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RideAustin did not work unless you had a US-registered credit card which cut off a huge group of people from being able to use it (not to mention they only publ

by jen20 6y ago

RideAustin did not work unless you had a US-registered credit card which cut off a huge group of people from being able to use it (not to mention they only published it in US app stores). I rented cars instead.

hn_throwaway_99 6y ago
I highly doubt the international market would have made a lick of difference for a service only accessible in a city in the middle of Texas. Not saying there weren't some international visitors who may have used it, but in the grand scheme of things that's a drop in the bucket.
- jen20 6y ago
  Ok then - not sure I agree during SXSW, ACL, the many downtown conventions etc, but fine, let’s go with that. It was during SXSW 2017 that RideAustin failed for 5 hours one night, and the alternatives (Fasten etc) also did not work. How many qualified customers never even opened the app again after being burned by that?
  - hn_throwaway_99 6y ago
    I mean, if anything you are exactly making my point. RideAustin was a local nonprofit, run on essentially a shoestring budget, that failed during a surge that was probably many times the load they normally get in any single night, and your response is "How many qualified customers never even opened the app again after being burned by that?" I'm not disagreeing with you, I'm just saying why would some small startup that really could only address a single, relatively small market (CA is big but pales in comparison to the world at large) be able to attract the capital necessary to eventually compete against Uber and Lyft? The service levels you've come to expect from Uber and Lyft don't come cheap, and they've already had years to scale their operations. It's a weird dichotomy I sometimes see on HN: "Why aren't there more competitors in this space?" and "Why doesn't this other startup provide the same levels of service and low low prices as this other enterprise that got billions in VC funding?"

by jen20 6y ago

hn_throwaway_99 6y ago

I highly doubt the international market would have made a lick of difference for a service only accessible in a city in the middle of Texas. Not saying there weren't some international visitors who may have used it, but in the grand scheme of things that's a drop in the bucket.

jen20 6y ago
Ok then - not sure I agree during SXSW, ACL, the many downtown conventions etc, but fine, let’s go with that. It was during SXSW 2017 that RideAustin failed for 5 hours one night, and the alternatives (Fasten etc) also did not work. How many qualified customers never even opened the app again after being burned by that?
- hn_throwaway_99 6y ago
  I mean, if anything you are exactly making my point. RideAustin was a local nonprofit, run on essentially a shoestring budget, that failed during a surge that was probably many times the load they normally get in any single night, and your response is "How many qualified customers never even opened the app again after being burned by that?" I'm not disagreeing with you, I'm just saying why would some small startup that really could only address a single, relatively small market (CA is big but pales in comparison to the world at large) be able to attract the capital necessary to eventually compete against Uber and Lyft? The service levels you've come to expect from Uber and Lyft don't come cheap, and they've already had years to scale their operations. It's a weird dichotomy I sometimes see on HN: "Why aren't there more competitors in this space?" and "Why doesn't this other startup provide the same levels of service and low low prices as this other enterprise that got billions in VC funding?"