Uber?

Quote: Evenbob

They'll be easy to steal once they learn
how. I can see a lane on a freeway that's
for robot cars only, but mixing them
with human cars and pedestrians is
asking for disaster.

I think driverless semi's are ripe for plunder. Plus what will an automated truck do about a blow-out?

Quote: petroglyph

I think driverless semi's are ripe for plunder. Plus what will an automated truck do about a blow-out?

Or getting blown off the freeway. What
will stop vandals from ransacking the
contents.

Quote: petroglyph

Plus what will an automated truck do about a blow-out?

Call AAA?

Quote: Evenbob

Or getting blown off the freeway. What
will stop vandals from ransacking the
contents.

The thought right now is convoy 5 trucks with drivers in front and rear only. But this ignores that convoying is illegal and dangerous.

UBER in and out of AUSTIN:

Brief background: Austin, probably at the prodding of TaxiCab Companies, told Uber and Lyft to do full background checks including police fingerprint checks on drivers and treat drivers as employees entitltled to a minimum wage or at least a minimum 'cut' of the fare.

Uber and Lyft said "Adios, Austin"

Replacement-type local companies sprung up using Facebook and Uber/Lyft like platforms but these newcomers seem to lack full scale up platform stability and often service deteriorates at rush hours or special events.

Recently: SWSX and a downpour combined to have SWSX attendees all want rides at the same time and demand soared beyond ten fold with all local platforms so overwhelmed that smartphones were lucky to even get error messages rather than just static pages of No Cars Available as drivers were desperately seeking fares.

Stories all over about drivers who live in
their cars 5 days a week and go home
on weekends. They sleep in Uber packs
in parking lots of Walmart, closed McD's,
airports, malls, Safeway's are big in Calif
for this. It's the only way they can make
enough to support a family, driving 16
hours a day.

One guy says 2 years ago he was making
$40 an hour with Uber, now it's $12.50.
Uber lies to the drivers and the public
about everything, they have been sued
countless times. One thing Uber does in
big cities is have huge unannounced
fare increases for 2 hours at a time and
people don't notice until they see their
CC statement. A ride that usually cost
$11 was $44 last night.

Well, Uber slices its customers and its drivers. Understandable. They are not in business to provide a living wage to their drivers or to limit the number of drivers in a certain area so as to keep a core of high earning drivers. They are in business to make money by brokering demand and supply.

Quote: Fleastiff

UBER in and out of AUSTIN:

Brief background: Austin, probably at the prodding of TaxiCab Companies, told Uber and Lyft to do full background checks including police fingerprint checks on drivers and treat drivers as employees entitltled to a minimum wage or at least a minimum 'cut' of the fare.

Uber and Lyft said "Adios, Austin"

Replacement-type local companies sprung up using Facebook and Uber/Lyft like platforms but these newcomers seem to lack full scale up platform stability and often service deteriorates at rush hours or special events.

Recently: SWSX and a downpour combined to have SWSX attendees all want rides at the same time and demand soared beyond ten fold with all local platforms so overwhelmed that smartphones were lucky to even get error messages rather than just static pages of No Cars Available as drivers were desperately seeking fares.

The law that Austin passed in 2015 requires ride share drivers to pass fingerprint based background checks. It also requires a few safety measures like not allowing passenger pick up and drop off in a lane of traffic. However it does not impose any regulation on the pay or treatment of drivers. After the law passed Uber and Lyft funded a PAC that raised enough signatures to get a referendum election to repeal the law. They then spent millions of dollars more than has ever been spent in an Austin city election campaigning for the prop with deceptive ads, but Austin voted overwhelmingly against the prop thereby keeping the fingerprint regulation.

Uber and Lyft immediately ceased operations leaving a couple of other ride hailing companies struggling to hire enough drivers to make the model work. A few others moved in and within a few months a company based in Boston called Fasten and a local non profit start up called Ride Austin emerged as the most viable and signed up enough drivers so that the service works pretty well. There are now more ride share drivers here than when Uber and Lyft were in full operation. The new companies held up well for a few big demand events like the Austin City Limits music festival and the F1 race. Last Saturday showed that they are still having some growing pains, but they say the scaling problems are now fixed. SXSW just kicked off and the music part of it hasn,t even started yet, so they'll get a chance to prove it.

Quote: Evenbob

Stories all over about drivers who live in
their cars 5 days a week and go home
on weekends. They sleep in Uber packs
in parking lots of Walmart, closed McD's,
airports, malls, Safeway's are big in Calif
for this. It's the only way they can make
enough to support a family, driving 16
hours a day.

Most of these stories seem to come from CA, showing what a gilded society the state has. A few booming hi-tech areas and the rest people scrapping by any way they can to survive the unlivability of it all.

I am not of the belief that Uber will fail as a company, but not as an idea. Ride-sharing is here to stay. It will shake out for sure. Many new-economy things shook out. But Uber is trying to do to many things what with the autonomous car project. They keep bleeding cash. Sooner or later investors will turn off the spigot and someone will pick the bones in BK court.

Then a go will be made of it. Markets will sort out. The medallion model of limiting cabs is over.

Quote: AZDuffman

Markets will sort out. The medallion model of limiting cabs is over.

Agreed. Strict control via medallions was doomed anyway, after NYC started virtually giving away taxi medallions to blacks so Harlem dwellers would not burn taxicabs.

I think things will stabilize at some sort of acceptable difference between nocturnal Uber Hovels and heavily capitalized cab companies. The computer processing platforms have to become more robust and the event planners have to provide greater technical assistance such as portable cellular towers.