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Scooters littering US city streets alarm: 'Unlock me or I'll call the police'
- toomuchtodo 8y agoAnyone know if people have started to gather these scooters up and part them out?
- bifrost 8y agoYep, it happens in SF. I've walked by several encampments and they're getting parted out fast.
- diogenescynic 8y agoDo they actually sell them? Who is buying this from them? I've seen a few homeless with them, but assumed they were trying to strip them down to recycle the metal, not sell for parts. Anyone actually know?
- bifrost 8y agoI've not stopped to ask, I'm assuming that someone's figured out how to remove the proprietary parts so that the scooters can be reused at will. I think metal recycling is also probable. I've heard that some scooter companies will offer rewards for scooters that were "lost" then returned, so thats probably pretty lucrative.
- toomuchtodo 8y agoI would love for someone to do an investigative piece on this, to determine the unit economics of shucking the scooter as well as talk to those doing this.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- beenBoutIT 8y agoUber will end up winning by being able to lose the most scooters and replace them the fastest.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- masonic 8y agoThey'll lose money on every one, but they'll make it up in volume.
- ttul 8y agoIn Vancouver, these things wouldn’t last five minutes.
- larrik 8y agoI don't really see the racism slant the article is trying to paint all over this stupidity.
- gowld 8y agoThat's because you don't view the police as a dangerous occupying force in your community.
- thucydidesofusa 8y agoI view the police as dangerous but recognize their danger as a necessary cost for effectiveness. I'm afraid of the police, but I'm more afraid of no police.
- foobarbazetc 8y agoThis is a very US centric view of policing.
- aphextron 8y agoI'm equally afraid of no police, and calling the police. Figure that out.
- r00fus 8y agoThere are stories every month of police going out of their way to shoot people or with trigger-fingers turning a normal situation into a police homocide - mostly impacting people of color.
- assblaster 8y agoThis article says the word "police" is racist. >Built-in alarm sparks anger from city officials amid concerns over racism and policing: ‘This is a threat to people’
- bifrost 8y agoUnfortunately, until we have a secondary form of law enforcement that is what you should do if someone is stealing...
- gowld 8y agoYou could also choose to not leave junk in the street to yell at people.
- seiferteric 8y agoWho is stealing? It sounds like this is essentially abandoned property in city streets?
- xanderstrike 8y agoJust like a parked motorcycle or bicycle right? You can just throw it on your van because it's abandoned.
- seiferteric 8y agohow long can you park your car somewhere before it is ticketed and eventually tagged as abandoned and towed away? Almost all parking is time limited. Does the company even care about that?
- bifrost 8y agoA while, and then its removed by law enforcement, not the general public. "Theft by Government" is wholly different.
- 8y ago
- gowld 8y agoThis is litter and vandalism. Why aren't people calling the police/city to remove this junk from the streets, and fine the owners for illegal dumping?
- ndespres 8y agoThere seems to be no problem, however, with devoting a majority of most city streets to the abandoning of unoccupied passenger vehicles, and littering the sidewalks with signage of instructions to motorists regarding the lawful abandonment of their vehicles. That is more offensive than pay-to-unlock scooters on the sidewalk and should be addressed first.
- aphextron 8y ago>There seems to be no problem, however, with devoting a majority of most city streets to the abandoning of unoccupied passenger vehicles, and littering the sidewalks with signage of instructions to motorists regarding the lawful abandonment of their vehicles. That is more offensive than pay-to-unlock scooters on the sidewalk and should be addressed first. This is a nonsensical, straw man argument that is propped up over and over in these threads. I pay taxes and registration fees to the state every year for the privilege of using public roads (and parking on them). I pay the city for parking. I pay CDOT to use the bridge. We have laws regarding the proper and improper usage of motor vehicles, with appropriate law enforcement to implement those rules. None of this exists with these scooters. It's just another bullshit VC play at making money off arbitraging public safety and wellbeing in an environment they don't have to deal with. The hubris has become absolutely disgusting.
