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There is a podcast called The Dollop where one person essentially teaches another person about a particular subject. They recently did Uber and it was eye-openi

There is a podcast called The Dollop where one person essentially teaches another person about a particular subject. They recently did Uber and it was eye-opening to see just how shady this company has always been. I am not a fan of Uber but after listening to this I will never use them again. Podcast link: http://thedollop.libsyn.com/271-uber http://thedollop.libsyn.com/271-uber

digi_owl 9y ago
Basically my impression since i first heard about them. But many pushed them as just good old American "disrupters" of a "stale" market. That is until the first dirty underwear regarding office shenanigans were aired, and then the twittering classes did a one-eighty in their view of Uber. And from that point on the company has been circling the drain.
- Consultant32452 9y ago
  I think both are true. Uber paved the way to significant improvements in taxi-ish services. Even traditional taxi services have bumped up their game in the face of actual competition. If at the end of all this we just wind up with Lyft, Uber still deserves some credit there. With all that being said, I probably won't be happy with the outcome of the lawsuits surrounding the shenanigans either. What will likely happen is Uber will get some hefty fines. But the people who will pay those fines are Uber's customers (and potentially investors). The more focus we can put on criminal and civil penalties for the individuals involved, even if that meant literally every person in the company, the better.
- sillysaurus3 9y ago
  The myth that you can build a billion-dollar business without some shady dealings needs to die. Startups are usually faced with hard choices if they want to survive. Pretending like Kalanick himself endorsed sexual harassment is ridiculous. We don't know whether he knew, how much he knew, or how involved he was. All evidence points to "the trail of information stopped at HR." I think we like to pretend that startups should be completely moral and make no questionable decisions because of how awful companies have acted in the past. While it's true we shouldn't let history repeat itself, it's false to say that merely disrupting a market is worth criticizing. And this is what disruption looks like. Balancing morality/ethics with winning is incredibly difficult. You can be an upstanding person, thrust into the CEO chair, and still screw up. Then all of your mistakes are magnified to ridiculous proportions and people claim it's a pattern of behavior that they spotted from the start, but everyone else was too blinded to recognize. Sound familiar? Not even in Uber's case -- it's a story that's repeated itself over and over. The straightforward response is "Well, startups shouldn't act so disreputably then." I agree that you shouldn't do anything that brings harm to individuals, nor should you ignore a toxic culture at your company. But refusing to even try -- to say that if you're not perfectly honest or perfectly moral, that you shouldn't be allowed to build a company -- is a formula for letting the true snakes dominate the world. Honest people who make mistakes are better than assholes with a thirst for power. But you have to let them be willing to admit that they've made mistakes. Kalanick has done this.
  - skellera 9y ago
    Sorry Travis. I don't think he meant it personally. Kidding aside, at those levels you have to manage all of that. PR is probably just as important as the tech.
  - ethanhunt_ 9y ago
    Ironically the sister-post to your parent post complains about a vampire being killed in the 19th century, when it's the same mindset that caused that and that wants to crucify Kalanick. The five-minutes-of-hate culture and public lynching culture is dangerous and has to end. In a year some contrarian will post an article on Medium with the title "Kalanick was unfairly ousted" and it'll be posted on reddit/r/TIL and the tide will turn as all the people whose opinions are an expression of whatever made it to the frontpage of their favorite aggregators reverse their opinion to fit the status quo.
