[Schwolop]

If I buy a car with airbags, I am buying the confidence that they are there to protect me. Indirectly I'm also buying the confidence to not need to check them before setting off.

In this instance, if I need to check the safety of my safety equipment before using it, that's a negative for me.

As a daily motorbike rider, I can definitively say that I will not be buying one of these because they have the capability to remotely disable the functionality. That's an absolute no-no for me.

[dahart]

I think that's fine to decide against purchase for that reason. All I'm saying is 1: you always have to check your safety equipment before using it, that's true with your motorcycle, and in this instance it's not some kind of crazy burden, it happens automatically as part of the device's functioning power-on, and it doesn't require you to do anything special that you wouldn't already have done. If you re-read your sentence about not wanting to check your safety before you ride, you might regret saying it that way, it doesn't sound very good. And 2: perhaps not your motorcycle, but your cars and phones and computers already have remote disable functionality.

[Schwolop]

I take your point, but maybe a more nuanced phrasing is that I don't want to check arduous parts of my safety equipment on every ride. For example, I might bend down and check that my brake pads are still OK before each ride, but I'm not going to unscrew the brake fluid reservoir to check for again or bleed the lines. I do accept that this airbag has a pretty straight-forward indicator that one would easily check before riding, and so it's fair enough to expect a user to check it each time.

However - no one can remotely disable my brakes over the air! So I can get to a position of not worrying about them much. In practice, I probably check the pads for wear every month or so. And that's good enough because I have an expectation that they're not going to change by themselves overnight.

With this airbag, the capability is there for someone to disable it without me noticing. I 100% agree they're not likely to do this intentionally. But it is under software control, as is the warning indicator, etc, etc. It's possible. And it's my life at stake.

Also, re #2 - my phones and computers aren't safety-critical, and no, my car does not have remote functionality. It's one reason I don't drive a car with over-the-air upgrade or CANBUS access functions. The safety benefits of more modern cars do not outweigh the added risks of turning them into internet-of-shit devices, for me.