The problem with this comparison is that image hosting services have a really low social and political impact. Ride sharing on the other hand... can't really be a giant Ponzi scheme.

I'll bite, which ride sharing program isn't running on investment capital and is actually supporting itself?

They all look like Ponzi schemes at the moment.

Good old traditional taxi service makes money. They even have apps now.

Ostensibly "ride sharing" is different than a taxi service. That's the argument Uber uses to avoid taxi regulations.

Haven't they been devastated by Uber and Lyft?

Regulated taxis are ponzis alright, it's just rigged by governments and investment is forced upon citizens. Absolutely no reason why an extremely commoditized good like transportation should have fixed rates set by a central planner. Uber/Lyft et al may not be perfect, but we will get there. It's tough to deregulate industries.

But, your rant does nothing to invalidate his point. Cabbies are in plus money wise. Chances are zero all taxis in the world will vanish, while Uber+lift can't subsidize forever.

Taxis are subsidized by artificial scarcity (medallion quotas).

Look, it's not like taxis or Uber/luft are a basic human necessity to be subsidized.

Public transport exist, and for people that actually need a car on a daily basis, cars exist.

Taxis are luxury service and not subsidized ( as that word is defined in the dictionary) by money offsets. We can derail this into whether medallions/insurance regulation should be there, but the hard cold argument here is : Money. Lots and lots of money.

Uber/luft are subsidized by hard cash just to exist.

I drive, so from the outside, this looks as if somebody was subsidizing Android watches, because they'll overtake real watches.

It's a business gamble, but many are mistakenly taking it as a fact.

So, correspondingly, expect either prices to keep rising on Uber/luft/etc, or them to go out of business.

Only in certain jurisdictions

Is there a major US city where taxis are not regulated and licensed (by medallion or otherwise) creating an artificial scarcity?

I'm not familiar enough with the US taxi bylaws to answer that.

Is there a particular reason you are restricting scope to only the US? Taxis and "ride sharing" organizations are an international phenomenon: I'd say the majority of jurisdictions do not have medallions. And the upstream point remains - most taxis can now be hailed via mobile apps.

I think by "can't" he means "shouldn't."

Yeah, I meant "shouldn't". Sorry about that.

Ah, yeah, I see that now.