    - amrrs 9y ago
      Your prediction seems to be true already https://hackernoon.com/travis-kalanick-lost-today-hoping-to-be-found-fc4a7bad9779 https://hackernoon.com/travis-kalanick-lost-today-hoping-to-... Irrespective of this fair/unfair argument, what stands out is how we have completely forgotten the platform that Uber laid out to disrupt our commuting experience, just like Jeff B did with Amazon Store!
    - jazzyk 9y ago
      i am against Internet lynching, but there have been enough scandals and just plain toxicity coming out of Uber for several years now. I know it was not quite your point, but idolizing assholes like Kalanick - "they may be a bit flawed, but they are brilliant businessmen/women", quite prevalent in the US, ends up in a lot of companies run by sociopathic assholes. Leave the fawning to sycopanthic media, please.
    - Frondo 9y ago
      Jesus, this is a seriously overblown description of what's happened to the guy. He hasn't been lynched, he hasn't been jailed, he hasn't had his riches taken away from him. He's been asked to endure one consequence of years of behavior that many, many of us don't approve of. There's no "five minutes of hate" here, there's a lot of people in the world looking at someone who behaved badly, consistently, without showing any sign of changing their behavior, and saying "enough, you don't get to run a big business anymore". Maybe you don't give a shit about the kind of business the guy built, and that's up to you, you don't have to give a shit, but acting like the rest of us are a lynch mob is a ridiculous misrepresentation of the situation.
- maxerickson 9y ago
  Above and beyond the fray! Lots of people, even on Twitter, have been skeptical of Über for quite some time.
EnFinlay 9y ago
Listening to The Dollop is a great reminder of how entirely fucked up things have been in America in the past. Last lobotomy? 1967. Last "vampire killed" 1892 (or 93). It gives me hope that no matter what madness happens in the present, it has been worse before.
nullnilvoid 9y ago
Wow, interesting stuff. I have not used Uber for a long time. Lyft is my goto app.
- amrrs 9y ago
  Had there been no Uber, there wouldn't have been Lyft. Uber is not just the first-comer or pioneer but it also fought most of the first-fights with city officials and Taxi unions which actually gave confidence to Lyft for their survival!
  - eridius 9y ago
    Just because Uber fought those fights doesn't mean nobody else could have fought them.
    - furioussloth 9y ago
      Of course not but they deserve hella credit for this. Also i think with all the major investigation and changes they are doing more than makes up for lot of bad things they did. If anything justice is served and people should move on.
      - eridius 9y ago
        How is justice served? Uber has done a tremendous amount of really shitty things. And for most of it, there has been no "justice" served. Furthermore, you're taking it as a given that Uber flagrantly violating local laws in order to launch ridesharing is a good thing, but not everybody will agree with that.
        furioussloth 9y ago
        Many people who had a better option than driving drunk will do. Many parents who wait for their kids to get home safe after parties will agree. The social good done is way higher to totally justify using some shady software to evade authorities. Ignoring sexual harassment complain was a huge mistake. But pretty much everyone involved was fired , an investigation by holder was carried out and most of his suggestions are being implemented. You have clearly not stayed in a city with really shitty taxi service.
shaftway 9y ago
Woah, learning all sorts of stuff. I remember Scour. That thing was scummy as all get-out.

