I suppose Uber's ease of use has inspired other companies, so it's great there was some competition. But now if Uber wants to return to Denmark, they must also obey the law.

I think in Europe we prefer to not have too much "disruption" and "lobbyism".

The big ongoing corruption case in Denmark right now is an IT company that paid for a $50,000 Dubai "research" trip with IT-bosses from the the local government (in hope of making it back for selling too-expensive IT equipment to the state)

There's a lot of people involved -- so far, a government employee has received a 4 month non-suspended prison sentence for receiving about $7,000 worth of iPhones etc.

Rather funnily, we had a Twilio in Nottingham too many years before Twilio was founded.

The difference between EU and American startups is that there are VCs investing huge sums in US companies so they can do mass advertising.

I don't think funding as such is the main problem in Europe though. We do have a few really rich tech people, as well as a lot of old wealth. What we don't have is the thousands of semi-rich people in the wake of the tech giants that can "repeat the cycle". Something especially needed since we haven't been spared the increase in housing costs.

1. They had the money to get the startup going 2. They had the technical expertise to (mostly) select good investments and cut through the bullshit. 3. They had experience with startups themselves; they were excellent mentors and had industry connections besides.

Now the system is in place, it seems rather magical.

I have never had a problem with the cabs where I live (and Uber is banned)

Anyway to add my anecdote as a counter to yours. I was back home in Scotland at Christmas last year. Private Cabs were all busy, so we tried an Uber wanted to charge nearly three times what the monopolistic black cabs (the ones you hail from the street) charge. My one and only experience with Uber and it didn't seem good.

You had a choice of NO CAB or an Uber at triple rate. Didn’t want to pay? Clearly someone else did. Economics at work.

One of my early experiences with Uber was much the same, trying to get my family home from the national zoo in Washington DC in a sudden rain storm. Cabs — not available. Uber — surge pricing. Totally worth it.

That said I use Lyft exclusively now because of Uber’s moral vacuum.

That's not what he said. Private-hire taxis are not the same as "black cabs". The first is more like what we'd call a car service in the US (call and schedule in advance). The second is what we know as a yellow cab (hail on the street).

I think 'Cabs Suck' was pretty ubiquitous comment in many many areas of the country pre uber/lyft; it's an industry that needed to be disrupted badly.

In general, the ability to know beforehand the price, is golden!

Adding to this: in countries payment can also be a problem, trivially solved via Uber. Take e.g. when I first arrived in South Korea and took an cab from the airport (fixed rates and in cabs in Korea are nice, so not a complaint there), the taxi couldn't take my card, and I didn't have 100k won in cash (accidentally took a luxury cab), so we had to drive around to find a bank that luckily took VISA.

Japan: Works great Turkey: Nope. Thailand: Nope. France: Works, but not always well

In a lot of countries, cab drivers are illiterate. And I don't mean functionally illiterate. I mean simply CAN NOT read. Not even a map. If you don't speak the language absolutely fluently, you're screwed.

You are citing some problems that aren't "uber vs taxi" but seem to be due to a lack of competition among taxis.

- Taxis shouldn't be allowed to reject you

- Taxis should all take cards, and preferably pre-payment

- Taxis should be bookable with apps

- Taxis should compete for service meaning a nice attitude and a nice car will be common.

So this isn't about "uber vs taxi" this is about monopoly taxi vs. non-monopoly taxi. Once the monopoly is out, Uber will just be like every other taxi company. And better still, all the taxi companies will be like Uber.

It might be that "taxi" in a lot of cities, especially US cities, are monopolies, have shitty cars, no apps, rude drivers etc. But that isn't because they are taxis, it's because they are a monopoly. Uber should be considered a taxi company, because they are taxi. But they should of course be allowed also to operate as a taxi, everywhere they want.

But that's not true. Uber doesn't fix these issues by being an "alternative", it fixes them by switching the incentives around. What this is about is "order a cab" vs. "hail a cab". By letting drivers opt into a ride, all of GP's issues disappear.

Of course you still do need competition once you're past that layer, yeah; taxi monopolies do sometimes offer cab-ordering services but those services still suck (Only available by phonecall with waiting time, no notifications, no prepayment etc). Simply removing the monopoly would not fix the issue entirely.

