Nothing quite says “high-performance muscle car” like a popup ad for a Mopar Extended Warranty covering your whole center console. That’s right, Dodge Charger owners are now experiencing an exciting new feature: pop-up ads that appear every time the vehicle stops at a light. This absolute garbage feature was spotted in the wild, take a look here.
Brand new 2024 vehicle: I disabled all connectivity. No software updates, no remote start through their app, nothing; it will never connect to the internet. These greedy car and ad companies have lost the benefit of the doubt. Literally no amount of money will ever be enough for these giant corporations…
It must be annoying to remove their mobile antennas though? It seems like most new cars have built-in connectivity.
To be completely honest, I haven’t gone that extreme yet. I know where the antenna is and could disconnect it fairly easily, but for this particular model it doesn’t seem necessary. I’ve disabled all wireless connectivity (similar to airplane mode) and so far it persists through battery changes. No nags after the first one and no attempts to connect or re-enable wireless functionality, but I’m keeping an eye on it…
Any particular trick? Pulling a fuse or antenna or just declining requests to go online?
The latter, disabling all connectivity, even emergency, etc. I’m watching it closely, but it hasn’t re-enabled.
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I believe you need to actively turn on internet through Bluetooth, at least on android phones.
Correct, Bluetooth pairing and Bluetooth tethering are two separate functions. First is for playback, second for internet sharing.
I chose the right decade to give up driving.
I chose the right decade to get a car without any options whatsoever
We were rocking an 08 Mazda without even power windows up until a few years ago. Even that is too much these days. I’m happier on buses and trains.
My 2007 just clicked over to 271K miles and I’m going to keep it running as long as possible. It has all normal bells and whistles of a limited version, but was built before all this madness began. It’s a CAR.
Hey so I’m getting this thing on my new Charger, I think it’s a check engine light?
I think I know who’s responsible.
I laughed pretty hard, thanks for that
I’d quit my job and start running the campaign for anyone who’s willing to run on outlawing this shit. I’d work 75 hour weeks handing out fliers about distracted driving.
If you’ve bought any Stellantis Fiat Chrysler Dodge Jeep etc. product in the last 20 years then you deserve this. Absolute junk.
I bought a Pacifica plug in hybrid because I wanted electric and needed a minivan for my 3 kids. Worst decision ever.
My 2006 dodge says I do not deserve this.
Did you know John Deere tractors have a dedicated piracy scene? Because the tractors require authorized technicians to service them and doesn’t allow farmers to service them themselves, spoofed firmware has appeared and is fairly frequently used to bypass this.
My point is, if you can jailbreak a tractor you can jailbreak a car. Just a matter of time.
Encrypted ECM? Build a new foss one and sell them online, you’ll make bank.
Hell yes I do.
When that old antipiracy ad was like “you wouldn’t download a car,” turns out they were vastly overestimating your average American tractor owner or car driver’s respect for the corporate arcology.
Arcology: architectural ecology, a city intended to be contained in a single structure.
Thanks boss, I used the word and I’m like “I’m maybe 10% sure this is a word and most that confidence is coming from SimCity 2000” but then I went full send, I might not be the best journalist.
You know, I meant the corporate hierarchy. They’re increasingly living in Spacex company towns or other arcologies and such. The gated communities, whatever the corpo version of the Ivory Tower is. In a word, that one building from SimCity 2000.
If this happened to me and assuming I had physical knobs/buttons for AC, etc, and those wouldn’t be affected, I would take a hammer to it, mount an iPad Mini or something for GPS, and just listen to music/podcasts/audiobooks on my phone via a Bluetooth speaker.
I already have bad road rage (I’m not proud of this & am actively working on it) and this would send me over the edge.
Good on you for working on yourself.
I can only respect that. Dodge ought to be afraid of you.
Pretty much everyone asked for this with their actions and choices as consumers. Lucky us, we can still choose not to buy a Dodge Charger or a Swasticar.
It’s def gonna spread tho. This is just one model one make. For now. In 2, 5, 10 years? CP77 without any of the fun shit.
Unless everybody now says “I’ll never buy anything from dodge”. If it doesn’t impact sales it really will become the new norm.
You’d really need to boycott anything made by the Stellantis group, which includes
- Abarth
- Alfa Romeo
- Chrysler
- Citroen
- Dodge
- DS
- Fiat
- Jeep
- Lancia
- Maserati
- Opel
- Peugot
- RAM Trucks
- Vauxhall
Because the exact same thing was reported by Jeep drivers a few weeks ago. Maybe the behavior stays contained to just the American brands under the Stellantis umbrella, but better to be safe than sorry.
