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I think that's backwards. We had society first, then we had laws. Laws exist to serve society, not the other way around. When a law stops being useful to societ

by imgabe 11y ago

I think that's backwards. We had society first, then we had laws. Laws exist to serve society, not the other way around. When a law stops being useful to society, we get rid of it. There's absolutely no evidence to suggest that disregarding one law that's considered unjust implies someone is going to disregard ALL laws. Rosa Parks didn't immediately decide to start murdering and raping people after she sat in the front of the bus. Uber does not promote "fuck the law". They promote "fuck this one particular law that sucks for everybody except a few who benefit from it". Maybe we could have had a long, drawn out process where the taxi system was slowly dismantled over the course of several decades, but who benefits from that? Not the customers who are stuck paying for overpriced, inefficient taxi service. Not the many drivers who are able to get flexible part-time work.

TeMPOraL 11y ago
> We had society first, then we had laws. Laws exist to serve society, not the other way around. Laws are extensions of social customs that happen when society grows beyond a certain size (think few dozen - hundreds of people). The things Uber does break are against social customs as well. > When a law stops being useful to society, we get rid of it. Yes, but the way we usually do it is not by someone unilaterally deciding they don't like it and breaking it, while raising enough money to keep its enforcement at bay. > They promote "fuck this one particular law that sucks for everybody except a few who benefit from it". They break this particular law (and a set of others, like tax laws, insurance laws, etc., as well as ideas of being decent and not threatening people who disagree with you - ideas that are sort of important in a civilized society) because that's the area they're doing business in. But other companies enlightened by their example will be breaking other laws. Who knows, maybe next SV-backed startup decides to ignore FDA? Because who cares about those "clinical trials", they're only slowing progress down. And the next one after that will ignore biosafety. Would you like to live in that world? > Maybe we could have had a long, drawn out process where the taxi system was slowly dismantled over the course of several decades, but who benefits from that? Not the customers who are stuck paying for overpriced, inefficient taxi service. Not the many drivers who are able to get flexible part-time work. We had that in Europe before Uber, and it was going fine. As a customer, I benefited from local company that offered pay-for-distance drive-by-GPS service stirring up the taxi market. They had some legal battles, there was a law adjustment, and the local market improved (the company is still around, and I'm still their happy customer). Rinse and repeat. That's how you do the progress of civilization.
- imgabe 11y ago
  Uber doesn't get to unilaterally decide anything. Customers overwhelmingly decided that they prefer Uber to whatever benefits they had been receiving from the regulated taxi industry. If they hadn't, Uber would be out of business and we'd only have taxis. > maybe next SV-backed startup decides to ignore FDA? Because who cares about those "clinical trials", they're only slowing progress down. Maybe they will? If a company can reliably produce safe drugs without FDA trials, why wouldn't we want that? Right now we have expensive drugs that are very safe. Few people die because they got a drug that was manufactured incorrectly (presumably, I don't know the actual statistics), but many people die because they can never afford the drug in the first place. Maybe without the trials more people would die from bad drugs, but more would live because they'd have access to cures that were previously out of reach. I don't know, but it's a question worth asking. There's also the issue of the black market created by the high prices caused by FDA trials, where drugs are sold from shady online pharmacies and manufacture under who-knows-what conditions. Desperate people will take risks like that when they have no options. If you were poor and contracted some rare disease where the treatment costs $100,000, but only has a .0001% chance of complications, would you rather die because you can't afford it, or try a $100 treatment that has a 1% chance of complications? Right now you don't even get the choice. For whatever reason we've decided it's better for people to die because they're poor than for them to die because of a manufacturing / clinical problem with a drug. If that's what we all think, that's fine, but we should be aware we're making that choice. > As a customer, I benefited from local company that offered pay-for-distance drive-by-GPS service stirring up the taxi market. They had some legal battles, there was a law adjustment, and the local market improved The fact that they had "some legal battles" and the laws was changed, implies to me that they were also operating in defiance of the law at the beginning. How is that different from what Uber does? Besides, now you have the taxis, your preferred company, and Uber as options. With your recommended strategy of "everybody obey the taxi laws", you would only have the taxis. Aren't you better off this way?
  - TeMPOraL 11y ago
    > Uber doesn't get to unilaterally decide anything. Customers overwhelmingly decided that they prefer Uber to whatever benefits they had been receiving from the regulated taxi industry. If they hadn't, Uber would be out of business and we'd only have taxis. Customers don't know shit. They only see the cool, new, better taxi company. Ask around, most people don't realize Uber is operating illegally. Questions you ask about FDA and consequences of prolonged trials are important. They are being asked. But my point is, you don't want random companies operating in the light while ignoring medical safety laws - that will lead only to people getting seriously hurt. You always have an avenue of operating under the radar; the enforcement around drugs is not that strict, if you want to ignore safety there are tons of ways to get pretty much any chemical. Folks over at nootropics communities order various experimental chemicals from chem labs, and it's probably even mostly legal. But they know all the dangers and they take full responsibility over what happens. > The fact that they had "some legal battles" and the laws was changed, implies to me that they were also operating in defiance of the law at the beginning. How is that different from what Uber does? Besides, now you have the taxis, your preferred company, and Uber as options. With your recommended strategy of "everybody obey the taxi laws", you would only have the taxis. Aren't you better off this way? They didn't break the law. They found a loophole in the licensing process and exploited it. Taxi companies got angry, the issue went through the legal system and the law was adjusted in a way that took into account the innovation and increased efficiency, while also keeping the good parts of the existing system. Contrast that with Uber, which not just breaks the law, they're being blatant about it.