I can order a regular taxi via an app that is as good as Ubers, or hail one in the street, or go to a taxi stand (I doubt there will be an Uber at the stand, but there is nothing stopping them I suppose). Or I can order an Uber-. I'm not sure if I could actually hail an Uber on the street, but hypothetically if an uber driver was idling and saw I needed a taxi, I'm sure I could just take a seat and order the ride using the app from the passenger seat before we drive off.

Regardless of whether I order a regular taxi or an Uber, I can prepay, track it in the app etc. And regardless of whether I order an Uber or a regular car, I expect a nice driver and a reasonably new car (Not rarely a Tesla).

My point is: when there is no monopoly, the others can't afford to have an app, cars, or services that are worse than Ubers. Also, when there is no taxi monopoly, it's pretty natural that Uber is "taxi" like all the other taxi companies. They provide nothing that the others don't!

Depends on the market. In Las Vegas, for example, there is plenty of taxi competition, but the taxis only work the tourist zones. The reason the people of LV forced their local politicians to welcome Uber, above the objections of the taxi cartel, is because the taxis refuse to pick up the locals in the neighborhoods. There's no need to when they can make the same money, or better, being lazy working the tourists.

Uber and Lyft have been a godsend for people with limited mobility, the elderly, those who can't afford or choose not to have a car, and those who would like to have a nice night out without worrying about a DUI. Taxis are despised in Las Vegas. Their lobbying power is the reason the monorail system stops just short of the airport.

That is pretty much how things are here in Lithuania. The system works well, you don't really come across drivers or cars with issues, and there isn't really any kind of monopoly. There aren't many true taxis, because being a 'taxi' vs a 'private driver' means you pay more effectively just to be able to drive in bus lanes.

Historically people would phone up to book (and a car would turn up in under 10 minutes), but now you can use a single app to book and pay by card with all the different taxi companies (and get whatever car is quickest or cheapest). Uber were late to the game when they entered the market in 2015, and their launch has gone pretty much unnoticed.

To add more advantages to the list: Full price transparency, pre-agreed price so you don't need to worry that you drive in circles, no driver searching for change for several minutes until you let him keep it.

And, like McDonald's did for fastfood, it creates a world wide standard for taxi services. I had a driver in India that took me to tourist stores instead of my destination and in Mexico City they warn you about taxi drivers robbing you - all not happening in an Uber.

This isn't the case in the UK, it's always an estimate and I've had plenty of shitty drivers who don't know how to drive in London which have added 10 mins to a surge price journey because they've missed turnings, driven round in circles or taken the wrong bridge.

The local cab firm that exists only in my small home town has all these "innovations" too.

Maybe, in a way, Uber was a necessary evil. From following the discussions about it here for years now, I realize there are many places around the world where taxi situation is absolutely horrible. All of that created an opportunity for a bunch of evil assholes (and I'm not using these words lightly) with VC money to take over and earn money breaking laws, knowing in full that the locals will appreciate the increase in quality and decrease in price to the point of actually defending them from regulators.

In UK you either get a taxi which uses a calibrated tamper-proof taximeter and published rates per mile, or you use a cab which must offer the option of pre-agreed fee.

This dual system existed decades before Uber.

I'm pretty sure similar [0], and worse [1], is also happening on Uber/Lyft, just not to the same scale yet because of taxis services being far more established around the world.

But I don't see any reason why cab drivers would be any more criminal than ridesharing drivers. Unless ridesharing services do some extra deep background checking on their drivers, which I doubt is actually happening.

[0] http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/h...

[1] http://www.whosdrivingyou.org/rideshare-incidents

The use of apps to book rides makes it very easy to trace drivers if anything untoward happens.

Route tracking also makes it easy to reclaim if an indirect route is taken (I have successfully done this with Uber).

Route tracking could of course be implemented with traditional taxis, but at the moment is a reason why ride sharing is considered safer.

It was a he who got robbed by a she and it could only happen because he got drugged by the water she offered and then abused his trust-advance, towards ridesharing drivers, by asking to use his toilet.

Her getting caught on his surveillance cam, leaving the house only two hours later, probably did more leading to her arrest than her being an Uber driver instead of a Cab driver because the victim didn't remember a whole lot of anything after having been drugged.

> The use of apps to book rides makes it very easy to trace drivers if anything untoward happens.

Afaik taxis also keep logs about where they go, tho that might depend on the country we are talking about, just like the background check practices of any given ridesharing service.

But I don't see why regular taxi services couldn't do the background check that Uber supposedly does.

