By J.A. Ackley
Jan 5, 2023
What makes cars (and, perhaps, people) today different than those in the past? That’s the question this video from BMW attempts to address.
It stars Arnold Schwarzenegger and the BMW i Vision Dee, “the first BMW with a digital soul.” The video also features cameos from David Hasselhoff, KITT from Knight Rider and, of course, an old-school BMW.
1/5/23 1:36 p.m.
I sure don't love current BMWs now.
1/5/23 2:06 p.m.
Not if they look like that.
1/5/23 2:11 p.m.
I mean, I already talk to my car, so why not give it the ability to talk back to me?
1/5/23 2:37 p.m.
We agree on that Duke.
1/5/23 2:38 p.m.
A car with AR windows and an AI chatbot... So BMW is still focused on marketing to people who live in their own world and don't have friends?
While the simple interior and exterior styling is admittedly somewhat refreshing, the implementation still just seems like next-gen soullessness to me. If they want me to think this of this technology as having any kind of 'digital soul' it should have a real type of personality to it: Be feisty and temperamental with me if I'm neglecting it or having not enough (or too much) fun with it, be the devil on my shoulder whispering encouragement in my ear and rewarding my driving enthusiasm, my autox/track instructor providing feedback to where I can push harder and where I should back off, and my commuter co-pilot helping with things like planning lane changes and spotting/timing gaps or finding short cuts to 'beat' the rush hour traffic patterns.
1/5/23 3:37 p.m.
Well, they sure as hell aren't focused on building "the Ultimate Driving Machine" any more.
1/5/23 3:46 p.m.
The message of this commercial seems to be "We used to build awesome cars, but I guess we're doing whatever this is now, so let's just go with it."
Still, I watched the whole thing. It just seemed weird as a narrative that Arnie started out talking about the emotional connection of the past, the robot BMW lady started off talking about the technological connection to the future, and neither of them ever really had a journey into understanding the other one's point of view. Maybe the sequel will explore that.
1/5/23 4:57 p.m.
In reply to J.A. Ackley :
This thread isn't complete 'til someone points out it was an E21, not an E30.
(Unless you're talking about a different cameo further along)
I made it a couple minutes in, but that's all they got before I started feeling well into the "that's time I'm never getting back" phase, though I can see why it was worth posting. I guess this is BMW trying to figure... BMW's marketing department trying to... I dunno. Maybe there are the seeds of realizing that they've disconnected from some of the attributes that created the cachet BMW trades on. Or maybe it's just trying to hang onto the buyers who know or care about that era for one more cycle.
1/5/23 6:10 p.m.
Do you love your phone? Do you love your smart, wifi connected, bluetooth enabled, LED screened refrigerator? Do you wake up in the morning just wishing that your car had the personality of your late model LG washing machine? If you answered yes, you will love your future transportation appliance as much as you love all your other appliances, when they're not down for updates or making you late for work so you can review ToS before changing your passwords.
1/5/23 6:50 p.m.
The car is fine. But Jesus Christ, what the hell is the rest of it?
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