Steph Willems wrote an article for The Truth About Cars titled Annoyment Optional: BMW Envisions a Future of Temporary Features. « Normally bundled into packages, these options — heated seats, adaptive cruise, automatic high beams and the like — could become something a buyer would pay for until they don’t feel like paying anymore. This, while making payments on the car itself. »
« Paying more for a feature your car already has? And who’s to say the cost of that feature isn’t already baked into the vehicle’s sticker price? That’s bound to rub many the wrong way. »
« For an automaker, it streamlines the production process. Outfit all build configurations with much of the same software and hardware (thank you, economies of scale), then rake in extra money after the fact by having buyers pay to unlock certain features. It’s positively Tesla-like in its brilliance/sleaziness, though the possibility of offending loyal buyers is very real. »
This reminds me of the phrase “mass customization” which I first encountered in the book The Experience Economy.
Articles of Interest 