Tho I agree with your last two points, I still think the only real difference here is that criminals and scammers haven't fully adapted to these ridesharing services yet, but the potential is there none the less.

None of the above are impossible to have in regular cabs + app.

In fact tons of countries already have just that.

There is nothing about taxi definition that would exclude ubiquitous from it. There is nothing about taxi definition that would exclude companies with easy to use apps from it etc.

For instance: enough cities may not have preferred/dedicated public transport lane which makes significant costs based on waiting times, rather than distance: hence pre-agreed price is an estimate at best.

To me: Uber is a taxi company through and through and if there are local regulation Uber should not be able to circumvent them.

What?

Uber is the sole party that structures the relationship with its drivers and determines the rate it would pay them. Why is it not their problem or fault? And, if it’s not their problem, whose is it?

The driver is the sole party who decides each day whether or not the offer from Uber is worth it.

If drivers don't think it is worth it, they won't do it. If they do think it is worth it, why should I get in the way of their choice?

If Uber raises the rates they pay drivers, rates to customers will also rise. Economics suggests more people will be drivers at the higher rate, but fewer people will buy rides.

More supply and less demand probably won't make drivers happy, either.

And competitors can come in and undercut, as long as drivers are willing to accept the pay provided.

Essentially, when Uber raises fares it increases earnings in the short term, but not long term, because more drivers enter the system and push their earnings back down as each driver gets fewer rides.

Uber could solve this problem by limiting the number of drivers. But that of course turns some underpaid Uber drivers into unemployed ex-Uber drivers. Which doesn't sound like a desirable outcome either.

I think the EU is doing the right thing. It sometimes takes a while for government laws or competition to catch up and balance out issues, but I don't for a second think that any company is going to play nice if it does not have to.

They really are.

You seem to be effectively saying "well, if they can get away with it there's nothing wrong with that"

>> they are not charities or social organizations here to make the world a better place, they are here to make money for their shareholders.

There's a lot more to it than that, we are not a pure, unfettered capitalistic society in Europe.

Uber is a US based company and will try to follow the capitalistic model as much as possible unless restricted by local laws. I would never make an assumption that a US based company's goal is to do good. Assume they are out to maximize profit no matter where they operate. If they seem to do good then there is a driver in their business model where this leads to more profits than doing bad.

In this case I'm not sure I am - if there are laws that companies need to follow, even if they are not always strictly or consistently enforced, I would consider it the legal obligation of a company to follow them.

If it is proved illegal then Uber will owe these people back pay and possibly back benefits which might collapse Uber and that is fine. If you want to run that close to the edge of the law then you have to accept the risk. But let these laws and judgments catch up with the new economy/technology.

I am a contractor myself, and the law in this area is murky. But in the case of the gig economy it is being used as a tax and rights avoidance strategy, not honestly.

Uber have already lost at least one case in the UK in which drivers sought to be classified as employed.

The point is not that uber is good for ignoring regulation, the point is that the current regulations, borne from an age where things such as uber could not have existed, don't quite hold up in the age where things such as uber do exist.

If the choice for me is "behave according to inane regulation", or "break the regulations", or "update the regulations to reflect the reality of the situation" I will, in every case, like to see what's behind door number three.

Phrasing the uber-versus-taxis debate without the third option is just suffering under the yoke of bureaucracy. We can do better.

You take cabs with a company who have a history of all sorts of shady dealings, a history of evading laws, evading employment rights, evading inspections, avoiding taxes, duping inspectors, not cooperating with police and a ton of other stuff.

But it's OK because you don't like the way other firms operate a service you think is a bit shabby.

You might want to take more of a look around at what you're supporting. Lots of stuff can work better without the laws, until it doesn't and you realise the laws were there for a reason.

Hailo did this, all within the bounds of the standard regulatory framework by joining independent drivers to customers with all of the advantages that you provide.

They never annoyed anybody.

Sadly it seems they tried and failed to take on the less regulated markets and this was their undoing.

I miss Hailo and I hope somebody comes along with a credible replacement soon. MyTaxi is just plain awful and is probably the best marketing for Uber round these parts there has ever been!

There really isn't any critical intellectual property or secret sauce that should stand in the way ... just pure graft required.

Hopefully this will do the trick http://www.whistletaxiapp.com/

The contractors thing is a tax avoidance scheme at the sole advantage, and responsibility, of Uber.

And then a new cab company came to town, and were sufficiently innovative in the market to convince you to stop taking the train, and take their cabs.

