7 ms·

It's mind boggling how most people think it's a simple matching FIFO matching algorithm, instead of how mind bogglingly complex making ride-sharing happen at sc

It's mind boggling how most people think it's a simple matching FIFO matching algorithm, instead of how mind bogglingly complex making ride-sharing happen at scale is I would know.

nanidin 4y ago
Maybe the world needs a ride share matching game, in the same vein as Elevator Saga[0]? [0] https://play.elevatorsaga.com/ https://play.elevatorsaga.com/
- smegsicle 4y ago
  or an openttd mod
charrondev 4y ago
Sometimes I wish it were simpler. I’ve had multiple situations where I couldn’t get a ride into my local city recently. The app says there are rides within 10 minutes, shows me a cheap rate and I hit yes. In 10 minutes no matches have been found. In 10 more minutes it finds someone 20 minutes away. 15 minutes later the driver cancels and I’m back to square one. Now the thing is the cost of the ride is a pittance and I would gladly pay double the cost just to get to my destination in a reasonable timeframe. Instead I just call a cab now, request a pickup at a certain hour and they send a driver. FWIW I’m 20 minutes drive from downtown Montreal, so this is not like I’m out in the sticks or anything, and couple years ago it was much easier to find a ride. Unfortunately I don’t think it’s even another ride sharing company taking the drivers, it’s just a lot of drivers pivoted to doing Uber eats instead.
- makeitdouble 4y ago
  I had a mostly similar experience in the France. The "gladly pay double" would translate in using a different app (the ones provided by traditional taxi companies) depending on the circumstance and the margin of error. Uber's app was still hands down the best to use, and I had so many issues with the others, like credit card registration being flakky, or the app straight crashing on specific screens. It looked a lot like they paid a dev company a lump sum to make the app and would proceed to pay for some more fixes every six months instead of keeping an ongoing maintenance contract. I kinda wish that now that the legal frameworks and service viability has been explored, Uber dies completely, and the gap is filled with local startups working closely with the local market to maintain ride services from there.
- wdb 4y ago
  Always worth comparing apps as Uber is especially at night not always cheaper than the good old cab app
Teever 4y ago
I think people don't care about it because at the end of the day all this mind bogglingly complex stuff just exists skim money off a transaction that should ideally be done between two individuals -- a buyer and a seller. Uber is nothing more than a rent-seeking middle man and no one cares about how complicated their rent-seeking activities are behind the curtain. Why can my ISP string up fiber optic all over my city and put routers and switches or whatever in boxes that can survive all kinds of inclement weather and end up charging me $100 a month for gigabit internet? Isn't that a much harder business than Uber?
- menzoic 4y ago
  >Uber is nothing more than a rent-seeking middle man and no one cares about how complicated their rent-seeking activities are behind the curtain The term rent-seeking gets thrown around a lot more lately, mostly from the web3 crowd. Most times its not used right. It's only rent seeking if the middleman isn't providing any value. Otherwise they're just getting paid for providing a service that people value.... Think about what you're saying. You don't "care how complex it is". Well that complexity determines whether or not it is rent seeking. You say ideally a transaction between two individuals. The major problem being solved here is finding the two best matched individuals based on their current location and destination over time. You need some system to aid this discovery no matter what. Here's the definition of rent-seeking: Rent-seeking is the effort to increase one's share of existing wealth without creating new wealth. Rent-seeking results in reduced economic efficiency through misallocation of resources, reduced wealth creation, lost government revenue, heightened income inequality, and potential national decline
  - Teever 4y ago
    > reduced economic efficiency through misallocation of resources Uber and Lyft generate 70 percent more pollution than trips they displace[0] >reduced wealth creation Uber and Lyft are pushing drivers into poverty[1] > lost government revenue How Uber dodges paying tax in Canada[2] I don't care about the complexity of the the black box algorithm that Uber implements because I know what purpose it serves. The whole purpose of Uber is to make people entirely dependent on it by driving out alternatives like local cab companies and public transit through low prices subsidizes by Saudi money. I think it's great that Uber has forced cab companies to modernize and make their services more convenient but we both know what will happen if Uber gets a stranglehold on this market. You'll see jacked up prices for the captive market and declining service. This is how it always goes. [0] https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/25/21152512/uber-lyft-climate-change-emissions-pollution-ucs-study https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/25/21152512/uber-lyft-climat... [1] https://www.nj.com/opinion/2020/03/uber-and-lyft-are-pushing-drivers-into-poverty-opinion.html https://www.nj.com/opinion/2020/03/uber-and-lyft-are-pushing... [2] https://troymedia.com/technology/how-uber-dodges-paying-taxes-in-canada/ https://troymedia.com/technology/how-uber-dodges-paying-taxe...
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
voz_ 4y ago
I worked there for 5 years, it's not that complicated, Uber just made it way too overcomplicated.
- pessimizer 4y ago
  I think that HN has crossed a threshold where the stereotypical HN reply is not someone condescendingly declaring that some problem they don't understand is easy, but instead someone who admits that they don't know how hard a problem is, condescendingly assuming that the person they're talking to is as ignorant as they are about it, and admonishing them to respect their betters and to make the assumption that the decisions that have been made and the methods that have been used by bigco X are rational. This is a weird forum. An argument that a company is big and successful so must have some process for making decisions that works well, so criticisms of those decisions by internet randos are necessarily badly informed and egotistically presumptuous because they can't have the understanding of the people directly involved yadda yadda yadda i.e. a standard status quo argument, generalizable to dismiss any criticism independently of the specific facts of any situation or the institution being defended - when you're making that argument, you could be making it to someone very highly placed or otherwise knowledgeable about the institution that you're defending.
dreamcompiler 4y ago
Okay granted it's a hard problem. It's a two-dimensional elevator scheduling problem with stochastic servers as well as stochastic customers. But does that really justify 30 thousand employees?

