5 ms·

> Without the innovation of the Uber app, I had local services with an app before Uber, I'm sure. It's really not much of a shift from a phone call either. Bu

by IanCal 8y ago

> Without the innovation of the Uber app, I had local services with an app before Uber, I'm sure. It's really not much of a shift from a phone call either. But then, all Uber cars are the same as private hire cans anyway here. It seems like the real innovation was being big enough to ignore the local rules. That and being able to say it's "ride sharing" with a straight face.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
monsieurbanana 8y ago
Hacker News about Dropbox (2007): "For a Linux user, you can already build such a system yourself quite trivially by getting an FTP account, mounting it locally with curlftpfs, and then using SVN or CVS on the mounted filesystem" Hacker News about Uber (2019): "It's really not much of a shift from a phone call either"
- dewitt 8y ago
  Hasn't Dropbox lost market value every quarter since they went public while growth has been flat and operating at a loss? I'm not saying the HN crowd didn't miss a $10B opportunity, but they also weren't exactly wrong.
  - mruts 8y ago
    10 years is the definition of wrong.
  - tyingq 8y ago
    Uber's S1 is available. They are, for sure, losing shit tons of money. And they have no reliable view into what happens to demand if you broadly raise prices. Maybe that works, maybe not. Nobody knows.
  - kelnos 8y ago
    Dropbox's weakening position isn't necessarily an indictment of the idea, just that they're in a tough market when you consider both Google and Apple offer (comparatively cheap) cloud storage that is well-integrated into their smartphone platforms. Also consider that the success of Google's and Apple's offerings has proved out the value of the idea many times over. Also, Dropbox was an early mover. That worked well for them in their early days, but the consumer space is saturated by better options. Dropbox (and Box) are often better suited to enterprise use, where some of the more advanced features (that regular consumers mostly don't care about) are important.
  - c0vfefe 8y ago
    Judging by your parent's comment, HN would've been wrong to assume that the reason for Dropbox's decline is a mass movement of users towards rolling their own linux hosting stack.
- IanCal 8y ago
  You have conveniently missed that there was already an app for ordering taxis before Uber for me. Also, yes, it's not much of a shift. I'm not arguing people rebuild it or have something together but the shift from: Call cab firm and say where you are to App calls cab firm and says where you are is not massively innovative. (edit - particularly when it has been done before) I know it's fun and cool to be snarky, but you have clearly missed what I've said and equated it to something wildly different. Please put a little more effort in to your comments to make them more useful. The Dropbox comment is amusing because that's a complex thing users would have to do and doesn't support what Dropbox supports. Switching from one app to another is really quite different.
  - kelnos 8y ago
    To me, the innovation isn't using an app instead of a phone call, it's the accountability and reliability. Before Uber, I'd have to call a taxi company at least a half hour before I want to leave. If they even answer the call, the response is always "20 minutes", regardless of how long you have to wait. At least a quarter of the time, the taxi will never show up. As a result, I'd barely ever take taxis anywhere. Instead I'd drive my own car, which meant finding/paying for parking and ensuring continued sobriety, else planning to leave the car and likely get a parking ticket the next day. I guess one benefit of the old way is that I'd plan ahead a bit better, so if driving myself wasn't practical I'd leave extra time to take transit or walk. If I order an Uber/Lyft, I'm nearly guaranteed a ride within a reasonable amount of time once my request is accepted. Yes, occasionally the driver will cancel and the app will find a new driver, which adds to the time. Sure, the time estimate itself is usually off by 10% or so. It's not perfect, but this experience is orders of magnitude better than it used to be. For the most part I only drive my car when I'm leaving the city or need to carry a bunch of things with me.
    - IanCal 8y ago
      So the innovation for you is something that has existed elsewhere before? Why is that innovative?
      - 8y ago
- ip26 8y ago
  Wow, there's a lot to process here. E.g., suddenly I remember how much HN doesn't go into the nitty-gritty anymore.
reverend_gonzo 8y ago
Wtf? It is completely different. Before Uber, you had to call dispatch, give them your location or your closest estimate of it: dispatch would then manually try to find a car that was available and send them to you. This usually took at least 30-40m, if they arrived at all. With Uber, I open the app, it looks at all available cars, finds the closest one available, and sends that car to my GPS location. Oh, and if that car gets stuck in traffic, it automatically picks another car and sends that over Uber completely revolutionized taxi services and is absolutely nothing like calling dispatch on a phone.
- lnanek2 8y ago
  Agreed. In SF whenever I called cabs they often wouldn't show up at all. I suppose they found a fare before they got to me. So features like ratings and assigned cars and ability to check the status added by Uber are all huge improvements for my usage.
  - IanCal 8y ago
    I've not anywhere argued that it hasn't been beneficial for people, but simply that it is not innovative. Here, Uber is just another private hire taxi. They cannot pick up random people from the street (and be insured, anyway), so they would not be picking up random other fares on the way unless the dispatcher told them to. This is what has existed for a long time before Uber appeared, so replicating that elsewhere is not innovative surely?
    - kortilla 8y ago
      >I've not anywhere argued that it hasn't been beneficial for people, but simply that it is not innovative. And that’s what’s making you look like a dolt. Taxis in most of the world were (and mostly still are) unreliable gambles that vary from city to city. Calling on the phone and waiting for 40 minutes without live tracking and automatic rerouting for when the driver decides to stop for groceries is a completely different level of usefulness. You just compared a flip phone to a smartphone (in more ways than one).
- 8y ago
seltzered_ 8y ago
I'm critical of U/L, but it's ignorant to say there hasn't been any innovation. Back then, you had to know the phone number to call - I'd try to be diligent about keeping a taxi number in my contact list but it's invalid when I really need it when traveling in a different city. Trying to hail a cab during a busy holiday? Good luck with that - cab splitting existed but nowhere near as frictionless as through apps + route-planning software. Plus phone calls usually didn't make it to the dispatcher during extremely busy times (walking out of a bar on new years). Waiting for the cab? Better stay put where you are since they can't see your live location.
- IanCal 8y ago
  > I'm critical of U/L, but it's ignorant to say there hasn't been any innovation. I won't say there's none, but there was a taxi app for me before Uber that knew where I was and let me book a taxi, that wasn't innovative. > Back then, you had to know the phone number to call - A benefit sure, but "being big" is not an innovation. > Trying to hail a cab during a busy holiday? Good luck with that Here when it's busy I can't get an Uber but I can book my local service. Uber is way less reliable here. > route-planning software. Every uber here uses Waze. > Waiting for the cab? Better stay put where you are since they can't see your live location. Hah! I've repeatedly had issues where Uber cars didn't seem to know where I was, their app put me in the middle of a lake once and I kept moving about trying to figure out where the hell I could meet the taxi because their position made no sense either. They cancelled on me and I had to chase them down a street and rebook, hoping it would connect to them.
  - kortilla 8y ago
    >Every uber here uses Waze. Swing and a miss. Op is talking about Uber’s scheduling system for assigning drivers to riders.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
navs 8y ago
So I used to call the local cab company a lot when taking work trips. Problems Uber solved for me: - Knowing my location automatically via GPS. I don't always know where I am. I'm on a street near some bar. - Knowing how long it'll take for my cab to get to me. I don't have to assume it's on its way and wait or call the operator to confirm ETA. - Paying when I don't have cash. In NZ, not all taxi cabs take cards. It's a major shift from a phone call. Not a fan of the company but it's certainly changed things with taxi companies now investing in their own apps and Uber alternatives sprouting up.

