You know where this leads to? Unrepairable devices.

Afaik you can not change a BMW headlight yourself, because it has a little chip inside to identify the part. If your car electronics does not find the headlight serial number it's looking for, that headlight won't work at all.

So you'll have to go to a BMW dealership (or licensed repair shop) and they have to reprogram the car to accept the new headlight.

Does that really stop thieves? Probably not. Does it hurt end users who want to work for themselves on their cars (or anything alike)? Yes, for sure.

Activation lock on a BMW is something totally different from a serialized headlight. Now that I think of it, most cars already have a system like this, where they wont start if the original key is not present.

I don’t come to the same conclusions you do.

I’m ok with things being useless if they are stolen.

That has nothing to do with repair status.

If something is stolen, I think it’s fine for it to be a brick.

If you find my old laptop when I’m gone, I’m fine for it to be a brick.

If I want to sell it, I can unlock it.