- ndespres 8y agoI pay my share of the burden for your bridges, roads, traffic cops, traffic lights, parking spaces, and the public health cost for your parking too. It's no straw man- the burden of automobile traffic on our society for the benefit of a few auto manufacturers is hugely out of proportion. I applaud any dent that any public or private entity can make into alternative modes of transportation. Is it a cash grab? Sure, in some respects. But if it results in a widened bike lane that scooters can share too, or a way for me to bike around the city without getting a car door to the face or worse, bring it on. Dodging a parked scooter on the sidewalk is no more burdensome to me than having to step around every parking meter that crowds the sidewalk presently.
- dsfyu404ed 8y agoJust from reading the title you know this is a CA startup because the scooter threatens to call the police. If it were a TX startup the scooter would threaten to defend itself with force in proportion to the threat. (In case you were wondering, that's a joke). The city has all sorts of tricks it uses to make life easy for people on it's side and hard for its perceived enemies. If the city cared about resolving this it would do these (or similar) things because that's how government works. It makes a bunch of rules that are insane when followed at either extreme, normally runs near the middle and then picks and chooses which extreme to apply for situations it thinks warrant special treatment (when the government is bad at choosing this is called corruption). They can impound the scooters without due process and then just say "oops" when ordered to return them. If you're a big enough jerk (as defined by the city's opinion which doesn't necessarily correlate with the truth) to be known to the traffic enforcement people this is probably exactly what would happen. Alternatively they can just make a big show out of not prosecuting people for stealing them. Clearly this isn't really a problem as far as the city government cares so they're just letting it run its course.
- alottafunchata 8y agoYou have to be fucking kidding me
- beenBoutIT 8y agoSounds like a lone drifter ambling about could kick down a row of these and execute a DDOS attack on whatever emergency lines the scooters are wired into.
- ericsoderstrom 8y agoAs the article says, they don't seem to actually call anything.
- _rpd 8y ago> Repeatedly touching a scooter for 10 minutes in Oakland on Wednesday afternoon did not result in a response or call to police. Looks like the company doesn't even make a call, probably to avoid the high fines for nuisance calls.
- beenBoutIT 8y agoOakland has a shortage of police officers and calling the OPD generally wouldn't result in a response in 10 minutes. I've heard stories of waiting several hours for officers to arrive.
- rdtsc 8y agoMove fast, break things, litter, threaten to jail people - the new agile startup manifesto. I would be curious to hear the backstory of how this decision was made. Someone had to propose the idea and someone in charge had to approve. Then nobody around them chimed in with "hey this is a bad idea". Granted they were already planning on dumping their trash on the streets anyway so ethical considerations were probably not at the top of the list...
- ceejayoz 8y agoYeah, it's a genuinely baffling decision. A polite "Hey! Looks like you're checking out our scooter! For more info, head to example.com - use COUPONCODE for $5 off your first ride!" seems like it'd be equally effective at getting the message across and far less off-putting.
- _rpd 8y agoMaybe they are experiencing really high levels of theft and are desperate to do something to stem the loss?
- ceejayoz 8y agoAn actual thief is probably going to laugh and roll their eyes at the idea that the police will respond to an automated 911 call from a scooter left on the sidewalk.
- malchow 8y agoIsn't it the case, in SF, that police do not even respond to actual automobile break-ins when their very owners call to request police aid? If a smashed window + stolen laptop (total loss: ~$2,500) can't convince the SF police to lift a finger, I doubt a scooter (~$400) will. Sad situation all around.
- seiferteric 8y agoI agree, they would never respond to such a call. Moreover if it actually flooded the dispatch with calls they would probably be in big trouble. I am sure it is an empty threat.
- nacho2sweet 8y agoKick these NARC scooters to the ground or throw them in a dumpster.
- scotty79 8y ago> “This is not only an annoying noise, this is a threat to people. For black people, that can really be experienced as a death threat,” This is so effed up it's beyond words. > said Kaplan, who is crafting legislation to regulate the scooters and now plans to add a proposal to prohibit loud noises and threats. Sure that's the right way to approach the problem of black people fearing for their lives every time anyone decides to loudly announce the possible need for involvement of government employees to conform with the laws.
- chrismcb 8y agoThese are two separate problems. Kaplan is trying to address one issue. That didn't mean the other issue isn't also being addressed. Even if you solved the issue of people fearing for their lives, the other issue still exists and needs to be addressed.
- jerf 8y agoAnyone have a recording of the audio played? A quick cruise to YouTube came up empty, though perhaps your search terms will be better than mine.
