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Trends: Uber vs. Lyft

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Re: Trends: Uber vs. Lyft

#41

Post by chadillac »

ethanhunt_ wrote: post #14

Only got through the first two links before I stopped reading. First link: says that Uber CEO Travis comes off as a bit of an ass in interviews, and therefore Uber should hire a PR person. So you're switching to Lyft because they have better PR people? Second link: an article with a headline that is misleading and would have a good run at being ruled libelous. TLDR: Travis said "I love [self driving cars] all day lon…

Biggest expenses AND biggest liabilities.

If I could take a self driving Uber/Lyft/taxi I would do it in a heart beat, my experiences with Uber/Lyft have been much better than a run of the mill taxi which is why I tend to use them over taxis whenever possible. That being said, a self driving car with no personal motives, road rage, cell phone, etc. sounds like an even better experience.

Re: Trends: Uber vs. Lyft

#42

Post by yummyfajitas »

moab wrote: post #30
yummyfajitas wrote: post #21

Why do we dislike Uber? Lets go through the links. 1) Stuff about the CEO's personal life. 2) CEO wants to automate business processes. Those of us in tech would never consider replacing humans with machines, right? 3) Trying to compete for workers. (Didn't we hate Apple/Google for agreeing not to do this?) 4) We love Peter Thiel and he hates it. 5-7) A few Uber drivers are crazy (Uber is helping the cops). Note that…

I feel like you're playing the devil's advocate here. Despite the recent witch-hunt surrounded the company lately (which I won't try to defend), you can't deny the fact that they've engaged in some fairly unscrupulous business tactics in order to 1) acquire drivers from competing ride-sharing services, and 2) significantly drop wages (primarily due to competition in cities with multiple ride-sharing services) at the…

I'm simply pointing out more or less nonsensical arguments and mob behavior. The Uber CEO may be an objectivist jerk, but that doesn't mean everything he does is evil.

2) significantly drop wages (primarily due to competition in cities with multiple ride-sharing services)...

Companies competing for workers drops wages? That's an interesting economic theory. I guess the Uber people who were hiring lyft cars in order to try and recruit the driver were saying "come join Uber, we'll pay you less?"

I'm confused here.

Re: Trends: Uber vs. Lyft

#44

Post by dnautics »

finnn wrote: post #37

Last time I tried Lyft it wouldn't let me login without a Facebook account. Has that been fixed?

You can now do it via email only. If you are often in heavily crowded areas (like bars around 2am), I strongly recommend uploading a picture so the driver can recognize you in the masses.

I can also get you a referral code :) pm me.

Re: Trends: Uber vs. Lyft

#45

Post by moab »

eksith wrote: post #36
moab wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think what'll come out of this entire experiment is something very, very similar to the current taxi industry - simply with better apps and dependability, and I will not complain at all. A little part of me suspects that this will not be Uber (at least in America, where the regulatory blockade feels really impenetrable as an engineer), although at this point it's anyones game.

My honest hope when I first heard of Uber was that it would give a huge wakeup call to the industry. Let's face it, America is a service industry and many of its services suck. The attitude is marginal at best, horrifying at worst. I hoped this level of customer scrutiny on performance would bring it up to the same level as in Japan. I'm still hoping someone will make it happen. Or rather, perhaps an entire army of s…

Your point reminds me of that recent New Yorker article on learning [1]. In particular, the author points out how particularly niche industries (competitive sports, theatre, orchestras) have seen significant improvements in median performance over the past few decades. However, this has been limited mostly to fields where there are a small number of potential openings and a pool of candidates significantly larger than the number of openings. One of the big questions I think about sometimes is how America can push its citizens and employees to be a little more disciplined/dedicated (ahh not exactly clear how to phrase that..) purely through economic manipulation (and not cultural impetus a la Japan).

