71–80 of 294 posts
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Far too early to say "correct". Starting a company that burns cash faster than anyone and cashing out is not at the same level of Steve Jobs.
Do you know why Steve Jobs was kicked out of Apple?
I must have missed that part when I saw "Jobs" in the theater.
Uber's business model is a total failure. Hubert Horan has done an amazing job exposing it [1] and you can also listen to his interview [2]. [1] http://horanaviation.com/Uber.html [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B0D_Q8xvosM
Lyft and Uber share the same business model, which is ride hailing. Is Lyft's business model also a total failure?
I'll leave it up to you to conclude whether or not trading $0.60 for a $1 can last forever.
Good for him. This is probably an unpopular opinion here, but I feel bad for this guy. Could have built a really great empire, and he probably would have if it was ten years ago. But things are changing so fast nowadays and the masses have a lot of power (maybe too much than they deserve) and Uber unfortunately was at the wrong place at the wrong time. When I talk to real people in the real world (not Twitter trolls…
You should just go back to jacking off over pictures of Milo and Travis.
Happy for him. I can only imagine how much being ousted from a company he created and raised to its current level must have hurt. I do not look fondly at what a pain local transport was in cities without public transport (and even those with), and it is Travis (yes, Travis first, Uber second) that led this paradigm shift. We can debate about Uber's business practices until the cows come home, but this is undeniable.…
The question is if this paradigm shift was more valuable than all of the negative things he did. If he didn't come up with it, how do we know someone wouldn't have done it a year later? We shouldn't rewrite history, but I don't think he deserves all that much credit for thinking up an app for cabs with drivers not needing a permit and using their own car.
1. Operate in legal grey areas to get a product infront of consumers. Build a large enough network of riders and drivers to prove the product market fit.
2. By the time, politicians and the connected taxi cartels realize the magnitude of the change and seek to outlaw it, rally their own voters to back Uber.
3. Under pressure, have politicians clear the path for legalization. This has played out in more cities than I can remember.
Step #1 before #2 is what made TK and Uber different. The level of ruthlessness it requires, I’d have a hard time substituting others in his position.
Happy for him. I can only imagine how much being ousted from a company he created and raised to its current level must have hurt. I do not look fondly at what a pain local transport was in cities without public transport (and even those with), and it is Travis (yes, Travis first, Uber second) that led this paradigm shift. We can debate about Uber's business practices until the cows come home, but this is undeniable.…
We all sit comfortably in the Bay Area because our ancestors murdered and stole lands from Native Americans. They also build an entire ecosystem that gained wealth from exploiting laborers and immigrants. History is messy, but they did these things so their children can sit around in comfortable homes enjoying these highly philosophical debates without any physical danger
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Thank you for providing a balanced view that’s so often missing on anything Uber related on HN. There is no denying that Travis threw ethics out of the window and took his paranoia way too far and never matured into a peacetime CEO. But every time a HN user takes an Uber, Lyft, Via, Grab, Ola etc etc you can thank Travis for his ruthlessness in fighting some of the most powerfully entrenched politicians (DeBlasio of…
That's not entirely true. Lyft paved the way for UberX.
Seems like a good time to dump this =). I think I know the kind of world Travis comes from. He was in a fraternity, and he treated it like a business like I did. When he owned a real business he applied those lessons far too liberally. Fraternities are ruthlessly competitive, going as far as planting fake pledges and building internal dossiers on all the other frats on campus. Very valuable was your loyal man with a…
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Lyft and Uber share the same business model, which is ride hailing. Is Lyft's business model also a total failure?
Yes. Without billions of subsidies from VCs, both companies are long gone. I'll leave it up to you to conclude whether or not trading $0.60 for a $1 can last forever.
Although unsurprising, this can't be a good indicator for the outlook of the company.
Perhaps someone well versed in these matters could chime in but the somewhat bigger question is whether its a good indicator even for the economy at large, since Uber's reach is quite global. Just today: One of the biggest surprises of the U.S. stock market’s relentless rally is how many individual investors have run away from it. The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed above 25000 for the first time on Thursday, pun…