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This wasn't an "automatic price increase" unless software got really good at explaining why they were increasing prices. http://cl.ly/image/2U3l242l350p/Image%

by cjoh 12y ago

This wasn't an "automatic price increase" unless software got really good at explaining why they were increasing prices. http://cl.ly/image/2U3l242l350p/Image%202014-12-15%20at%2012.41.06%20PM.png http://cl.ly/image/2U3l242l350p/Image%202014-12-15%20at%2012... "We are all concerned with events in CBD. Fares have increased to encourage more drivers to come online & pick up passengers in the area." Somebody wrote that sentence, and it's a gross one. The same doesn't belong on the Post, it belongs on the person who wrote that and upon the culture that allows for sentences like that to be written.

res0nat0r 12y ago
That doesn't discount the fact that the surge pricing algorithm is still automatic. They don't have people sitting at their evil corporate HQ clicking buttons trying to maximize screwing people over.
- davidgerard 12y ago
  No, but they knew what they were doing and can't claim they didn't choose to continue.
  - dllthomas 12y ago
    Although it's possible (no idea whether it's the case) they didn't have a mechanism to shut it down, on the time frame they would have needed to.
    - davidgerard 12y ago
      We can't philosophically disprove it. But Occam's razor applied to the behavioural evidence suggests Uber thinks surge pricing is fantastic, and keeping it in place during crises is corporate policy unless and until there's a media backlash large enough for it to actually get through their thick skulls that people are pissed off.
      - dllthomas 12y ago
        Presuming Uber thinks surge pricing is fantastic, wouldn't it be all the more likely they wouldn't build in a mechanism to disable it at the drop of a hat?
        davidgerard 12y ago
        Possibly. But it's a red herring considering the issue is moral culpability and whether their behaviour is socially acceptable.
        dllthomas 12y ago
        Their behavior, at this point, was "pay drivers out of their own pocket to help get people away from the emergency". It's hard to call that "socially unacceptable". It arguably took longer than it should have, but it takes time to make decisions in any large company. Hopefully they will learn from the experience, get better plans in place, and clarify policies for the future.
- spacefight 12y ago
  No, but that very algorithm was designed and implemented by humans from their big evil corporate HQ.
- milesskorpen 12y ago
  I wouldn't be surprised if surge over a certain % requires human intervention.
- piyushpr134 12y ago
  How do you know ? Do you work there ?
DigitalSea 12y ago
No offence, but you have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. Surge pricing is indeed an automatic thing. It triangulates demand in a particular area and if there are not enough Uber drivers to meet the demand, the price increases based on the demand and supply, thus bringing more drivers into the city and then eventually bringing the price down. There isn't someone in an office somewhere going, "Ooh, a hostage crisis, lets bump surge pricing by a factor of 4 for some sweet profits" The person who wrote that sentence explained what happened, of course a real person wrote it, it's a blog post. Automatic surge pricing kicked in, like it does anywhere in the world because there was high demand and not enough Uber drivers. While the app is smart, it can't automatically detect when there is a hostage crisis happening in the area and turn off surge pricing... Such an uninformed response from the likes of a Hacker News user is actually worrying. I thought everyone here mostly understood how Uber works, obviously not.
- icebraining 12y ago
  I think the point is that, while surge pricing kicked in automatically, they could have disabled it when they realized why it did so, instead of writing a blog post explaining it.
  - DigitalSea 12y ago
    Is this not what happened? Surge pricing kicked in, shortly thereafter, Uber made all trips out of the CBD free and then offered to refund anyone who made a trip during the surge pricing and was charged. I believe the blog post came afterwards, wouldn't make much sense to write a blog post before they made it right. People are complaining about how long it took Uber without having any kind of understanding how its system works. For all we know, disabling surge pricing isn't as easy as clicking a box in some kind of admin panel.
    - jeromegv 12y ago
      No that's not what happened. They first tweeted to acknowledge the increase of price during the hostage crisis. It's only once the backslash started that they made the trips free.
deleted 12y ago
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by cjoh 12y ago

res0nat0r 12y ago

That doesn't discount the fact that the surge pricing algorithm is still automatic. They don't have people sitting at their evil corporate HQ clicking buttons trying to maximize screwing people over.

davidgerard 12y ago
No, but they knew what they were doing and can't claim they didn't choose to continue.
- dllthomas 12y ago
  Although it's possible (no idea whether it's the case) they didn't have a mechanism to shut it down, on the time frame they would have needed to.
  - davidgerard 12y ago
    We can't philosophically disprove it. But Occam's razor applied to the behavioural evidence suggests Uber thinks surge pricing is fantastic, and keeping it in place during crises is corporate policy unless and until there's a media backlash large enough for it to actually get through their thick skulls that people are pissed off.
    - dllthomas 12y ago
      Presuming Uber thinks surge pricing is fantastic, wouldn't it be all the more likely they wouldn't build in a mechanism to disable it at the drop of a hat?
      - davidgerard 12y ago
        Possibly. But it's a red herring considering the issue is moral culpability and whether their behaviour is socially acceptable.
        dllthomas 12y ago
        Their behavior, at this point, was "pay drivers out of their own pocket to help get people away from the emergency". It's hard to call that "socially unacceptable". It arguably took longer than it should have, but it takes time to make decisions in any large company. Hopefully they will learn from the experience, get better plans in place, and clarify policies for the future.
spacefight 12y ago
No, but that very algorithm was designed and implemented by humans from their big evil corporate HQ.
milesskorpen 12y ago
I wouldn't be surprised if surge over a certain % requires human intervention.
piyushpr134 12y ago
How do you know ? Do you work there ?

DigitalSea 12y ago

No offence, but you have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. Surge pricing is indeed an automatic thing. It triangulates demand in a particular area and if there are not enough Uber drivers to meet the demand, the price increases based on the demand and supply, thus bringing more drivers into the city and then eventually bringing the price down. There isn't someone in an office somewhere going, "Ooh, a hostage crisis, lets bump surge pricing by a factor of 4 for some sweet profits" The person who wrote that sentence explained what happened, of course a real person wrote it, it's a blog post. Automatic surge pricing kicked in, like it does anywhere in the world because there was high demand and not enough Uber drivers. While the app is smart, it can't automatically detect when there is a hostage crisis happening in the area and turn off surge pricing... Such an uninformed response from the likes of a Hacker News user is actually worrying. I thought everyone here mostly understood how Uber works, obviously not.

icebraining 12y ago
I think the point is that, while surge pricing kicked in automatically, they could have disabled it when they realized why it did so, instead of writing a blog post explaining it.
- DigitalSea 12y ago
  Is this not what happened? Surge pricing kicked in, shortly thereafter, Uber made all trips out of the CBD free and then offered to refund anyone who made a trip during the surge pricing and was charged. I believe the blog post came afterwards, wouldn't make much sense to write a blog post before they made it right. People are complaining about how long it took Uber without having any kind of understanding how its system works. For all we know, disabling surge pricing isn't as easy as clicking a box in some kind of admin panel.
  - jeromegv 12y ago
    No that's not what happened. They first tweeted to acknowledge the increase of price during the hostage crisis. It's only once the backslash started that they made the trips free.

deleted 12y ago

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