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LibreTaxi – A free and open source alternative to Uber and Lyft

libretaxi.org

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Re: LibreTaxi – A free and open source alternative to Uber and Lyft

#271

Post by rthomas6 »

saint_fiasco wrote: post #263
uncletammy wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If only there existed a peer-to-peer version of electronic cash that would allow online payments to be sent directly from one party to another without going through a financial institution . Maybe one of these days...

In my country most cell phones are on pre-paid plan. You can buy cell phone credits at a gas station, then that credit gets used up as you make calls and send messages. When the cell phone companies came up with a service to transfer cell phone credits to other users, people started using that as currency. Only problem is each company runs its own proprietary system and there is no way to send credit to a someone who…

In a few countries like Kenya and Tanzania, this concept is already in use and is extremely widespread. A LOT of people use this system instead of having a bank account. They even use it to pay bills and buy things at stores.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M-Pesa

Re: LibreTaxi – A free and open source alternative to Uber and Lyft

#272

Post by bcook »

ralmeida wrote: post #202
bcook wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not completely sure whether you're referring to cash or Bitcoin.

How does cash vary in value? If you have a $50 bill, you can expect to buy a very predictable amount of food (for example) next week, regardless of what happens. Not so much if you have 0.0521 BTC.

There are plenty of cash currencies, aside from USD, that fluctuate wildly.

Re: LibreTaxi – A free and open source alternative to Uber and Lyft

#273

Post by usrusr »

SilasX wrote: post #243
galdosdi wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Shouldn't be an obstacle. This is already exactly how normal, hailable, regulated taxis work (at least in much of the USA, and certainly in NYC -- I can't speak for elsewhere). That's why taxi driver is (at least in the US) a statistically more dangerous occupation than police officer. From the point of view of a driver, this scheme is less dangerous than the status quo, at least there is potentially a little more pa…

I have to disagree that this is "exactly how normal taxis work". Notable differences (many apply to Uber/Lyft also): 1) There's no check to ensure that the vehicle is ensured for commercial rides before they start taking hails. 2) Likewise, no background check. 3) No regulatory body to investigate cases of e.g. scamming passengers out of money or refusal to comply with agreed-upon rates and dropoff. [1] 4) The local…

All those points would not be an obstacle to an open source solution that is not trying to build a grand unified global Uber drop-in for random rideshare drivers to sign up with, but instead only ("only") tries to be an installable turn-key solution for existing operators (or regional federations thereof) to add the smartphone hailing user experience to their existing offering, without much investment.

I did not find a clear answer on the site wether this project is aiming at independent ridesharing or at being a turn-key solution for more conventional taxi dispatch organisations. There is the idea of "hack and tune it for your city", which is clearly not the global approach, but then they also advertise "1-minute hiring", which is definitely not what I would be looking for if I were to customize it for my hypothetical preexisting organisation.

Something like wordpress or the myriad open source online shop systems, but for taxi dispatch and with a unified smartphone client (or client protocol, actually) that can work with all installations. That might be the best way to avoid a single gobally dominant private network that can set their "tax" on all rides at will. The app/clients might be supported for discovery by a global registry of regional installations and some trust management, but it might actually be not only easier but also more reliable to just leave that to plain old web, with something like libretaxi:-URIs to connect the app to a regional network discovered by your search engine of choice.

Re: LibreTaxi – A free and open source alternative to Uber and Lyft

#274

Post by stOneskull »

valuearb wrote: post #224
angry-hacker wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But do you have anything to compare it with? Regular taxis, just hitchhiking etc? Maybe the whole safety thing is just fearmonger.

We know the whole safety thing is a fear monger.

if people are worried, they shouldn't use it.

let the trailblazers get axed and eventually the trust ratings will build up on the non-murderers.

then they can use it.

Re: LibreTaxi – A free and open source alternative to Uber and Lyft

#275

Post by tekklloneer »

rail2rail wrote: post #264
cyber_mango wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I call this false. Got proof?

AZERBAIJAN MANAT ZAMBIAN KWACHA BELARUSIAN RUBLE All currencies, all are as volatile as can be.

