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Two Uber managers detained in France over 'illicit' low-cost service

theguardian.com

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Re: Two Uber managers detained in France over 'illicit' low-cost service

#71

Post by mcuk2k »

dylanjermiah wrote: post #65
mcuk2k wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The good thing about governments conspiring to create a shortage is that taxi drivers make a reasonable income. This is an aspect that Silcon-Valley-style technology platforms have no apparent interest in supporting. For example, as time progresses Adsense might sign up more and more publisher capacity, yet that pushes down the income and discourages respectable publishers from using the service. You go from a fairly…

A large majority of Uber drivers are former taxi drivers, you don't have to lease a vehicle for 45k per year, choose hours of work, and you have more control over passengers bad behaviour (two way rating system).

That's the way these things work though. Start-up moves in, offers good rates because they have the VC money to burn. The early adopters do well (like drilling for oil), then after several years reality sets in. The legacy employer no longer exists, in fact, there are no competitors except one or two global technology companies. Finally, cars drive themselves.

Re: Two Uber managers detained in France over 'illicit' low-cost service

#72

Post by therobot24 »

dylanjermiah wrote: post #67
therobot24 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it's obvious that the regulation is backwards Not disagreeing here. However, fines are put in place as a deterrent. In this instance, their purpose is a punishment for breaking a law. Uber is treating them like a tax and the government appears to disagree with that interpretation. If this were a case of a chemical company continuing to improperly dispose of waste, i'm sure at some point you'd want the government to…

Improperly disposing waste is not equivalent to providing a better service cheaper and quicker.

You're right, but in both cases each company is doing the same thing, repeatedly breaking a law with no intention of stopping. Wouldn't you agree that the government has a duty to treat both cases equally?

Re: Two Uber managers detained in France over 'illicit' low-cost service

#73

Post by jkoudys »

viola11 wrote: post #43
jkoudys wrote: post #22

Every time this topic comes up, the discussion always revolves around whether or not Uber is properly licensed, or if it's fair for them to operate. What's often overlooked is the very reason so many of these licenses became as valuable as they did in the first place, and like so many economic issues it boils down to one thing: trust. For example, anyone who's seen more of NYC than just JFK airport and Times Square k…

"Instead, as citizens, we should look at the regulations we have and ask if they still serve to protect people as they once did, or if they now exist to protect political and business interests." Those are grand words for defending a taxi company that uses an app with driver + passenger ratings as basis for arguing that it is not a taxi company and that it shouldn't need to employ actual drivers. Are you sure you did…

My comment was specifically a criticism of people making legal arguments in these forums. I'm not going to go ahead without a law degree, knowledge of Parisian taxi law, and the few snippets of legal arguments I read in articles, and start debating its legal standing and whether or not it's technically a "taxi" company.

Re: Two Uber managers detained in France over 'illicit' low-cost service

#74

Post by jkoudys »

dsp1234 wrote: post #60
jkoudys wrote: post #22

Every time this topic comes up, the discussion always revolves around whether or not Uber is properly licensed, or if it's fair for them to operate. What's often overlooked is the very reason so many of these licenses became as valuable as they did in the first place, and like so many economic issues it boils down to one thing: trust. For example, anyone who's seen more of NYC than just JFK airport and Times Square k…

fares are often 1/4 what's paid for a yellow taxi. Maybe this is the actual market rate for the service being provided, and not that people value it less.

It's definitely become a combination of the two. Originally the licensing did provide value to the consumer, because it meant a trusted authority was regulating things -- something people would value quite a bit, when you have to trust the driver not to deliberately harm or extort you. Depending on your region, it's more and more about artificially restricting the supply, so the market rate's probably much lower. I think dollar vans still charge much less than the market rate for a trustworthy taxi. I'd consider a trustworthy cab and a dollar van to be two separate offerings.

Re: Two Uber managers detained in France over 'illicit' low-cost service

#75

Post by jkoudys »

Shivetya wrote: post #36
jkoudys wrote: post #22

Every time this topic comes up, the discussion always revolves around whether or not Uber is properly licensed, or if it's fair for them to operate. What's often overlooked is the very reason so many of these licenses became as valuable as they did in the first place, and like so many economic issues it boils down to one thing: trust. For example, anyone who's seen more of NYC than just JFK airport and Times Square k…

When government conspires with business to create a shortage it needs to be shaken up. The cost to entry for taxi services should not be the absurd numbers quoted in many cities, a number which only exists to benefit the existing companies and the politicians they support. What likely annoys these people the most is that their little game is being called out. Regulation has its place, that is not stifling competition…

There are good arguments in favour of restricted supply, mainly because the roads themselves are publicly owned, and the public pays the cost of every extra vehicle on them. What's especially problematic about the way regulations are used now, is they're forcing the exact opposite outcome: uber (and others) are much better at efficiently routing cars to passengers. Taxis driving in loops around the city, waiting for someone to hail them, places far more of a strain on traffic than an uber driver.

