3 ms·

There are certainly times when unjust laws should be ignored. However, when one ignores the law one should be prepared to suffer the consequences of his action

There are certainly times when unjust laws should be ignored. However, when one ignores the law one should be prepared to suffer the consequences of his actions. Uber's CEO is clearly not prepared to suffer those consequences.

alexqgb 15y ago
The immediate consequence is a trial, not necessarily a conviction, which may or may not follow. The CEO (and just as importantly, his backers) seem entirely prepared to run this risk. One of the abiding virtues of due process is that it's public. In the event that a cartel captures a regulatory agency, and turns it against the people it's supposed to serve, a system of open justice will force them to fight for their odious privilege in full view of the press. The risk - for the cartel - is that the trial will backfire by spotlighting just how corrupt and abusive their underlying legal supports have become. Even if they do win in court, the victory my by Pyrrhic. In the absence of a clear (and superior) alternative, the arguments that supported the initial regulatory capture may still carry some weight with an otherwise ambivalent public. In these cases, private acts of cartel-busting may be truly foolish. But in cases like Uber or Airbnb - where the public can not only see the alternative clearly, it can download it as a wildly useful app - it becomes exponentially harder to strangle genuine progress. Extreme and widespread dissatisfaction with the norm (which is very much the case with SF Taxi service) makes aggressive legal suppression even riskier - especially when cash-strapped states and municipalities can be convinced that the new market is big enough to substantially augment their tax bases. None of this means that the overt cartel-busting approach to business development isn't risky as hell. It is. But timed correctly, and supported by the right technological breakthroughs, it can pay off spectacularly. If anyone deserves the entrepreneur-as-hero laurels, it's these guys.

alexqgb 15y ago

The immediate consequence is a trial, not necessarily a conviction, which may or may not follow. The CEO (and just as importantly, his backers) seem entirely prepared to run this risk. One of the abiding virtues of due process is that it's public. In the event that a cartel captures a regulatory agency, and turns it against the people it's supposed to serve, a system of open justice will force them to fight for their odious privilege in full view of the press. The risk - for the cartel - is that the trial will backfire by spotlighting just how corrupt and abusive their underlying legal supports have become. Even if they do win in court, the victory my by Pyrrhic. In the absence of a clear (and superior) alternative, the arguments that supported the initial regulatory capture may still carry some weight with an otherwise ambivalent public. In these cases, private acts of cartel-busting may be truly foolish. But in cases like Uber or Airbnb - where the public can not only see the alternative clearly, it can download it as a wildly useful app - it becomes exponentially harder to strangle genuine progress. Extreme and widespread dissatisfaction with the norm (which is very much the case with SF Taxi service) makes aggressive legal suppression even riskier - especially when cash-strapped states and municipalities can be convinced that the new market is big enough to substantially augment their tax bases. None of this means that the overt cartel-busting approach to business development isn't risky as hell. It is. But timed correctly, and supported by the right technological breakthroughs, it can pay off spectacularly. If anyone deserves the entrepreneur-as-hero laurels, it's these guys.