No. Uber & Lyft are basically regulatory hacks. They showed up with enough money to just ignore the medallion rules since they were in a slight gray area. Their

No. Uber & Lyft are basically regulatory hacks. They showed up with enough money to just ignore the medallion rules since they were in a slight gray area. Their investment allowed them to get everyone onto their product faster than the changes that were demanded by taxi medallion owners demanded could get through state & city legislators. Public opinion swayed and it became impossible for the taxi medallion owners to lobby for changes that would ban Uber & Lyft. Tech is an enabler in that story, but I don't even think it's the most important part of the story.