF are breaks NOT connected directly to the tyres? Why the tf they have to be software controlled? This is the "critical" path, and SHOULD be 100% under driver's control, at all times.
And then just 3 days back, the same thing happened with steering wheel while I was reversing the car. But this time, the car hadn't even turned-off... the wheel just got jammed. Restarted the card, and it worked. What the absolute fck man!! What tf!
Electronics and the corresponding software should stay 100% out of all critical paths inside of the car. Sure if it "helps", it's fine, but, that should NOT turn into such outcomes.
I remember watching a youtube video where the one guy who has become The Fisker Whisperer said that screwing up an update will total the vehicle because several of the control modules just can't be had anywhere, at least until another ends up in a junkyard.
There is literally nothing about any Fisker automobile that makes it worth all this effort. But a handful of rich boomer tech execs think there's nothing else in the world that could possibly meet their expectations for a hybrid or electric vehicle, have more wealth than they know what to do with, and so here we are.
Saabs are much the same way. Some nonsense about a completely overengineered security system in the newer vehicles that makes losing a key a "well, now you're fucked" event, I believe?
More than anything I am nervous about having a car running priority code that can have mandatory updates pushed at any time that change the cars behavior -- not just throttle response and adjusting the emissions here, they could be updating thresholds for when the auto-pilot cancels and return to manual control, what level of cruise the car defaults to (GM BlueCruise IMO is terrible about this, it cancels hands free mode often, without any auditory alert) and so on.
Give me a car without internet uplink any day!