GM Says It’s Ditching Apple CarPlay and Android Auto for Your Safety::undefined
“We are dropping carplay and android auto because mobile phones distract the driver”
But the dashboard looks like this
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Lmao. Shortly followed by their own systems that are subscription based.
I’m ditching ever considering them for a vehicle purchase for my own sanity.
Fucking OEM infotainment systems are bullshit and I will never buy a car ever again that doesn’t support CarPlay and Android Auto.
Tbh I was already no longer considering them. My previous car was GM and got junked before 10 years were up. Now I’m driving a Nissan still going strong (edit: on year 10 right now), haven’t even had any major problem yet (knock on wood). By year 7, the GM had a replacement engine, clutch and starter. And I was living with the fuel gauge not resetting to zero properly when it started so having no idea how much fuel was in the tank until the low fuel light came on.
This experience has been so much better that it will take a lot to get me to consider an American brand over a Japanese one.
One of many reasons I will never consider a new car. My old one has an aftermarket Android stereo that blows all the OEM ones out of the water, and it needs zero internet access. All I need is Spotify, AntennaPod and Magic Earth.
This is going to cripple them in the market. Removing features does nothing to make a vehicle more attractive to the average idiot. Maybe GM thinks they can get away with it because the demand for cars exceeds the supply right now, I don’t know.
They are going back to the days of a $100 proprietary hdmi cable and annual maps subscription with ads for your own safety
They see how much money Google and Apple are making selling your data and want a bigger cut so they need to make it so they’re the only source of data extraction then your data is more valuable.
This isn’t much different than smart TVs pushing their shitty outdated apps on you versus using something like a Roku or Firestick which is third party and updated regularly. This is a classic GM move of taking the exact wrong action on something and expecting great results. This is why they keep going bankrupt.
I have an older Roku tv. I recently got a nice roku streambar and hooked it up to the older Roku tv.
The tv displayed a popup with a message along the lines of “Oh hey, we see you connected a newer Roku device. No worries. Well just use it instead of the older built in one and you’ll never know the difference.”
More of this please.
As they mention in the article, tesla and rivian are doing quite well and both have opted not to integrate with phone mirroring options. So it’s a gamble, but they may think they can get away with it. Like you say, the high demand may be giving them the confidence to try.
Tesla and Rivian are both newer electric-only manufacturers, though (unless there’s something I don’t know about Rivian). Their market is quite different from stodgy old GM’s.
And their software integrated into their cars is much better and receives OTAs (as a Rivian owner). However also as a Rivian owner: I’d prefer car play/AA.
They’re probably still marketing to boomers, maybe an ok play in the short term, but that target audience is probably not going to prop them up forever
Yes, let’s trust a corporate that’s doing things for our safety out of the kindness of their heart.
Like Google
Yes but also Google provided useful software and services in exchange for your data and OEMs give you nothing but a shit infotainment system.
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it doesnt really matter why they do it as long as it increases security imho
maybe they do it to sell more cars because their cars are deemed safer than competitors? so what? less people dying and getting injured is a good thing
There’s no way a real human being older than 12 actually believes the things you just typed.
The mental gymnastics to attribute phone projection vs some in house app to deaths is crazy. The only thing this will protect is their own bottom line
This feels like something a C-suite came up with to carve out extra profit and had some bean counters crunch the numbers on, fluffed them up a bit and then had the company roll with it on his idea.
I’m usually disappointed by consumer apathy, but from everyone I talk to who has a car with a screen, if they have CarPlay/Android Auto they couldn’t do without it, and if they don’t have it it’s the biggest thing they wish they had.
Fwiw there are aftermarket options do add it through USB.
The hardware would have to support video input via USB though. I think if we’re talking about car electronics, more than likely those addons use wired Android Auto and are really meant for cars that don’t support it wirelessly.
Unless, of course, you’re talking about some aftermarket head units as well in which case all bets are off.
Currently, this a dealbreaker for me. As in I won’t buy a vehicle that does this, or charges me a subscription fee for a built in feature like heated seats.
There really needs to be a standardised open protocol rather than Android Auto and Apple CarPlay.
There’s no reason why I shouldn’t be able to use a non-Apple/Google app for my in-car infotainment. Apple and Google just want our data.
Let Android Auto and CarPlay be options in a competing market, rather than zero choice and just having to use whatever your phone provides.