Maybe it depends on the country you are from.

It doesn't avoid the misery of the train which suffers from overcrowding every day and frequent cataclysmic failures adding anything from 30 mins to hours to your commute.

If only more companies would get on board with remote working. There is literally no need for 90% of people to be in the office 5 days a week.

1. https://cdn.images.express.co.uk/img/dynamic/1/590x/tube-596...

2. http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2015/08/05/17/2B201BF40000057...

This. Worse case scenario in a city with a diverse economy is 50%, that is half of the people don't really need to be there in the first place.

I work remotely for a company who's headquarters are in a district which is a textbook example of bad urban planning.

Each time I have to be there for some reason I witness a sea of people in cars and public transport taking literally minutes to cross one intersection and I wonder - how and why do they put up with this?

Edinburgh and Newcastle both have thriving tech scenes with plenty of startups needing problems solved badly.

I also support public transport. I pay for a monthly pass, every month. Do I want that to be my only option? No.

So in practise you pay more than double, as the additional public transportation you take is 'free'? Just being curious.

None of the above is a problem when ordering cabs from a cab company's app. You don't need Uber to get accountable cabs, or to not have to haul them on the street.

(For reference, I'm in Australia.)

Edit: Does this mean people can now hail an Uber without needing an account or the app?

So I guess: Back to trams and walking?

I'd call up. I'd complain. They told me they'd take the feedback onboard, and they'd definitely do something.

And then, of course, they hung up and went back to doing whatever it is they did rather than providing customer service.

I can only assume this is because it wasn't worth it to them to bother, but I also know it's why there's a value proposition that supports uber, at least for my use case.

I don't know if uber drivers earn less than cab drivers, but I do know that uber drivers they tell me they earn more that their former cab jobs. I don't know if uber is a horrible company or not, but I do know that when I complain, they promise I'll never see that driver again.

I know that uber will actually show up to pick me up.

I know that the drivers are held accountable.

That's worth a lot. Worth enough to you? I don't know. Worth enough to me that I'd pay more than the going taxi rate, though.

Uber has "invested" billions of dollars (double digits) in making itself cheap. That tells me that if they were even just comparable in price to taxis, they would never be able to survive.

In the quiet words of the Virgin Mary, [citation needed].

Uber has invested millions of dollars into something. One of those things is, undoubtedly, expanding. One of the facets of expanding is, undoubtedly, lowering fares.

Does this mean that an uber-like service must run at a net loss in order to provide their service? Of course not.

Really?

Transportation service, not taxi.

When I call for taxi, they ask where I want to go, so the whole window situation never happen.

Not always rosey with Uber drivers. My first was in San Diego a few years ago: driver had been in town 2 days, asked us for directions, and spent the entire drive asking me about sexual activities he could find on Craigslist that was illegal in his country. Presumably it could have been a fraudulent situation and he was driving for someone else, which would likely get that person removed from Uber, but still, not a great intro to the service.

Bit of a silly stance and rant in my opinion.

I'll wait.

Of course, I've tasked you with an impossibility. You're saying I should use a service that doesn't exist. The only way that services like the one we're talking about work is by having a surfeit of vehicles available, and the only service that has that in Melbourne is uber.

You can call what I was saying a "silly stance", but you're saying that from a position of ignorance.

Perhaps, for a moment, you should consider the outside perspective.

On the other hand, if you do find the service I described, please let me know. I'd like to use it.

It's the same taxi drivers driving you today as would be driving you 4 years ago.

Phoning a cab here is looking for the local cab company number, getting shitty call quality, argue with an operator where you are, wait who knows how long for a cab you don’t how it looks like, explain the driver where you’re supposed to go, do the “fucking let me pay by card” dance.

Even trying one of the national cab company’s app only reduced that shittiness by half. It can be the same drivers at the wheel, the delivered service difference is still night and day.

BTW, I lived in London, public transport is not at all that bad; it's acceptable in Budapest, where I also used it quite a few times. If you can and are willing to afford a taxi, get a taxi, otherwise public transport is fine. (Not in Cambridge, though, there is no public transport in the night.)

So Uber is a better cab service, than the original one. Hopefully the upcoming regulations will result in only slightly increased pricing and a more sustainable system (keeping the drivers in mind).

Your argument is akin to arguing juciero is not a juice machine. it's a connected juice delivery experience that is uniquely distinguishable from the act of making juice from solids.