I think they’re a great idea, but how are they different from your standard car purchases?
All you can do at Car Meets is just look at a bunch of cars and decide which ones you want to purchase.
Maybe I’m missing something here; what else can you do in these Car Meets?
Check your achievements 
I agree they are useless.
Useless? Naw. Really my only gripe with car meets is that it takes SO LONG for the meet to populate with actual players cars and not just drivatars. And even then you’re not sure if you’re in a meet with real people or just pre-downloaded avatars =/
Kinda killed the novelty for me.
Exactly… so they are kind of pointless then.
Just a fancy car purchase screen.
You can also begin online road trips from car meets or challenge racers to a showdown event (a one event race).
Think of the car meet as a lobby where you can get together before starting events. Then think of online road trip as the quick race option.
Oh I see, now that makes sense.
So I need to be online to access features of car meets. Do I need Xlive Gold for the showdown events and online road trips? Me thinks I do…
Yes indeedy! Worth it, if you ask me.
Showdowns!
never lost a showdown in a 300SL
Ooh ooh ohh, want to have a race?
If you lose ppi maybe it will drag me out of retirement