These companies are mining society of a public good for their own benefit. It's a tragedy of the commons where only a handful of actors are the ones destroying the commons.

There are arguments against "dockless" cars that are always trotted out when these scooters come up but if you park like an asshole, that is to park outside of a single parking spot, you are likely to get your car keyed or damaged as well.

I don't see how this author could be anything but completely ignorant of social norms with public spaces or this is a submarine pr piece when they write like this is surprising

Edit: It especially seems like a pr piece when they talk about the jobs they bring to the area as a plus when we see how exploitative these jobs are from the people that perform them[1]

[1]https://slate.com/technology/2018/05/charging-bird-scooters-...

People stealing scooters to scam the Charging fee hardly seems like Bird exploiting anyone.

Bird is exploiting people by selling them on a pie in the sky view that this job can earn decent money when its wrought with fraud that they are aware of. Some people disagree, but my personal view is that this is a job for an employee that Bird is trying to foist off onto "contractors" who have far less protections, so that they can earn more money than competitors who would operate ethically

When you smash one you are saying “i vote car.” I vote to continue to make the status quo system of cars how we move from point a to b. And there are a lot of problems with cars. Are you sure you want to be on team car?

> When you smash one you are saying “i vote car.” I vote to continue to make the status quo system of cars how we move from point a to b. And there are a lot of problems with cars. Are you sure you want to be on team car?

You're being too black and white. These people could really just be against "team dockless" [1].

There's also nothing wrong with being on "team car."

[1] https://www.google.com/search?q=dockless+bike+pile&source=ln...

Cars are left in public too: https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=parked+cars

> Cars are left in public too: https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=parked+cars

You'll notice the cars in those photos are not piled haphazardly in the middle of the street, obstructing traffic; but rather in neat rows on the side in spaces designated for them.

You could arguably call a parking space a dock for a car.

Right now the cars have all the parking spaces where scooters could go! I think dockfull will happen as we remove more and more cars.

I live in K-Town in LA. I'm convinced these scooters are perfectly suited for getting and my neighborhood, but they haven't rolled out here yet... So I have been bringing back carloads of them from Venice and Santa Monica and introducing them myself. I'm only doing like 4 a day, but I've already seen a number of them being used that I dropped off (I vandalize with a distinct but subtle mark on the neck of the scooters to 'track em')

A few anecdotal observations I've had:

- People in Venice hate them more than in Santa Monica. Way more are damaged intentionally in a way that ends up being super useful for me: they use a sharpie to block out the barcode. Since I go out in the evening it's rare to find fully charged scooters in a nice line, which these jackpots are. It's easy to clean it off with nail polish remover.

- People are very curious and positive about them in K-Town so far. One time I pull into the parking lot of Boba Bear and drop off a few off.. and got a free boba tea as the manager said that it helps his business. Since I like to go there I end up leaving scooters there, and it's almost as if it's known as a hub for them. :)

- The crowdsourced recharger contractors do not mind coming out here to pick up low battery scooters. They never stick around.

- The biggest menace of these things is there damn beeping. It's loud and annoying as all hell, Jesus fuck.

- The biggest danger these present are janky scoots with bad breaks, or sticky/erratic acceleration. A lot of these scoots are beat up badly, but are still working and being used.

- Lime let me sign up as a 'Juicer', bird has me in queue. I interpret this as lime having less oversight on that process, since my address is not in an area they try to service. I haven't received the charger kit yet though, all this is just happened in last few days.

Personally I think of this as a fun robin hood style adventure. It will be interesting to see how perception evolves.

I'm not sure that destroying property really counts as "frightening" or "very violent."

It's pretty damn environmentally wasteful.

Mods please fix clickbait title

After you smash the scooters please put them into a recycle bin