They move the seam but kept the passive seal.

Mercedes over the years moved the ML door seams from the roof (see below on our 2002 ML500):

And redesigned the seams to the sides (see below, 2006 model). They also recessed the doors slightly into the body shell, obviously hoping that would help with the water problem.

Side shot of 2006 ML500 - driver's side doors.

But they retained the rubber passive seal as the water barrier, rather than eliminating the presence of water in the door sills in the first place. Also, the rubber seal does not run the entirety of the door: on our 2002 there's a visible gap on the top of all 5 doors where water is let in. On the 2006, same story. This is just plain old incompetent engineering. You need to have respect for water: it's an amazing substance. And it does not belong in your car -- it should be kept outside the vehicle.

So, Mercedes creates the ML design -- a utility vehicle, for god's sake, for outdoor use -- that rusts from the inside out, recognize they have a problem. Instead of fixing the inherent design flaw, they try moving the seams around to make sure less water gets in. Brilliant.

Somewhere in some Mercedes conference room, after they finished high-five-ing each other over how awesome they each were in just being execs in the room, this executive group agreed that just making the Mercedes-Benz ML rust slower was an acceptable solution to their customer's predicament of buying and now owning shoddy, rusting out 7,000 lbs tanks. The real predicament here, Mercedes, is that we trusted you to live up to your reputation.