And btw taxi companies that you seem to hold here as paragon of virtue, in many cases are nothing but rent-extracting entities that own the medallions (the cost

And btw taxi companies that you seem to hold here as paragon of virtue, in many cases are nothing but rent-extracting entities that own the medallions (the cost of which has been artificially inflated to make them out of reach of most individuals willing to actually drive a taxi) and charge the drivers for the privilege of being allowed to use it, without ever producing anything useful. And any added value such companies might produce (many of them don't even bother) - like centralized dispatch, convenient user interface, payment processing, etc. - guess what, is enabled by the same technology you blame for Uber.