digi_owl 9y ago

Basically my impression since i first heard about them. But many pushed them as just good old American "disrupters" of a "stale" market. That is until the first dirty underwear regarding office shenanigans were aired, and then the twittering classes did a one-eighty in their view of Uber. And from that point on the company has been circling the drain.

Consultant32452 9y ago
I think both are true. Uber paved the way to significant improvements in taxi-ish services. Even traditional taxi services have bumped up their game in the face of actual competition. If at the end of all this we just wind up with Lyft, Uber still deserves some credit there. With all that being said, I probably won't be happy with the outcome of the lawsuits surrounding the shenanigans either. What will likely happen is Uber will get some hefty fines. But the people who will pay those fines are Uber's customers (and potentially investors). The more focus we can put on criminal and civil penalties for the individuals involved, even if that meant literally every person in the company, the better.
sillysaurus3 9y ago
The myth that you can build a billion-dollar business without some shady dealings needs to die. Startups are usually faced with hard choices if they want to survive. Pretending like Kalanick himself endorsed sexual harassment is ridiculous. We don't know whether he knew, how much he knew, or how involved he was. All evidence points to "the trail of information stopped at HR." I think we like to pretend that startups should be completely moral and make no questionable decisions because of how awful companies have acted in the past. While it's true we shouldn't let history repeat itself, it's false to say that merely disrupting a market is worth criticizing. And this is what disruption looks like. Balancing morality/ethics with winning is incredibly difficult. You can be an upstanding person, thrust into the CEO chair, and still screw up. Then all of your mistakes are magnified to ridiculous proportions and people claim it's a pattern of behavior that they spotted from the start, but everyone else was too blinded to recognize. Sound familiar? Not even in Uber's case -- it's a story that's repeated itself over and over. The straightforward response is "Well, startups shouldn't act so disreputably then." I agree that you shouldn't do anything that brings harm to individuals, nor should you ignore a toxic culture at your company. But refusing to even try -- to say that if you're not perfectly honest or perfectly moral, that you shouldn't be allowed to build a company -- is a formula for letting the true snakes dominate the world. Honest people who make mistakes are better than assholes with a thirst for power. But you have to let them be willing to admit that they've made mistakes. Kalanick has done this.
- skellera 9y ago
  Sorry Travis. I don't think he meant it personally. Kidding aside, at those levels you have to manage all of that. PR is probably just as important as the tech.
- ethanhunt_ 9y ago
  Ironically the sister-post to your parent post complains about a vampire being killed in the 19th century, when it's the same mindset that caused that and that wants to crucify Kalanick. The five-minutes-of-hate culture and public lynching culture is dangerous and has to end. In a year some contrarian will post an article on Medium with the title "Kalanick was unfairly ousted" and it'll be posted on reddit/r/TIL and the tide will turn as all the people whose opinions are an expression of whatever made it to the frontpage of their favorite aggregators reverse their opinion to fit the status quo.
  - amrrs 9y ago
    Your prediction seems to be true already https://hackernoon.com/travis-kalanick-lost-today-hoping-to-be-found-fc4a7bad9779 https://hackernoon.com/travis-kalanick-lost-today-hoping-to-... Irrespective of this fair/unfair argument, what stands out is how we have completely forgotten the platform that Uber laid out to disrupt our commuting experience, just like Jeff B did with Amazon Store!
  - jazzyk 9y ago
    i am against Internet lynching, but there have been enough scandals and just plain toxicity coming out of Uber for several years now. I know it was not quite your point, but idolizing assholes like Kalanick - "they may be a bit flawed, but they are brilliant businessmen/women", quite prevalent in the US, ends up in a lot of companies run by sociopathic assholes. Leave the fawning to sycopanthic media, please.
  - Frondo 9y ago
    Jesus, this is a seriously overblown description of what's happened to the guy. He hasn't been lynched, he hasn't been jailed, he hasn't had his riches taken away from him. He's been asked to endure one consequence of years of behavior that many, many of us don't approve of. There's no "five minutes of hate" here, there's a lot of people in the world looking at someone who behaved badly, consistently, without showing any sign of changing their behavior, and saying "enough, you don't get to run a big business anymore". Maybe you don't give a shit about the kind of business the guy built, and that's up to you, you don't have to give a shit, but acting like the rest of us are a lynch mob is a ridiculous misrepresentation of the situation.
maxerickson 9y ago
Above and beyond the fray! Lots of people, even on Twitter, have been skeptical of Über for quite some time.

EnFinlay 9y ago

Listening to The Dollop is a great reminder of how entirely fucked up things have been in America in the past. Last lobotomy? 1967. Last "vampire killed" 1892 (or 93). It gives me hope that no matter what madness happens in the present, it has been worse before.

nullnilvoid 9y ago

Wow, interesting stuff. I have not used Uber for a long time. Lyft is my goto app.

amrrs 9y ago
Had there been no Uber, there wouldn't have been Lyft. Uber is not just the first-comer or pioneer but it also fought most of the first-fights with city officials and Taxi unions which actually gave confidence to Lyft for their survival!
- eridius 9y ago
  Just because Uber fought those fights doesn't mean nobody else could have fought them.
  - furioussloth 9y ago
    Of course not but they deserve hella credit for this. Also i think with all the major investigation and changes they are doing more than makes up for lot of bad things they did. If anything justice is served and people should move on.
    - eridius 9y ago
      How is justice served? Uber has done a tremendous amount of really shitty things. And for most of it, there has been no "justice" served. Furthermore, you're taking it as a given that Uber flagrantly violating local laws in order to launch ridesharing is a good thing, but not everybody will agree with that.
      - furioussloth 9y ago
        Many people who had a better option than driving drunk will do. Many parents who wait for their kids to get home safe after parties will agree. The social good done is way higher to totally justify using some shady software to evade authorities. Ignoring sexual harassment complain was a huge mistake. But pretty much everyone involved was fired , an investigation by holder was carried out and most of his suggestions are being implemented. You have clearly not stayed in a city with really shitty taxi service.

shaftway 9y ago

Woah, learning all sorts of stuff. I remember Scour. That thing was scummy as all get-out.