If you look at these companies in silos then it seems like they could be legitimate, however once you look at the context of other similar companies who are hop

If you look at these companies in silos then it seems like they could be legitimate, however once you look at the context of other similar companies who are hoping to be the winner - and that's the only way they can success and the outcome isn't sustainable for any of them (unless their goal is to exit via the public markets and give the loss to them or some big money VCs). They all need the metrics they're working with to hold and the outcome for all of them is likely to be drastic for all of them. Perhaps they're hoping efforts by Uber and others in the same boat will work together in helping mould the market and become aligned with society's efforts/need to create Universal Basic Income for everyone. If UBI is to come into play then other metrics must shift too. The reward we give people for innovation will have to be at par with what's reasonable - and the peaks and valleys will more or less flatten out. The people who will be most innovative can use their own funds to trickle into future innovations that will be operated efficiently, e.g. Elon Musk. Perhaps there will no longer be VC firms in the future, and it will be individuals that invest through crowdfunding platforms. What would likely be a great hybrid model is crowdfunding platform but with VC firms - syndicate-like - except where an individual could allocate $5/month into the fund, perhaps only allowing individuals to invest with a monthly cap, so no one individual or organization can have some bizarre incentive or goal towards swaying the decision makers of the fund, etc. I'd argue the pros of getting $1 from a million people is far better than $1mm from a few. The most successful crowdfunding platforms right now, because they're VC-backed and thus have those same pressures on them, have to charge an unreasonable fee - which is unnecessary pressure on the projects that are trying to get funded. The alternative right now is feeding into the VC system who expect relatively short-term high profits - which then only allows platforms that charge an excessive amount to become dominant; and this does cause more efficient efforts by others to not be able to survive as easily - something I'm sure they're aware of as part of how they can get ahead with their model.