logoalt Hacker News

maxdoyesterday at 10:49 PM7 repliesview on HN

that's a symptom of a bigger problem.

Someone in auto industry decided that plugging device, and dependency on core functionality of the car to 3rd party device, that might be lost, have battery died, used for something else, etc is a good way to save money and not do proper software. It's even more bizare now, mid 2026, when software is solved with AI.

It's good that there are some companies, that ban android/apple car since that's an ugly experience for the user.


Replies

JoshTriplettyesterday at 10:54 PM

> Someone in auto industry decided that plugging device, and dependency on core functionality of the car to 3rd party device, that might be lost, have battery died, used for something else, etc is a good way to save money and not do proper software.

On the contrary, having cars stop trying to provide a bespoke more-proprietary outdated piece of software you have less control over, probably have surreptitious telemetry reporting back from, and might have to pay a subscription fee for, and instead just delegate to the smartphone you already have, is a huge and surprising win.

> It's good that there are some companies, that ban android/apple car since that's an ugly experience for the user.

It's a terrible user-hostile loss when cars do that, typically because they want to maintain more control or try to extract more revenue from the user.

If you don't want to use it, don't use it; there's nothing forcing you to do so.

show 2 replies
Telaneoyesterday at 11:04 PM

Given that the (user-facing) software that comes with the car is always broken (modulo Tesla and a few other modern exceptions), it's no wonder people want to replace that software with literally anything else that actually works.

This isn't the auto industry deciding that you need to use your phone. On the contrary, GM and others tried hard to push back on Carplay and AA. This is the buyers telling the auto makers that they want Carplay and AA since they know that that actually works, and they know that the software the car actually comes with will be garbage, or at the very least unfamiliar and not really worth dealing with when you can hook up your phone and let that actually solve the problems the user wants to be solved.

It's insane to me that anyone could be of the opinion that it's good that some automakers ban/don't implement Carplay and AA. It's just taking away user choice. It's hard to believe anyone could have this opinion without either never having driven a modern car, or just being an industry plan.

show 1 reply
afavouryesterday at 10:56 PM

> It's good that there are some companies, that ban android/apple car since that's an ugly experience for the user.

Absolutely nonsensical. Both Android Auto and Apple CarPlay are better experiences than any first party car interface I’ve experienced.

In many ways the auto industry stumbled when they allowed this connectivity, just like phone networks stumbled when they let Apple dictate the iPhone from top to bottom. Good news is those stumbles worked out great for users. We get iPhones without bundled crapware apps and we get cars that don’t require monthly subscriptions for basic functionality your phone provides.

janalsncmyesterday at 11:03 PM

> software is solved with AI

Presumably every car manufacturer can use AI. Yet there are still bugs. If all bugs are solved with AI, and therefore every car manufacturer with access to AI writes bug-free software, the only remaining conclusion is that some car manufacturers don’t have AI yet.

show 1 reply
parineumyesterday at 10:55 PM

> It's even more bizare now, mid 2026, when software is solved with AI.

Why doesn't op simply ask AI to write software to fix his problem?

show 1 reply
Our_Benefactorsyesterday at 11:38 PM

> It's good that there are some companies, that ban android/apple car since that's an ugly experience for the user

Hello, Elon

Seriously this is so wrong. I love being able to carry all my preferences from my phone directly to the car without any additional configuration. Before this, we had to do stupid stuff like entering individual contacts in the cars system.

dmitrygryesterday at 10:57 PM

[flagged]