Re: Two Uber managers detained in France over 'illicit' low-cost service

#76

Post by jkoudys »

Retric wrote: post #69
golergka wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that this comment lacked arguments, so I decided to provide an example of my logic. Let's imagine that there's a bad driver — nothing horrible enough to be newsworthy, but just bad manners, bad routes, stuff like that. Let's imagine that he operated at an individual taxi park. This means that to provide a feedback to authority, the user would have to spend his time to call the company, to "snitch" about the d…

Tips are the standard solution for this. Drivers end up making less when there rude. PS: My response to rating systems is to generally give everyone 1 or 2 stars. Otherwise you end up with https://xkcd.com/1098/ making the whole thing pointless.

That's a tricky approach for an international organization like uber to rely on, as the cultural attitudes toward tipping vary.

Re: Two Uber managers detained in France over 'illicit' low-cost service

#77

Post by willlma »

Retric wrote: post #69
golergka wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that this comment lacked arguments, so I decided to provide an example of my logic. Let's imagine that there's a bad driver — nothing horrible enough to be newsworthy, but just bad manners, bad routes, stuff like that. Let's imagine that he operated at an individual taxi park. This means that to provide a feedback to authority, the user would have to spend his time to call the company, to "snitch" about the d…

Tips are the standard solution for this. Drivers end up making less when there rude. PS: My response to rating systems is to generally give everyone 1 or 2 stars. Otherwise you end up with https://xkcd.com/1098/ making the whole thing pointless.

Drivers also rate you as a passenger. If they rated you 1-2 stars, you would never get picked up again. By doing what you're doing, you're making your drivers less likely to keep their jobs, just because they landed on some OCD individual who thinks (s)he's capable of restoring the average rating to 2.5. Uber and Lyft drivers need to keep their ratings in the 4.3-4.7 area in order to keep working, so please stop doing that.

Also: end up, they're, response, rating, thing

Re: Two Uber managers detained in France over 'illicit' low-cost service

#78

Post by dragonwriter »

willlma wrote: post #77
Retric wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tips are the standard solution for this. Drivers end up making less when there rude. PS: My response to rating systems is to generally give everyone 1 or 2 stars. Otherwise you end up with https://xkcd.com/1098/ making the whole thing pointless.

Drivers also rate you as a passenger. If they rated you 1-2 stars, you would never get picked up again. By doing what you're doing, you're making your drivers less likely to keep their jobs, just because they landed on some OCD individual who thinks (s)he's capable of restoring the average rating to 2.5. Uber and Lyft drivers need to keep their ratings in the 4.3-4.7 area in order to keep working, so please stop doin…

The whole reliance on fixed points on a 5-point rating scales either assumes that users share a common culture, or is blind to cultural differences in how ratings are applied which are well-known.

Anyone who does that is doing something so stupid that it should be undermined.

Re: Two Uber managers detained in France over 'illicit' low-cost service

#79

Post by mrgoldenbrown »

dylanjermiah wrote: post #65
mcuk2k wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The good thing about governments conspiring to create a shortage is that taxi drivers make a reasonable income. This is an aspect that Silcon-Valley-style technology platforms have no apparent interest in supporting. For example, as time progresses Adsense might sign up more and more publisher capacity, yet that pushes down the income and discourages respectable publishers from using the service. You go from a fairly…

A large majority of Uber drivers are former taxi drivers, you don't have to lease a vehicle for 45k per year, choose hours of work, and you have more control over passengers bad behaviour (two way rating system).

And what happens when Uber continues to lower the rates Uber drivers earn at? Eventually taxis will look like a better job again.

Re: Two Uber managers detained in France over 'illicit' low-cost service

#80

Post by viola11 »

dylanjermiah wrote: post #46
viola11 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Defending law violations only by arguing that they make "the economy" more efficient is not very convincing. Especially in this case since the real innovations that Uber brings in terms of ride allocation are not incompatible with paying taxes and insurance. Rather, the technical innovations of Uber appear to in themselves not be enough to actually compete with existing taxis, hence why the second innovation of actua…

Transportation being cheaper and more efficient means people save time and save money. Uber has also allowed hundreds of thousands of people with an income source. _That_ is a convincing argument to me. "Actually compete with existing taxis" They are competing, Uber is doing 3-5x more rides in SF than the taxis as a whole were doing before Uber. That's without including Lyft. So they're expanding the market, meaning…

Indeed they are competing with existing taxi services, but not as a taxi company, but rather as a "ride share", despite providing a taxis service, and branding themselves as such.

Given that they had the choice between acting and probably-illegally, I can find no reason to act questionably except profit expectations. This in turn means that Uber can reasonable be expected to have come to the conclusion that their technological innovations alone do not provide sustainable growth in the taxi market.

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