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You can say it's a great waste if you'd like. But it is huge. Ubiquitous. World-changing. Uber will be in history books, whether or not it pans out as a valuabl

by kolbe 9y ago

You can say it's a great waste if you'd like. But it is huge. Ubiquitous. World-changing. Uber will be in history books, whether or not it pans out as a valuable company: we'll see. But it has already earned its greatness, even if said greatness was just burning billions of dollars to transform our world.

frgtpsswrdlame 9y ago
Uber is going to burn billions of dollars and what change have they affected with it? That taxi companies now have phone apps?
- kolbe 9y ago
  You mean that we can now relaibly summon them to our location? That we can share rides via similar routes? We can cut out the medallion scam, where capital owners can rent seek off of driver's labor? Optimize routes to more efficienly move people and save energy?
  - heurist 9y ago
    ... in markets where they can and do operate. Uber might be widely used in large cities but elsewhere it has little impact. Uber exists because American public transportation infrastructure is awful, nonexistent, or otherwise inefficiently designed. If they get to the point of running self-driving car networks then there will be much more to talk about. Until then they've only created a solution for a very small portion of the population.
    - chillacy 9y ago
      I'm no fan of uber's ethical track record, but I've had the opportunity to use uber in both Indonesia and Poland, which was extremely convenient. In Poland in particular, I took a taxi from the airport before learning that uber could take me back. I learned while I was there that the taxi driver exploited me because I was a tourist who didn't know the local prices and he could charge 5x normal rates.
  - prostoalex 9y ago
    You're describing corrupt US markets with somewhat passive operators, but in the rest or the world the story is different. In Scandinavian countries each taxi company has an app, is fairly efficient, and it's just the matter of downloading a bunch of apps. In some Asian and Eastern European markets unlicensed cheaper gypsy taxis are an everyday thing, with a host of problems of their own, so arrival of yet another competitor is not really a game changer.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
yongjik 9y ago
I can't tell if this is sincere or satire. :/
pducks32 9y ago
Yea I think this is really really really stretching things.

by kolbe 9y ago

frgtpsswrdlame 9y ago

Uber is going to burn billions of dollars and what change have they affected with it? That taxi companies now have phone apps?

kolbe 9y ago
You mean that we can now relaibly summon them to our location? That we can share rides via similar routes? We can cut out the medallion scam, where capital owners can rent seek off of driver's labor? Optimize routes to more efficienly move people and save energy?
- heurist 9y ago
  ... in markets where they can and do operate. Uber might be widely used in large cities but elsewhere it has little impact. Uber exists because American public transportation infrastructure is awful, nonexistent, or otherwise inefficiently designed. If they get to the point of running self-driving car networks then there will be much more to talk about. Until then they've only created a solution for a very small portion of the population.
  - chillacy 9y ago
    I'm no fan of uber's ethical track record, but I've had the opportunity to use uber in both Indonesia and Poland, which was extremely convenient. In Poland in particular, I took a taxi from the airport before learning that uber could take me back. I learned while I was there that the taxi driver exploited me because I was a tourist who didn't know the local prices and he could charge 5x normal rates.
- prostoalex 9y ago
  You're describing corrupt US markets with somewhat passive operators, but in the rest or the world the story is different. In Scandinavian countries each taxi company has an app, is fairly efficient, and it's just the matter of downloading a bunch of apps. In some Asian and Eastern European markets unlicensed cheaper gypsy taxis are an everyday thing, with a host of problems of their own, so arrival of yet another competitor is not really a game changer.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

yongjik 9y ago

I can't tell if this is sincere or satire. :/

pducks32 9y ago

Yea I think this is really really really stretching things.