by imgabe 11y ago

TeMPOraL 11y ago

> We had society first, then we had laws. Laws exist to serve society, not the other way around. Laws are extensions of social customs that happen when society grows beyond a certain size (think few dozen - hundreds of people). The things Uber does break are against social customs as well. > When a law stops being useful to society, we get rid of it. Yes, but the way we usually do it is not by someone unilaterally deciding they don't like it and breaking it, while raising enough money to keep its enforcement at bay. > They promote "fuck this one particular law that sucks for everybody except a few who benefit from it". They break this particular law (and a set of others, like tax laws, insurance laws, etc., as well as ideas of being decent and not threatening people who disagree with you - ideas that are sort of important in a civilized society) because that's the area they're doing business in. But other companies enlightened by their example will be breaking other laws. Who knows, maybe next SV-backed startup decides to ignore FDA? Because who cares about those "clinical trials", they're only slowing progress down. And the next one after that will ignore biosafety. Would you like to live in that world? > Maybe we could have had a long, drawn out process where the taxi system was slowly dismantled over the course of several decades, but who benefits from that? Not the customers who are stuck paying for overpriced, inefficient taxi service. Not the many drivers who are able to get flexible part-time work. We had that in Europe before Uber, and it was going fine. As a customer, I benefited from local company that offered pay-for-distance drive-by-GPS service stirring up the taxi market. They had some legal battles, there was a law adjustment, and the local market improved (the company is still around, and I'm still their happy customer). Rinse and repeat. That's how you do the progress of civilization.

imgabe 11y ago
Uber doesn't get to unilaterally decide anything. Customers overwhelmingly decided that they prefer Uber to whatever benefits they had been receiving from the regulated taxi industry. If they hadn't, Uber would be out of business and we'd only have taxis. > maybe next SV-backed startup decides to ignore FDA? Because who cares about those "clinical trials", they're only slowing progress down. Maybe they will? If a company can reliably produce safe drugs without FDA trials, why wouldn't we want that? Right now we have expensive drugs that are very safe. Few people die because they got a drug that was manufactured incorrectly (presumably, I don't know the actual statistics), but many people die because they can never afford the drug in the first place. Maybe without the trials more people would die from bad drugs, but more would live because they'd have access to cures that were previously out of reach. I don't know, but it's a question worth asking. There's also the issue of the black market created by the high prices caused by FDA trials, where drugs are sold from shady online pharmacies and manufacture under who-knows-what conditions. Desperate people will take risks like that when they have no options. If you were poor and contracted some rare disease where the treatment costs $100,000, but only has a .0001% chance of complications, would you rather die because you can't afford it, or try a $100 treatment that has a 1% chance of complications? Right now you don't even get the choice. For whatever reason we've decided it's better for people to die because they're poor than for them to die because of a manufacturing / clinical problem with a drug. If that's what we all think, that's fine, but we should be aware we're making that choice. > As a customer, I benefited from local company that offered pay-for-distance drive-by-GPS service stirring up the taxi market. They had some legal battles, there was a law adjustment, and the local market improved The fact that they had "some legal battles" and the laws was changed, implies to me that they were also operating in defiance of the law at the beginning. How is that different from what Uber does? Besides, now you have the taxis, your preferred company, and Uber as options. With your recommended strategy of "everybody obey the taxi laws", you would only have the taxis. Aren't you better off this way?
- TeMPOraL 11y ago
  > Uber doesn't get to unilaterally decide anything. Customers overwhelmingly decided that they prefer Uber to whatever benefits they had been receiving from the regulated taxi industry. If they hadn't, Uber would be out of business and we'd only have taxis. Customers don't know shit. They only see the cool, new, better taxi company. Ask around, most people don't realize Uber is operating illegally. Questions you ask about FDA and consequences of prolonged trials are important. They are being asked. But my point is, you don't want random companies operating in the light while ignoring medical safety laws - that will lead only to people getting seriously hurt. You always have an avenue of operating under the radar; the enforcement around drugs is not that strict, if you want to ignore safety there are tons of ways to get pretty much any chemical. Folks over at nootropics communities order various experimental chemicals from chem labs, and it's probably even mostly legal. But they know all the dangers and they take full responsibility over what happens. > The fact that they had "some legal battles" and the laws was changed, implies to me that they were also operating in defiance of the law at the beginning. How is that different from what Uber does? Besides, now you have the taxis, your preferred company, and Uber as options. With your recommended strategy of "everybody obey the taxi laws", you would only have the taxis. Aren't you better off this way? They didn't break the law. They found a loophole in the licensing process and exploited it. Taxi companies got angry, the issue went through the legal system and the law was adjusted in a way that took into account the innovation and increased efficiency, while also keeping the good parts of the existing system. Contrast that with Uber, which not just breaks the law, they're being blatant about it.