- _rpd 8y agoThe Guardian video has it, although it also has muzak playing over it ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6Ly1aArYjU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6Ly1aArYjU
- eggbrain 8y agoFound someone uploaded it to YouTube here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsW4kIg4PQc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsW4kIg4PQc
- jerf 8y agoThank you, perfect.
- deepdiving12 8y agoNo publicity is bad publicity I guess?
- foobarbazetc 8y agoLol no police officer is going to give a fk what happens to one of these scooters. They should all be launched into the sun.
- eggbrain 8y agoFor everyone curious as to what the alarm sounds like in person: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsW4kIg4PQc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsW4kIg4PQc
- Old_Thrashbarg 8y agoScooters are litter? Are parked cars litter? What about when a restaurants put a chair or table outside on the sidewalk? Maybe a closer analogy is the other kind of electric scooter (as in the mopeds like Scoot). Never heard them called litter. So is being on the sidewalk vs the street what determines if it's litter?
- post_break 8y agoImagine if a company like uber bought thousands of smart cars. Parked them on all the streets. And said there ya go, now you can rent me! Meanwhile people who normally parked on the streets couldn't because these short lease cars were there. I would say that's littering.
- reustle 8y agoHave you ever visited a city with car2go or DriveNow?
- post_break 8y agoI understand that those exist, and fill the same role. My point was with these scooters, and rent a bikes, they get dumped on a city seemingly over night and the volume is vastly different than car2go.
- ceejayoz 8y ago> Are parked cars litter? If you leave them outside of a designated parking spot, sure. > What about when a restaurants put a chair or table outside on the sidewalk? That probably depends on who owns the sidewalk.
- LukaD 8y ago> If you leave them outside of a designated parking spot, sure. What if designate about a third of the city's public space as scooter parking spots? Would that be ok? To me all the cars that fill my city, standing around being useless 90% of the time, are nothing but litter.
- aprrrr 8y agoI don't understand the legal or ethical rationale that these scooters are different from any other items discarded on the sidewalk. This is different from leaving your personal scooter for a few minutes while you shop, or from someone accidentally dropping their wallet or phone. If you intentionally strew things around in public and leave them there, why shouldn't anyone do with them as they like? How is this not littering for profit? The reasoning of, "I left this thing on the sidewalk...I have no plans to come back for it any time soon...I hope someone comes along and wires me money to use it for a bit then drops it somewhere else...but don't you dare touch it unless you pay me!" seems specious. That is not part of the social contract. No one has a reasonable expectation to use the sidewalk as an unattended warehouse or storefront for as long as they like. At best, this is gaming the question of what is or isn't abandoned property.
- mikestew 8y agoAlmost a literal example of the tragedy of the commons, only with scooters instead of cows. Or privatize the profits, socialize the costs. I dunno, pick whatever metaphor fits you best, but it stills boils down to, "find a loophole in the social contract and exploit it."
- gojomo 8y agoHuh? In a high-trust society, you absolutely can leave personal or business property in a shared public area, with the vague expectation it will be moved/reclaimed "soonish" (such as "before nightfall" or "within a day"). In some cases, there are posted limits: 2-hour parking; 72-hour maximum; etc. You can also often leave temporary signs/markings (like sidewalk chalk or "garage sale"/"lost pet" posters). You can hand out flyers/coupons or solicit signatures on the sidewalks. You can monopolize a public field/court for a temporary period simply by starting to play/picnic there with friends. You can leave boxes/deliveries/garbage on sidewalks and in parking-spaces for later pick-up. How can there be confusion that a branded scooter, which squawks when moved without authorization (just like other laptop/vehicle/shopping-cart/shoplifting security devices), is "abandoned property"? Further, both the proprietor's needs (to recharge/inventory) and typical usage patterns mean these scooters seldom stay in one spot for more than a few hours – the same commons impact as if they were widely-owned personal scooters. So dockless scooters look to me like an innovative use of the commons, fairly analogous to other precedents. Sure, if specific negatives are detected, and outweigh the positive until ameliorated, new rules could then be required. But in a free, high-trust country, the default should be permissiveness until harm can be shown. It's obtuse to shoehorn something new into the category of "litter", when that's clearly not the intent of those responsible nor the practical impact.
- LukaD 8y agoWhere's the outcry over cars littering the city?