

Renault will remotely lock down electric cars - praptak
https://blogs.fsfe.org/gerloff/2013/10/31/renault-will-remotely-lock-down-electric-cars/

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NickM
I feel like this is a bit overblown. If I stop paying lease payments for my
car, it will get repossessed, and rightly so. If it's not my car, then I don't
have some special rights that say I should be able to do whatever I want with
it without paying the owner.

The "evil government" scenario is maybe a tiny bit more compelling, but really
if the government is trying to quash protests then I think we have bigger
problems. It doesn't matter whether you control your car if the government
controls the roadways. I'm picturing the following scenario:

Hacker: Haha! We have hacked around your evil non-free car software, thus
preventing you from locking down the battery charging system! Now we can all
drive to our protests again!

Evil Government: Okay, we'll put up a roadblock.

Hacker: ...oh.

~~~
masklinn
> If I stop paying lease payments for my car, it will get repossessed

That's a somewhat different situation. The Zoe is a $20000 car not a rental,
you do own the useless husk after your car has been remotely bricked because
you didn't renew your battery-license.

In fact "license" is really what it feels like, and the Oracle-kind. With the
Zoe it looks like your $20k don't actually buy a car they buy the right to a
license, then you pay a license (the battery rental) on top of that, and if
you don't pay for license renewal you end up with an expensive and
uncomfortable shed.

Plus you're beholden to Renault for both use of the car (battery contract,
which is per-driven-distance and does have overage costs) _and_ its sale (you
have to transfer the battery contract to the next owner).

But the license comes with free hours of support, yay! (free replacement of
the battery, and roadside assistance)

~~~
pkulak
Actually, it's $14,000. The Leaf, for example, is in the low 30s, which is
made by the same company and anyone is free to buy instead.

All you are doing is shifting the risk for the most costly and fragile part of
the car to the manufacturer. Everyone leases Leafs because no one wants to
shoulder the risk of a bad $12,000 battery, but then if you scratch a door
panel, you have to answer for that in two years. Financing $13,000 plus $100 a
month for a battery is probably about the same price per month as the average
lease.

~~~
Pxtl
That explains it. So the battery is the most expensive and fragile part of the
car and requires a lot of maintenance the owner doesn't want to deal with...
so the manufacturer says "we'll own and take care of the battery stuff, you
just own everything around the battery".

I see where they're coming from, but it's a very odd solution. Owning only
_part_ of a car is darned weird, and feels like a hackish workaround to the
problems of clumsy warranties and leases.

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LukeWalsh
This will be even scarier when there are no alternatives left, and the only
options will be physical objects that abuse personal data.

I think it will take true pioneers in other fields to extend the open source
movement beyond software. With rapid prototyping and manufacturing techniques
exploding, how much longer until I can submit a pull request for an open
source car?

~~~
kabdib
At the moment it's really difficult to print battery chemistry.

You probably need real nanotech to print a spring or other item that requires
complex metallurgy. I wonder about things like tires, or even seat covers.

So it'll be a while.

~~~
praxeologist
Maybe it isn't that far off:
[http://vimeo.com/51702339](http://vimeo.com/51702339)

"Imprint Energy aims to reshape the battery landscape. Currently available
battery technologies limit the pace of improvement in design and functionality
of portable electronic devices. Imprint Energy will address these shortcomings
with its breakthrough zinc-based rechargeable battery technology, Zinc Poly™.
Zinc Poly™ battery technology removes longstanding limitations on the
rechargeability of zinc-based batteries and enables the production of
ultrathin, flexible, high energy density rechargeable batteries for
significantly lower cost and without the design limitations or safety concerns
of other battery technologies."

I think they say the batteries can be printed on modified textile printing
equipment. I contacted them recently because I would love to use this tech if
it lives up to their claims. They wouldn't give me any sort of details like
how much energy is stored in one of the square inch patches they are showing
though.

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tomelders
My next car will be an electric car. My next car will not be a Renault.

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thinkpad20
Shouldn't the invisible hand take care of this? No one is forcing you to buy a
Renault.

~~~
rhizome
The invisible hand is not a law, but an article of faith.

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nodata
Non-SSL mirror: [http://blogs.fsfe.org.nyud.net/gerloff/2013/10/31/renault-
wi...](http://blogs.fsfe.org.nyud.net/gerloff/2013/10/31/renault-will-
remotely-lock-down-electric-cars/)

~~~
y0ghur7_xxx
Why would someone want a non-ssl version?

~~~
nodata
The nyud mirror doesn't work with ssl. The "Non-SSL" warns people of this.

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Hansi
I don't see this an issue from the rental point of view but considering the
average enterprise's ability to properly secure anything from hacking I'd
beconcerned about this being hacked so I wouldn't want one of these.

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hepek
I think the battery-on-lease makes sense, because (I've heard somewhere) they
are planning on swapping batteries instead of recharging them in their
official charging stations.

~~~
yabatopia
Unfortunately battery swapping is dead. It was an interesting concept, but
after the spectacular failure of their Israel based partner Better Place
Renault made it very clear that battery swapping is no longer a valid option.

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Mithaldu
I can't wait for the first car cracktros and all the neat tricks the scene
programmers will pull with car computers.

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gojomo
Not so different from Tesla's software-capped (and remote-unlockable-for-a-
fee) battery capacity:

[http://www.engadget.com/2013/04/01/tesla-model-s-
axes-40kwh-...](http://www.engadget.com/2013/04/01/tesla-model-s-axes-40kwh-
battery-option/)