[1] http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/11/10/better-time

Re: Trends: Uber vs. Lyft

#46

Post by fixedd »

ihaveajob wrote: post #32
sinak wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So I cycle around SF, but am considering stopping. The data varies depending on which source you use, but it seems like cycling is about 3 times less dangerous than motorbiking, and considerably (at least ~5-10x) more dangerous than driving. Most people who've lived in SF have plenty of anecdotal evidence of friends who've been hurt, often seriously, by bike accidents. I'd love to be proven wrong about this: I love c…

It has been shown that the biggest factor in bike safety is the number of cyclists on the road. The more bikes, the more aware drivers are of our presence. In SF, Critical Mass had (I've learned) a huge impact in breaking ground for bike infrastructure. Currently, the Bay Area Bike Share has become a strong factor. If we stop biking now until it's safer, it might never be so.

There's also been shown to be an inverse correlation between wearing a helmet and safety. It seems that motorists correlate "having a helmet on" with being safe, and so are more aggressive around those who are wearing.

Re: Trends: Uber vs. Lyft

#47

Post by kjksf »

rtpg wrote: post #18
sswezey wrote: post #3

This article lacks any kind of substance: it is a short summary of a couple of links about Über with an accompanying graph of the blogger's Über/Lyft usage.

The author has stated that he has reached his breaking point, and others should consider whether they have too. Disruptive companies have this narrative of being some sort of underdog fighting against the corrupt elite of a broken industry. If I'm going to agree with letting them take their huge margins (partly due to illegally not implementing regulations/collecting the proper taxes), they can at least pretend not t…

Uber breaks the law, everybody knows about it and yet no one goes to jail or get sued.

How does that happen? How does Uber avoids any consequences for their flagrantly illegal (according to you) behavior?

Do they have magic "get out of jail" card?

Did they manage to buy police, district attorneys, judges, the whole enchilada?

Is it time to turn to street to overthrow our government, which, at least according to you, is incapable of performing it's function of preserving law and order in the face of those blatant criminals from Uber.

Re: Trends: Uber vs. Lyft

#48

Post by philwelch »

msoad wrote: post #20

I stopped using Uber about six months ago. Lyft is both cheaper and more fun. Most of drivers I rode with were not full time driver. For me it's always fun to meet new people who are doing all sort of different things in their life.

Lyft sounds like it's more for extraverts--to me, the idea of sitting in the front seat, fist-bumping the driver, and riding around in a car with a stupid pink mustache on it sounds horrifying in much the same way that going on a cruise ship or getting caught in a cheesy tourist trap sounds horrifying. I think it's great that there are different services for different customers though.

Re: Trends: Uber vs. Lyft

#49

Post by general_failure »

This is silly. Make decisions based on actual experiences rather than hearsay in media.

It is honestly appalling that you are attributing thus decisions to some sort of higher moral ground. If you are an american, that country wages war and kills at will. IPhone are made at foxconn, most products are made in China who gives a shit about our planet. I could go on. Did you quit all these already?

Re: Trends: Uber vs. Lyft

#50

Post by codezero »

birken wrote: post #23

If you live in San Francisco, you might consider getting a bike and/or using public transportation instead of ride-sharing services. Either of them are better for the city by reducing congestion and pollution, and biking in particular is surprisingly fast and convenient. If you are interested in getting introduced to biking, there are a bunch of free classes by the SF Bicycle Coalition that I highly recommend you loo…

I just started biking to/from caltrain and in the first week, I've already had someone try to steal my bike off the train and have nearly been hit by several cars in completely un-extraordinary circumstances.

I'm sticking with it, but it doesn't paint a great picture for biking over other forms of convenient, readily available transport. Also the initial cost of biking, even when going for a super cheap bike and gear was ~$400, which will only pay for itself after ~6 months assuming I don't need to buy more gear (I already know I will, to deal with rain, and repairs).

My alternative was paying $50 for monthly parking at the caltrain station. My cost estimate includes the price of gas to get to and from the caltrain station.

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