And those three markets also accept (and even more highly value) stable currencies. Bring a Euro to any store in Belarus and it'll be accepted at a greater value than the listed exchange rate.

Re: LibreTaxi – A free and open source alternative to Uber and Lyft

#276

Post by jeremyboom8 »

timthelion wrote: post #51
throwanem wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FOR SALE: One-room cabin, rural Montana. Lovely vistas, no neighbors. One previous owner. Great fixer-upper! Manual typewriter provided; must supply own explosives, packaging, target list, and postage.

No neighbors? “The honest truth is that I am not really politically oriented. I would have really rather just be living out in the woods. If nobody had started cutting roads through there and cutting the trees down and come buzzing around in helicopters and snowmobiles I would still just be living there and the rest of the world could just take care of itself. I got involved in political issues because I was driven t…

Tim, are you ok?

Re: LibreTaxi – A free and open source alternative to Uber and Lyft

#277

Post by usrusr »

SippinLean wrote: post #198
galdosdi wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Medallion has nothing to do with it, any TLC licensed driver can rent a medallion cab. To get a TLC license you pass a BS exam that anyone can pass and a background check, and get an ID. I don't see why LibreTaxi, in areas that have a individual driver licensing scheme, couldn't require that. You just look at the driver's license when you get in, or they post it on the back seat. The license information is recorded i…

passing an exam, obtaining a license and passing a background check sound like a much more thorough vetting process than the "1-minute hiring" on this app

As far as I understand it the "1-minute hiring" is not something the people behind libretaxi are actually doing, it's something people running a libretaxi instance would do.

Or hopefully they would rather not, at least if they are serious about it and are not just running on a short-lived inspiration to play pretend-Kalanick.

Re: LibreTaxi – A free and open source alternative to Uber and Lyft

#278

Post by lagadu »

mschuster91 wrote: post #78
jasode wrote: post #54

>, pay cash upon arrival. Paying cash is a non-starter. I haven't been to a bank ATM in over 10 years. I don't even know what my card's secret PIN is to make a cash withdrawal. Being virtually cashless by using credit-cards for everything is very common in professional circles. A credit-card is simpler and the exact line-item amount showing up on my monthly statement helps me keep track of travel expenses. (Also, man…

> Paying cash is a non-starter. That certainly depends on the country. Good luck living cashless in Europe, especially in Germany where virtually no small store, food vendor etc. has a CC reader.

Varies wildly: come a few km northwards to Denmark and you'll easily go on for months without seeing a single banknote while living here. Hell in the past couple years I've withdrawn euros many more times than I did dkk because of trips to Germany: I need it far more often there than anywhere else in western and southern Europe. It's incredibly annoying.

Re: LibreTaxi – A free and open source alternative to Uber and Lyft

#279

Post by em3rgent0rdr »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #269
em3rgent0rdr wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

because there is no centralized determinator of trust.

Web of trust doesn't have a centralized determinator. You assign trust to people you've interacted with, and they assign trust to people they have interacted with, etc. Putting it on a blockchain doesn't make that more effective. If you look at the reviews of strangers, you have to figure out which ones are real and which ones are fake... it works exactly the same with or without blockchain.

putting it on the blockchain provides a mathematical proof that entity X got score Y. That itself doesn't solve the problem of proving that entity X corresponds to person P. Although person P could tie something such as driver's license number to entity X. Of course that could be done with a centralized trust system as well. But with the centralized trust too, but also requires trusting the centralized trust, and makes everyone subservient to that centralized trust.

Re: LibreTaxi – A free and open source alternative to Uber and Lyft

#280

Post by em3rgent0rdr »

em3rgent0rdr wrote: post #260

with #DeleteUber trending, I think now would be a great time to promote this, but I think needs the following: (1) ought to use a fully open-source messaging backend instead of Telegram (closed server). Would be great if could interface to the Telegram bot with a variety of messaging systems. (2) needs to work without a dataplan if to be viable in rural areas (Silence, the SMS-fork of Signal) (3) needs to easily acce…

clarification: after testing out the app, it seems clear that passenger and driver could agree on any mutually-agreeable payment method. But it would be nice to have something integrated.
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