4 ms·
On the other hand it surely inspired a round of modernization in many local taxi industries that would not have happened without. But I'm with you, I think that
by usrusr 7y ago
On the other hand it surely inspired a round of modernization in many local taxi industries that would not have happened without. But I'm with you, I think that the risk of a dump, destroy, disappear sequence outweighs those benefits.
- Bartweiss 7y agoIn the earliest days of Uber, the very large city I live in had mostly taxi services with no online support beyond a phone number. The most tech-savvy service offered a (not actually quite) real time map, but you just used it to guess where to go flag down a cab. At this point, every major taxi company has a sleek Uber-style call-a-cab app, and most of them work great. Fare prediction has also become common, if not actually a guarantee, and in-app fare payment has mostly killed hearing "the credit card reader is broken" after a ride. (Which was already illegal but omnipresent, so competition solved the problem where regulation failed completely.) Of course, this wasn't a city with medallions, so Uber couldn't just outcompete taxis by dodging regulation. I'm not sure how NYC et al have changed, since no amount of modernization could fix that problem.
- erik_seaberg 7y agoThere used to be a phone number, and the guy would tell you to wait an hour and a half, after which the cab probably never showed up. I used to drive airport shuttles (dispatched by VHF and pager!) and we sometimes rescued people who had been completely screwed over.