It's mind boggling how most people think it's a simple matching FIFO matching algorithm, instead of how mind bogglingly complex making ride-sharing happen at scale is I would know.

nanidin 4y ago

Maybe the world needs a ride share matching game, in the same vein as Elevator Saga[0]? [0] https://play.elevatorsaga.com/ https://play.elevatorsaga.com/

smegsicle 4y ago
or an openttd mod

charrondev 4y ago

Sometimes I wish it were simpler. I’ve had multiple situations where I couldn’t get a ride into my local city recently. The app says there are rides within 10 minutes, shows me a cheap rate and I hit yes. In 10 minutes no matches have been found. In 10 more minutes it finds someone 20 minutes away. 15 minutes later the driver cancels and I’m back to square one. Now the thing is the cost of the ride is a pittance and I would gladly pay double the cost just to get to my destination in a reasonable timeframe. Instead I just call a cab now, request a pickup at a certain hour and they send a driver. FWIW I’m 20 minutes drive from downtown Montreal, so this is not like I’m out in the sticks or anything, and couple years ago it was much easier to find a ride. Unfortunately I don’t think it’s even another ride sharing company taking the drivers, it’s just a lot of drivers pivoted to doing Uber eats instead.

makeitdouble 4y ago
I had a mostly similar experience in the France. The "gladly pay double" would translate in using a different app (the ones provided by traditional taxi companies) depending on the circumstance and the margin of error. Uber's app was still hands down the best to use, and I had so many issues with the others, like credit card registration being flakky, or the app straight crashing on specific screens. It looked a lot like they paid a dev company a lump sum to make the app and would proceed to pay for some more fixes every six months instead of keeping an ongoing maintenance contract. I kinda wish that now that the legal frameworks and service viability has been explored, Uber dies completely, and the gap is filled with local startups working closely with the local market to maintain ride services from there.
wdb 4y ago
Always worth comparing apps as Uber is especially at night not always cheaper than the good old cab app

Teever 4y ago

I think people don't care about it because at the end of the day all this mind bogglingly complex stuff just exists skim money off a transaction that should ideally be done between two individuals -- a buyer and a seller. Uber is nothing more than a rent-seeking middle man and no one cares about how complicated their rent-seeking activities are behind the curtain. Why can my ISP string up fiber optic all over my city and put routers and switches or whatever in boxes that can survive all kinds of inclement weather and end up charging me $100 a month for gigabit internet? Isn't that a much harder business than Uber?

menzoic 4y ago
>Uber is nothing more than a rent-seeking middle man and no one cares about how complicated their rent-seeking activities are behind the curtain The term rent-seeking gets thrown around a lot more lately, mostly from the web3 crowd. Most times its not used right. It's only rent seeking if the middleman isn't providing any value. Otherwise they're just getting paid for providing a service that people value.... Think about what you're saying. You don't "care how complex it is". Well that complexity determines whether or not it is rent seeking. You say ideally a transaction between two individuals. The major problem being solved here is finding the two best matched individuals based on their current location and destination over time. You need some system to aid this discovery no matter what. Here's the definition of rent-seeking: Rent-seeking is the effort to increase one's share of existing wealth without creating new wealth. Rent-seeking results in reduced economic efficiency through misallocation of resources, reduced wealth creation, lost government revenue, heightened income inequality, and potential national decline
- Teever 4y ago
  > reduced economic efficiency through misallocation of resources Uber and Lyft generate 70 percent more pollution than trips they displace[0] >reduced wealth creation Uber and Lyft are pushing drivers into poverty[1] > lost government revenue How Uber dodges paying tax in Canada[2] I don't care about the complexity of the the black box algorithm that Uber implements because I know what purpose it serves. The whole purpose of Uber is to make people entirely dependent on it by driving out alternatives like local cab companies and public transit through low prices subsidizes by Saudi money. I think it's great that Uber has forced cab companies to modernize and make their services more convenient but we both know what will happen if Uber gets a stranglehold on this market. You'll see jacked up prices for the captive market and declining service. This is how it always goes. [0] https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/25/21152512/uber-lyft-climate-change-emissions-pollution-ucs-study https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/25/21152512/uber-lyft-climat... [1] https://www.nj.com/opinion/2020/03/uber-and-lyft-are-pushing-drivers-into-poverty-opinion.html https://www.nj.com/opinion/2020/03/uber-and-lyft-are-pushing... [2] https://troymedia.com/technology/how-uber-dodges-paying-taxes-in-canada/ https://troymedia.com/technology/how-uber-dodges-paying-taxe...

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

voz_ 4y ago

I worked there for 5 years, it's not that complicated, Uber just made it way too overcomplicated.

pessimizer 4y ago
I think that HN has crossed a threshold where the stereotypical HN reply is not someone condescendingly declaring that some problem they don't understand is easy, but instead someone who admits that they don't know how hard a problem is, condescendingly assuming that the person they're talking to is as ignorant as they are about it, and admonishing them to respect their betters and to make the assumption that the decisions that have been made and the methods that have been used by bigco X are rational. This is a weird forum. An argument that a company is big and successful so must have some process for making decisions that works well, so criticisms of those decisions by internet randos are necessarily badly informed and egotistically presumptuous because they can't have the understanding of the people directly involved yadda yadda yadda i.e. a standard status quo argument, generalizable to dismiss any criticism independently of the specific facts of any situation or the institution being defended - when you're making that argument, you could be making it to someone very highly placed or otherwise knowledgeable about the institution that you're defending.

dreamcompiler 4y ago

Okay granted it's a hard problem. It's a two-dimensional elevator scheduling problem with stochastic servers as well as stochastic customers. But does that really justify 30 thousand employees?