by IanCal 8y ago

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

monsieurbanana 8y ago

Hacker News about Dropbox (2007): "For a Linux user, you can already build such a system yourself quite trivially by getting an FTP account, mounting it locally with curlftpfs, and then using SVN or CVS on the mounted filesystem" Hacker News about Uber (2019): "It's really not much of a shift from a phone call either"

dewitt 8y ago
Hasn't Dropbox lost market value every quarter since they went public while growth has been flat and operating at a loss? I'm not saying the HN crowd didn't miss a $10B opportunity, but they also weren't exactly wrong.
- mruts 8y ago
  10 years is the definition of wrong.
- tyingq 8y ago
  Uber's S1 is available. They are, for sure, losing shit tons of money. And they have no reliable view into what happens to demand if you broadly raise prices. Maybe that works, maybe not. Nobody knows.
- kelnos 8y ago
  Dropbox's weakening position isn't necessarily an indictment of the idea, just that they're in a tough market when you consider both Google and Apple offer (comparatively cheap) cloud storage that is well-integrated into their smartphone platforms. Also consider that the success of Google's and Apple's offerings has proved out the value of the idea many times over. Also, Dropbox was an early mover. That worked well for them in their early days, but the consumer space is saturated by better options. Dropbox (and Box) are often better suited to enterprise use, where some of the more advanced features (that regular consumers mostly don't care about) are important.
- c0vfefe 8y ago
  Judging by your parent's comment, HN would've been wrong to assume that the reason for Dropbox's decline is a mass movement of users towards rolling their own linux hosting stack.
IanCal 8y ago
You have conveniently missed that there was already an app for ordering taxis before Uber for me. Also, yes, it's not much of a shift. I'm not arguing people rebuild it or have something together but the shift from: Call cab firm and say where you are to App calls cab firm and says where you are is not massively innovative. (edit - particularly when it has been done before) I know it's fun and cool to be snarky, but you have clearly missed what I've said and equated it to something wildly different. Please put a little more effort in to your comments to make them more useful. The Dropbox comment is amusing because that's a complex thing users would have to do and doesn't support what Dropbox supports. Switching from one app to another is really quite different.
- kelnos 8y ago
  To me, the innovation isn't using an app instead of a phone call, it's the accountability and reliability. Before Uber, I'd have to call a taxi company at least a half hour before I want to leave. If they even answer the call, the response is always "20 minutes", regardless of how long you have to wait. At least a quarter of the time, the taxi will never show up. As a result, I'd barely ever take taxis anywhere. Instead I'd drive my own car, which meant finding/paying for parking and ensuring continued sobriety, else planning to leave the car and likely get a parking ticket the next day. I guess one benefit of the old way is that I'd plan ahead a bit better, so if driving myself wasn't practical I'd leave extra time to take transit or walk. If I order an Uber/Lyft, I'm nearly guaranteed a ride within a reasonable amount of time once my request is accepted. Yes, occasionally the driver will cancel and the app will find a new driver, which adds to the time. Sure, the time estimate itself is usually off by 10% or so. It's not perfect, but this experience is orders of magnitude better than it used to be. For the most part I only drive my car when I'm leaving the city or need to carry a bunch of things with me.
  - IanCal 8y ago
    So the innovation for you is something that has existed elsewhere before? Why is that innovative?
    - 8y ago
ip26 8y ago
Wow, there's a lot to process here. E.g., suddenly I remember how much HN doesn't go into the nitty-gritty anymore.

