We shall see. Cars with better software are a really important differentiator. Toyotas may be reliable, they may be the most popular today, but then why doesn't everyone choose a Toyota?
And anyway, Toyota's most innovative and market-making vehicles, like the Prius: software plays a pretty big role no? I don't think you can reduce a complex product like this, but I'm not wrong: a car with great user-facing software is pretty exciting to consumers. The Apple Car would probably be pretty successful, the Tesla has pretty innovative software that differentiates it from other EVs, the deployment and preferences for Apple CarPlay and Android Auto enabled cars... it can be true that someone buys something despite the software being bad, but that's not where the trend is going.
A lot of Americans buy American cars simply because they're loyal to American brands, or European cars because they want their neighbors to be jealous of their ability to buy such overpriced transportation. I think software is low on the list.
People buy Teslas because they go fast, get 300 miles to a charge and have five star safety ratings. "Software" is thing main thing capable of rivaling build quality and repair costs as the thing people most complain about. They're leaving a major untapped market for competitors to fill with electric cars that have tactile HVAC controls etc.
There was a meme a while ago where thing thing people used to want out of their car's entertainment system was satellite navigation and fancy everything, whereas the thing people want now is a dumb standard plug to connect their phone to the car's speakers.
It's the customer-facing software that looks sub-par. There are hundreds of thousands of lines of embedded code in almost each ECU. Those cannot be crap in a prius without having an effect on the car's (the hardware) performance.
The software in my Skoda Scala and my Vauxhall/Opel Corsa is terrible as well, but like most new-ish Toyota's, all of them support Apple Play so it doesn't matter.
The Honda software is mediocre as well but I suspect any sensible automaker realizes that most consumers are using Car Play or Google Play so they put some junior engineers on a checklist item and call it a day.
People had paper maps and often precise directions that they had on their laps or a human navigator using those maps or directions. They stopped at gas stations to ask for directions (or didn't--guys refusing to stop to ask for directions was something of a trope). So obviously they managed but probably in ways a lot of people today wouldn't find satisfactory.
How did you manage before smartphones and even email/text for meeting people and generally coordinating activities generally? People managed.
Sure. You may just not have a navigation system or be able to park in some places. I don't need a smartphone to drive in general and don't always plug it in locally. (I may more or less need a transponder on some roads or have a bit of hassle.)
I guess that could change at some point but would guess that there would be a lot of pushback to Operating this vehicle requires a working smartphone especially given there's no cellular access in a lot of places.
And anyway, Toyota's most innovative and market-making vehicles, like the Prius: software plays a pretty big role no? I don't think you can reduce a complex product like this, but I'm not wrong: a car with great user-facing software is pretty exciting to consumers. The Apple Car would probably be pretty successful, the Tesla has pretty innovative software that differentiates it from other EVs, the deployment and preferences for Apple CarPlay and Android Auto enabled cars... it can be true that someone buys something despite the software being bad, but that's not where the trend is going.