Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

How Uber Backers Orchestrated Kalanick’s Ouster as CEO

wsj.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 164 posts

Re: How Uber Backers Orchestrated Kalanick’s Ouster as CEO

#91

Post by kyokpae »

vm wrote: post #70
zer00eyz wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kalanick is less CEO and more like a comic book caricature of one before they fall into pure evil. The fact that the board stood by him as long as they did is just mind bending.

He created a service that reduced drunk driving rates by 1/3, enabled nearly 200K drivers to become entrepreneurs, provided a valuable service to millions of customers, and accelerated the shift to self driving cars. That deserves serious credit.

> reduced drunk driving rates by 1/3

Hardly true: http://fortune.com/2016/07/28/uber-drunk-driving-study/

> enabled nearly 200K drivers to become entrepreneurs

Going self-employed doesn't make you an entrepreneur.

> provided a valuable service to millions of customers

Looks like true: http://fortune.com/2016/10/20/uber-app-riders/

> accelerated the shift to self driving car

Not true. Uber's entered the game very late and since then lagged behind most of the competitors in this space: http://uk.businessinsider.com/the-companies-most-likely-to-g...

Re: How Uber Backers Orchestrated Kalanick’s Ouster as CEO

#92

Post by gommm »

sowbug wrote: post #23
jontas wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That quote says it's been two and a half centuries.

The reference was to general change in word usage, not to change in this word's usage. See also https://billbennett.co.nz/2009/09/01/writing-warning/

Nice quote from one of the links on this page:

I think 'to be a nitpicker' is one of those irregular verbs: I am a purist, you are a pedant, they are a bunch of nitpickers.

Re: How Uber Backers Orchestrated Kalanick’s Ouster as CEO

#93

Post by madeofpalk »

vm wrote: post #70
zer00eyz wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kalanick is less CEO and more like a comic book caricature of one before they fall into pure evil. The fact that the board stood by him as long as they did is just mind bending.

He created a service that reduced drunk driving rates by 1/3, enabled nearly 200K drivers to become entrepreneurs, provided a valuable service to millions of customers, and accelerated the shift to self driving cars. That deserves serious credit.

> and accelerated the shift to self driving cars

No. They damaged the move forward with self driving cards by putting them on roads before they were ready and without permission and breaking the law. Not to mention the part about how it's all using stolen tech.

Re: How Uber Backers Orchestrated Kalanick’s Ouster as CEO

#94

Post by camillomiller »

kyokpae wrote: post #91
vm wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He created a service that reduced drunk driving rates by 1/3, enabled nearly 200K drivers to become entrepreneurs, provided a valuable service to millions of customers, and accelerated the shift to self driving cars. That deserves serious credit.

> reduced drunk driving rates by 1/3 Hardly true: http://fortune.com/2016/07/28/uber-drunk-driving-study/ > enabled nearly 200K drivers to become entrepreneurs Going self-employed doesn't make you an entrepreneur. > provided a valuable service to millions of customers Looks like true: http://fortune.com/2016/10/20/uber-app-riders/ > accelerated the shift to self driving car Not true. Uber's entered the game very late…

Let's not forget that, however you frame it, he might have done all that by exploiting the worst traits of digital capitalism. I.e. they found the cleverest way to keep the revenue flowing (and maybe profits, one day) while getting rid of those pesky liabilities called means of production, all with appalling levels of capital concentration and lack of redistribution. Kalanick might be out, but UBER now is hardly less monstrous as a company.

Re: How Uber Backers Orchestrated Kalanick’s Ouster as CEO

#95

Post by dandare »

Could someone please explain to me why does Uber has 12,000 employees? Drivers are not employees, there is no content to curate, no brick & mortar operation, the app and tech stack is pretty much developed and stable. Sure the Otto and UberEATS are now part of Uber but still.

Re: How Uber Backers Orchestrated Kalanick’s Ouster as CEO

#96

Post by gadders »

gadders wrote: post #89
x0x0 wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uber drivers are entrepreneurs like the fry-station cook at mcdonalds is a small business owner. Except McDonalds can't make you pay for your own fry station. Or lease it from McDonalds at high rates: For examples, Experian estimates the average weekly payment for a new car lease is $96, while a 2013 vehicle through Xchange costs $130 a week. [...] After reviewing the terms of one lease, experts estimate that a drive…

I think you'll find McDonald's can make you do all of those things.

For the downvoters, some evidence:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14577840- McDonald's forcing people to buy a special salt shaker

"In early September, McDonald’s announced it would start offering all-day breakfast across the U.S. Customers will soon be able to order a limited selection of breakfast items past the usual 10:30 a.m. cutoff. That will require changes in the restaurants, such as finding room on the grills for eggs and in the fryer baskets for hash browns when most customers are ordering burgers and fries. Those changes cost money—including a potential $500 to $5,000 for equipment—that will fall mostly on franchisees."

https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2015-mcdonalds-franchises...

Re: How Uber Backers Orchestrated Kalanick’s Ouster as CEO

#97

Post by hboon »

dandare wrote: post #95

Could someone please explain to me why does Uber has 12,000 employees? Drivers are not employees, there is no content to curate, no brick & mortar operation, the app and tech stack is pretty much developed and stable. Sure the Otto and UberEATS are now part of Uber but still.

They are active in more than 600 cities. Even assuming tech support, design, engineering and R&D staff are negligible, 20 employees per city seems to make sense. Partnership, Marketing, legal, operations, vehicle rentals.

Their software might scale and business model replicable across many cities, but they still need people on the ground running.

Re: How Uber Backers Orchestrated Kalanick’s Ouster as CEO

#99

Post by dandare »

hboon wrote: post #97
dandare wrote: post #95

Could someone please explain to me why does Uber has 12,000 employees? Drivers are not employees, there is no content to curate, no brick & mortar operation, the app and tech stack is pretty much developed and stable. Sure the Otto and UberEATS are now part of Uber but still.

They are active in more than 600 cities. Even assuming tech support, design, engineering and R&D staff are negligible, 20 employees per city seems to make sense. Partnership, Marketing, legal, operations, vehicle rentals. Their software might scale and business model replicable across many cities, but they still need people on the ground running.

All those cities are located in less than 100 states. What are those people on the ground doing?

Re: How Uber Backers Orchestrated Kalanick’s Ouster as CEO

#100

Post by pelario »

gadders wrote: post #96
gadders wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you'll find McDonald's can make you do all of those things.

For the downvoters, some evidence: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14577840- McDonald's forcing people to buy a special salt shaker "In early September, McDonald’s announced it would start offering all-day breakfast across the U.S. Customers will soon be able to order a limited selection of breakfast items past the usual 10:30 a.m. cutoff. That will require changes in the restaurants, such as finding room on the…

Why the downvotes?
Post reply on HN