• 11 Posts
  • 150 Comments
Joined 6 months ago
cake
Cake day: June 11th, 2025

help-circle





  • That is not a good comparison because people don’t buy the car expecting the seats to have the warming feature. It probably is even offered as an option that the customer rejected upon purchase.

    When I download software and pay for the basic tier it has the pro features built in anyhow. I can pay to unlock those pro features but I don’t expect to use those features already just because I already have them.

    If I go to the football and the crowd is small enough to fit in the grandstand but only those who explicitly paid for it are allowed into the grandstand I don’t complain about my entitlement.









  • Of course you can do business that way. If the heating costs $x, and half the customers pay for it but $5x is charged then that is a profit.

    The alternative would be to make two sets of cars (with and without heating). Or four sets of cars if another similar optional feature is shipped like this. Or 8 permutations if there are three features etc

    It can certainly be cheaper to install them by default even if not all customers pay to enable them. ie it is mathematically possible that their system is cheapest for both the manufacturer and the consumer. The alternative would be no different for us cold-bummed drivers but possibly more expensive for the toasted-tush drivers.



  • OK I accept the analogies are not good equivalents.

    It is not necessarily true that everyone has already paid for the seat warmer hardware. The car may cost the same as if it didn’t have the hardware installed. Certainly the owners were happy enough with the car price to buy it without seat warming option.

    The manufacturer may find it cheaper to just install it for everyone and wear the cost in the hope that enough people will pay for the warmer to be enabled.

    Of course it is possible that everyone pays for the hardware anyhow but it is not necessarily the case.



  • I don’t have a solution but more transparency for starters. If I put money on the line I want to make sure the judge isn’t corrupt.

    “Publicity is the very soul of justice. It is the keenest spur to exertion, and the surest of all guards against improbity. It keeps the judge himself, while trying, under trial”

    — Jeremy Bentham, 1748-1832, English Jurist & Philosopher.

    My friend just had a $100k decision against him and looking at a further $500k in legal fees for the other side while having paid $600 of his own fees.

    The judge lied in the published decision that my friend already pleaded guilty to a crime from a recent previous hearing and was convicted. However the police had dropped the prosecution of that case because there was no evidence.

    Despite that obvious bias going into the decision I don’t know if any lawyer will appeal on that basis because of the career repercussions of calling out a judge.

    It would help if he could publish online the previous case which was dismissed but he would risk contempt of court for continuing to talk about the matter (a defamation case).

    There were plenty of other dodgy things like the other party committing perjury, being caught out lying yet the judge not caring.

    This other party is not “rich” but connected to powerful people.