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To quote a lawyer friend, "Break only one law at a time. If you have a dead body in your trunk, be sure to use your turn signals." The pragmatic reason for thi
by tlb 10y ago
To quote a lawyer friend, "Break only one law at a time. If you have a dead body in your trunk, be sure to use your turn signals."
The pragmatic reason for this is that the penalties and probability of getting caught for a given crime are often inversely correlated. So if you commit a small crime and a large crime simultaneously, you're likely to get caught for the small crime and then they'll notice the large crime too.
Uber set out to break a set of laws that arguably needed breaking: those that protect incumbent taxi services against competition. Calling their taxi service a limo service to avoid anti-competitive regulations is a small crime. But instead of learning the "one crime at a time" rule, they seem to have learned "Hey, we can get away with crimes!"
- jfim 10y ago> they seem to have learned "Hey, we can get away with crimes!" I'm not sure if it's really that. It seems that they're closer to having a scorched-earth policy where they intentionally break the rules. If the regulators step in and put some legislation that blocks Uber from operating, it also blocks their competitors from operating as well. If not, then they win by having their way and having a first mover advantage. Either way, they win or their competitors lose. That strategy seems to have worked very well for them in the US, but not as much in other markets.
- unityByFreedom 10y agoAren't there places in the US where Lyft is operating and Uber isn't? Like Austin?