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How do you deal with a dispute about a messy car? Or if the car pickup had no gas? Or a disputed theft of personal possessions? Middleman add value by dealing

How do you deal with a dispute about a messy car? Or if the car pickup had no gas? Or a disputed theft of personal possessions? Middleman add value by dealing with edge cases and aggregating trust. They aren’t pure rent extractors. We had hyper well defined ride sharing system with clear rules unbiased rules, high anonymity, focused on individual providers prior to Uber and Lyft- Taxis. People hated it, as it was rife with little abuses. Uber, Lyft, and similar provide a ton of value by brokering trust between the provider and rider.

t-3 4y ago
The only real difference between an Uber and a taxi from a customer POV is the price. Not sure what trust has to do with it.
- rglullis 4y ago
  Not to mention that if Über really provided "tons of value", they would've been profitable by now. But they only got popular because they have Softbank subsidizing riders for over 10 years already.
- marssaxman 4y ago
  I don't even know what the price of a taxi is anymore. That is the least important difference! An Uber or a Lyft will actually show up - and quickly - when I call it; will actually take me where I want to go without wasting time running up the meter; and will actually charge me in a fair and predictable way, which does not involve dickering with the driver or unexpectedly having to find a bunch of cash because the card reader is "broken". All of these things can be reasonably summarized as forms of trustworthiness.
rglullis 4y ago
Up until 4 years ago, there was no practical way to have a money exchange without a middleman. Today we have all the Uniswap-style decentralized exchange who makes more transaction volume than all of the other centralized exchanges, and do it without wash trading, and no operator can steal or embezzle the funds. To get this, all it was needed was to have a protocol, namely the Automatic Market Maker system popularized by Uniswap. Protocol is what we need, not platforms. One protocol being developed to deal with conflict resolution is https://kleros.io https://kleros.io. A decentralized car sharing company could work initially just like a regular car-rental company, by having the renter providing an deposit to cover for damages and refunded when the vehicle is returned in acceptable conditions. In case of small disputes, a pre-arranged third party works as a arbiter. And in the case where there are some serious problems, actual courts and the "traditional" institutions should be there to execute their role.

t-3 4y ago

The only real difference between an Uber and a taxi from a customer POV is the price. Not sure what trust has to do with it.

rglullis 4y ago
Not to mention that if Über really provided "tons of value", they would've been profitable by now. But they only got popular because they have Softbank subsidizing riders for over 10 years already.
marssaxman 4y ago
I don't even know what the price of a taxi is anymore. That is the least important difference! An Uber or a Lyft will actually show up - and quickly - when I call it; will actually take me where I want to go without wasting time running up the meter; and will actually charge me in a fair and predictable way, which does not involve dickering with the driver or unexpectedly having to find a bunch of cash because the card reader is "broken". All of these things can be reasonably summarized as forms of trustworthiness.

rglullis 4y ago

Up until 4 years ago, there was no practical way to have a money exchange without a middleman. Today we have all the Uniswap-style decentralized exchange who makes more transaction volume than all of the other centralized exchanges, and do it without wash trading, and no operator can steal or embezzle the funds. To get this, all it was needed was to have a protocol, namely the Automatic Market Maker system popularized by Uniswap. Protocol is what we need, not platforms. One protocol being developed to deal with conflict resolution is https://kleros.io https://kleros.io. A decentralized car sharing company could work initially just like a regular car-rental company, by having the renter providing an deposit to cover for damages and refunded when the vehicle is returned in acceptable conditions. In case of small disputes, a pre-arranged third party works as a arbiter. And in the case where there are some serious problems, actual courts and the "traditional" institutions should be there to execute their role.