[risenshinetech]

This entire article is clickbait.

- Headline "My new car has a mysterious and undocumented switch".

No, this is not a new car. This is a used car. Finding undocumented switches in a vehicle someone else owned is very common. People modify their cars all the time. Finding an undocumented switch in a new car would be wild.

- "And that’s how the search comes to an end. After a bit of perseverance I figured out what it is."

You literally took your car to a dealership, and the mechanic told you what it was. This ENTIRE ARTICLE boils down to this statement. You did the bare minimum to investigate what it was: took the panel off and confirmed that the wires went __somewhere__.

How does this get upvoted so heavily on Hacker News?

[soueuls]

Maybe because "My new car" does not imply that the car itself has never been used?

Just that it's YOUR new car.

[yard2010]

That's one thing I'm very curious about: is there a way in english to differentiate between "(my new) car" (a used car which is new to me) and "(my) new car" (a new car which is mine)?

[Sanchless]

Usually you'd say "brand new" to signal that it's from the factory. It is quite ambiguous otherwise.

[dmazin]

Damn, you're cranky. The original article was a good read.

[ctb_mg]

I have to say I agree fully and it's kind of disappointing how much chaff makes it to the HN front page. This is ostensibly an interesting article, but at second glance doesn't really hold up to any scrutiny as anything really novel... folks buying used cars for decades have been doing detective work on 3rd party aftermarket modifications that have been left in. Instead, show me a door chime that has been converted to Toto's Africa using an arduino or custom fab board with STM chip.