There are aftermarket options to support screen mirroring over usb, so I think it is possible. Is anyone else putting in the work to compete with Google and Apple? I’ve been watching as Google ads integration to various cars - as an example they didn’t show turn by turn directions on the screen behind the steering wheel a while ago, and added it on Honda at some point. These features take investment, and perhaps the OSS options aren’t keeping up?
There needs to be a lot more to it than just screen monitoring, it needs to recognise touch inputs, high-fidelity, low-latency audio (both ways), and importantly the car needs to be able to send information back to the device (is the handbrake on, are the headlights on, etc). That requires integration from the carmaker.
Open source solutions at the moment cannot be used with in-car infotainment, because of that requirement that the car needs to send information to the device. I think there should be an open protocol for this that all cars implement.
the car needs to be able to send information back to the device (is the handbrake on, are the headlights on, etc).
I use Android Auto every single day, and I genuinely don’t know what you’re talking about. I also used it on rental vehicles for years when I was traveling for work, so it’s not that my current daily driver is just old. I have never seen information sent from the vehicle to my phone, and certainly never needed it.
Zooming out a bit, why would my vehicle need to send data to my phone? Even your examples (handbrake, headlights), are those actually necessary? Of course not.
I use android auto every day too, and it absolutely does those things.
When you turn your headlights on (I.e.when it’s dark) the android auto display goes from light mode (so you can see it even in blaring sunshine and wearing sunglasses) to dark mode (so it doesn’t blind you when it’s dark). It doesn’t do this via magic, it does it because the car sends that information to your phone.
Android auto also will not let you perform some functions while driving. It does this by detecting your handbrake. This is a legal requirement in many jurisdictions.
There’s also more minor things like the car telling the phone whether it’s RHD or LHD and altering the UI accordingly.
So respectfully, you are wrong. Not only is it useful, but it’s sometimes a legal requirement. And Android Auto already uses data sent by the car.
That’s why alternative solutions don’t exist.
Imagine if we had a functioning Congress that could respond to these (and other) new tech advances with real standards that move technology forward safely and responsibly.
What a world we could have.
I just want to buy a 90’s car without a stupid iPad bolted to the dashboard, an electronically actuated parking brake, or hundreds of worthless, permanently enabled nannies keeping me from doing what I want to with my own car and making repairs hundreds more expensive than they should be.
Imagine being able to buy a brand new 90s Corolla for 10k. That’d be nice
I recently saw a 94 corolla with like 2400 miles on it while car shopping online. I guess it just got bought, parked, and forgotten about. It was in spectacular condition.
It was also $26,000.
It was a Honda Accord iirc. Saw the same post…
I have a 2019 car, manual transmission, knobs and switches for climate and heated seats, and a touch screen for carplay. It’s the best.
I love the ones that pop up as soon as you start driving that say “keep your eyes on the road!” 🤦♂️
My 07 Accord is all old school. I installed a bt adapter and I’m happy as fuck.
I don’t want to even rent a car without CarPlay. Good luck with that GM.
there is a strong demographic of us which hate that shit. knobs and switches gang
CarPlay exists fine with knobs and switches. It’s just a solid integration for playing audio and having a solid GPS view with Apple Maps/Google Maps/Waze. It doesn’t inherently require giving up knobs and switches.
Some are better than others. You can control CarPlay without touching the screen in Mazdas for example.
Do do I, but those two things are not mutually exclusive
I don’t think you’re using the word “strong” correctly.
Anyway, all you have to do is just NOT plug your phone onto the car.
Knowing GM they will lobby to ban Apple CarPlay and Android Auto.
Tim Babbitt, GM’s head of product for infotainment, gave MT a better explanation at a press event for the new Chevrolet Blazer EV, the flagship vehicle in the no CarPlay or Android Auto strategy (and our 2023 MotorTrend SUV of the Year winner). According to him, there’s an important factor that didn’t make it into the fact sheet: safety. Specifically, he cited driver distraction caused by cell phone usage behind the wheel.
How exactly will this disincentivize phone use? Wouldn’t this encourage hands-on phone use instead of using a UI that limits interaction?
I feel like this is a solvable engineering problem.
Sounds more like an excuse to double down on their own “infotainment” development.
I thought ford had a garbage interface until I drove a gm. They’re about to officially be an old fart car only. No one below 40 will buy a car without apple or android interfaces.
I have a GM vehicle I like. I already don’t pay them for OnStar. I’m certainly not going to pay them to replace my phone. And then likely have to pay for cellular access for my car.
safety
Lol
They’re going to sell a self-developed product at some monthly premium, for sure.
The only safe solution is a proprietary GM solution.