I have a Kia, likely going Toyota or Honda when it’s time. So help me if they do this shit…
This
Lancia
Sad to see that name here, but they’re nothing like they were in the Group B days. At least my ultimate dream car will never have ads, even if I’ll never be able to afford the car itself 🥲
Lancia is as good as dead. They only make (made?) one car, and only in the Italian market, and it was a slightly larger Fiat 500. Stellantis is struggling enough with the brands that are still making cars. I’d be shocked if Lancia comes back.
Stop buying new cars until they remove this bullshit. We can go 40 years with existing cars without buying a single new one.
The cost of used cars isn’t much better assuming you don’t want a piece of crap. After almost being killed by 2 used cars I’d prefer to not risk it anymore.
I was very lucky in that I can repair most cars. It’s a lot harder now. Before I had a real job, all my vehicles cost less than 3k. If you learn what to look for and to stay safe (brakes, tires) you shouldn’t really be in danger with a used car. Now in an accident, some ass in a 30 foot tall dodge truck will kill you, but that’s kind of unavoidable even if you’re on the sidewalk
Subaru has great safety ratings and the “used Subaru tax” (as in, a used Subaru tends to be more expensive) is because they are very good cars. They have some of the best safety ratings on the market.
Skill issue. Used cars are dangerous if maintenance is neglected.
I have a Renault master from 2016. I’m pretty sure I can squeeze another 50 years out of this diesel bitch with adequate maintenance and care. Plus my other car is an e-bike.
Excited to see what cool things people can do with a jailbroken car.
Starting price is now $58,000.
They ditched selling the accessible models for the luxury market and they do the most cheap and trashy thing possible.
It’s incredible how stupid millionaire CEOs can be.
It does appear… pretty bootleg.
Starting price on a new Dodge Charger is $61,590, get on that inflation train, boss!
What? That’s about double the price of a Camry which is probably a better car all around
It seems like every US brand under Stellantis has completely lost their minds.
Jeep has become all around terrible while becoming more expensive at the same time and it looks like the same thing is happening to Dodge.
Why? Well, probably because Dodge badly needs the money. The brand’s U.S. sales plummeted 29% in 2024
This’ll help sales, I’m sure.
Capitalism is an ouroborus
They’re solid vehicles. My 08 caliber died last year with nearly 300k miles. Their interiors are just so old looking. I had an 97 Contour that doesn’t look much different than their current interiors.
Stellantis looking at all that blank ad space on your infotainment console: “It’s free real estate!”
Should we make better cars that don’t have the interior of 2002? No. Better add ads!
The american dream right here.
It’s why american cars suck. Nobody buys dodge overseas.
You have to be stupid enough to buy something just to support your ruling class in order to buy american cars.
I saw my first one the other day (outside of America).
The guy clearly is an American living here. It’s hard to put into words just how out of place it all looked, it’s like you picked up a palm tree, cocunuts and all, and plopped it down in the middle of Antarctica.
They picked some good frogs to test this on
Any minute now one of those brave-browser idiots will be along to tell us all how great ads are because they can make us aware of products that we had not yet discovered or remind us of products we didn’t know were near by.
What does this have to do with brave-browser users?
Brave derives revenue from advertising.
Brave devotees are the only people I’ve ever seen defending advertising as a user friendly revenue model.
I had no idea lol I use brave just to avoid ads which is why I’m confused.
Brave is a series scam company.
Brave is involved in a crypto scam and is backed by conservative evil fuck Peter thiel
Thanks for the heads up.
I’d suggest you change to Firefox, but they have made some… troubling changes to their privacy policy recently, so it may be a good idea to use a debranded port of it instead.
Afaik that’s mostly FUD and was debunked.
I’m still not happy with Mozilla throwing money down the AI toilet.
you have 48 hours to uninstall brave or you will be thoroughly cancelled.
on lemmy, using the browser you are currently using is tantamount to getting a maga tattoo
you may delay the cancellation by 24 hours by promoting your affinity for linux installs, or swearing that you will switch to a non USA produced kind of ketchup
also, no nicole for you until you reform from your evil ways
Downvoters don’t get the joke!
I’ve noticed brave users are some of the biggest useful idiots on the internet.
I genuinely think there are 2 classes of brave users: people who are invested in the company trying to viral market it, and the morons who fall for it.
I use it on my mobile devices to avoid youtube ads. Because i’ve yet to find a better way to avoid them on a tablet or phone.
If you have a better option for iphone/ipad, i’m willing to try it.
What about users who don’t use it for the crypto stuff, vpn or any other shady features? I just use it to browse without ads. What’s the downside?
I think many people don’t like it conceptually because the advertising for Brave is:
Built in Privacy + Crypto + Ad Blocking
Firefox + uBlock Origin suffices well enough for most people. It’s stable, suits the purpose, and separates them from a company entangled with crypto.
Everyone is just trying to do their best to balance convenience with the social impacts of their actions. People make change because they care, either altruistically or personally, but it always comes with some sort of personal cost. Putting your neck out there and trying to make a change is more important than any specific browser choice