reverend_gonzo 8y ago

Wtf? It is completely different. Before Uber, you had to call dispatch, give them your location or your closest estimate of it: dispatch would then manually try to find a car that was available and send them to you. This usually took at least 30-40m, if they arrived at all. With Uber, I open the app, it looks at all available cars, finds the closest one available, and sends that car to my GPS location. Oh, and if that car gets stuck in traffic, it automatically picks another car and sends that over Uber completely revolutionized taxi services and is absolutely nothing like calling dispatch on a phone.

lnanek2 8y ago
Agreed. In SF whenever I called cabs they often wouldn't show up at all. I suppose they found a fare before they got to me. So features like ratings and assigned cars and ability to check the status added by Uber are all huge improvements for my usage.
- IanCal 8y ago
  I've not anywhere argued that it hasn't been beneficial for people, but simply that it is not innovative. Here, Uber is just another private hire taxi. They cannot pick up random people from the street (and be insured, anyway), so they would not be picking up random other fares on the way unless the dispatcher told them to. This is what has existed for a long time before Uber appeared, so replicating that elsewhere is not innovative surely?
  - kortilla 8y ago
    >I've not anywhere argued that it hasn't been beneficial for people, but simply that it is not innovative. And that’s what’s making you look like a dolt. Taxis in most of the world were (and mostly still are) unreliable gambles that vary from city to city. Calling on the phone and waiting for 40 minutes without live tracking and automatic rerouting for when the driver decides to stop for groceries is a completely different level of usefulness. You just compared a flip phone to a smartphone (in more ways than one).
8y ago

seltzered_ 8y ago

I'm critical of U/L, but it's ignorant to say there hasn't been any innovation. Back then, you had to know the phone number to call - I'd try to be diligent about keeping a taxi number in my contact list but it's invalid when I really need it when traveling in a different city. Trying to hail a cab during a busy holiday? Good luck with that - cab splitting existed but nowhere near as frictionless as through apps + route-planning software. Plus phone calls usually didn't make it to the dispatcher during extremely busy times (walking out of a bar on new years). Waiting for the cab? Better stay put where you are since they can't see your live location.

IanCal 8y ago
> I'm critical of U/L, but it's ignorant to say there hasn't been any innovation. I won't say there's none, but there was a taxi app for me before Uber that knew where I was and let me book a taxi, that wasn't innovative. > Back then, you had to know the phone number to call - A benefit sure, but "being big" is not an innovation. > Trying to hail a cab during a busy holiday? Good luck with that Here when it's busy I can't get an Uber but I can book my local service. Uber is way less reliable here. > route-planning software. Every uber here uses Waze. > Waiting for the cab? Better stay put where you are since they can't see your live location. Hah! I've repeatedly had issues where Uber cars didn't seem to know where I was, their app put me in the middle of a lake once and I kept moving about trying to figure out where the hell I could meet the taxi because their position made no sense either. They cancelled on me and I had to chase them down a street and rebook, hoping it would connect to them.
- kortilla 8y ago
  >Every uber here uses Waze. Swing and a miss. Op is talking about Uber’s scheduling system for assigning drivers to riders.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

navs 8y ago

So I used to call the local cab company a lot when taking work trips. Problems Uber solved for me: - Knowing my location automatically via GPS. I don't always know where I am. I'm on a street near some bar. - Knowing how long it'll take for my cab to get to me. I don't have to assume it's on its way and wait or call the operator to confirm ETA. - Paying when I don't have cash. In NZ, not all taxi cabs take cards. It's a major shift from a phone call. Not a fan of the company but it's certainly changed things with taxi companies now investing in their own apps and Uber alternatives sprouting up.