4 ms·

From the article: >Lime said its service, which lets customers rent scooters scattered around cities and leave them on the sidewalk for the next person to pick

by foobar1962 8y ago

From the article: >Lime said its service, which lets customers rent scooters scattered around cities and leave them on the sidewalk for the next person to pick up I now look for a "Tragedy of the Common" errors in business models. That's it right there: they freely exploit a public resource without care or consequence. The fallacy is evident when we ask "What if everybody does this?"

adventured 8y ago
There's an obvious outcome from that: the companies will pay a tax/fee to municipalities for the right to do that. There's no scenario where that doesn't occur universally in the future. Cities love to regulate anything and everything they can within their jurisdiction. If they charge a reasonable fee for it, it's net beneficial. There will be a lot more rules sketched out over time for this type of product.
jonlucc 8y ago
I guess I'm not sure I understand how this relates. Everybody already does do this. You are allowed to drop your bike off at a bike rack or on the sidewalk out of the way of traffic if you're brave (or have more faith in your neighbors than I do).
- foobar1962 8y ago
  > I guess I'm not sure I understand how this relates. Everybody already does do this. You are allowed to drop your bike off at a bike rack... Scenario: go to park your personal bike at the public bike rack only you discover it's full of bikes from some company who wants to make a buck out of it. A lot of these business models take advantage of resources that are "free" but have really cost a lot of money to set up and maintain, usually by the public. I'm in Sydney and am now starting to see share bikes littering the landscape. One had been dumped in a public ocean bath (at Balmoral).
  - Steltek 8y ago
    You'll probably saturate the market before you run out of parking. One car space converted to bike racks would hold 20 bikes and if bike share is truly that popular, it's an entirely viable option.
    - foobar1962 8y ago
      > One car space converted to bike racks would hold 20 bikes... In a city CBD, what would one car space be worth? In Sydney some car parks charge $23 an hour. Should this space just be given to some bike share company that decides to set up shop?
tmh79 8y ago
this is basically exactly what cars and on street parking is...
- tomjakubowski 8y ago
  street parking is often time-limited and/or costs money. I wouldn't mind the VC-backed e-scooter detritus on the sidewalk so much if they paid the city for the space they take up, much like the way a film crew pays the city for a permit to offset their disruption to the neighborhood, or the way a beach boardwalk performer pays for their space.

adventured 8y ago

There's an obvious outcome from that: the companies will pay a tax/fee to municipalities for the right to do that. There's no scenario where that doesn't occur universally in the future. Cities love to regulate anything and everything they can within their jurisdiction. If they charge a reasonable fee for it, it's net beneficial. There will be a lot more rules sketched out over time for this type of product.

jonlucc 8y ago

I guess I'm not sure I understand how this relates. Everybody already does do this. You are allowed to drop your bike off at a bike rack or on the sidewalk out of the way of traffic if you're brave (or have more faith in your neighbors than I do).

foobar1962 8y ago
> I guess I'm not sure I understand how this relates. Everybody already does do this. You are allowed to drop your bike off at a bike rack... Scenario: go to park your personal bike at the public bike rack only you discover it's full of bikes from some company who wants to make a buck out of it. A lot of these business models take advantage of resources that are "free" but have really cost a lot of money to set up and maintain, usually by the public. I'm in Sydney and am now starting to see share bikes littering the landscape. One had been dumped in a public ocean bath (at Balmoral).
- Steltek 8y ago
  You'll probably saturate the market before you run out of parking. One car space converted to bike racks would hold 20 bikes and if bike share is truly that popular, it's an entirely viable option.
  - foobar1962 8y ago
    > One car space converted to bike racks would hold 20 bikes... In a city CBD, what would one car space be worth? In Sydney some car parks charge $23 an hour. Should this space just be given to some bike share company that decides to set up shop?

tmh79 8y ago

this is basically exactly what cars and on street parking is...

tomjakubowski 8y ago
street parking is often time-limited and/or costs money. I wouldn't mind the VC-backed e-scooter detritus on the sidewalk so much if they paid the city for the space they take up, much like the way a film crew pays the city for a permit to offset their disruption to the neighborhood, or the way a beach boardwalk performer pays for their space.