This could not be further from the truth. As someone who was driving full-time in Austin when this happened, I can absolutely say this hurt both the drivers and the passengers.

The apps were extremely buggy for both drivers and passengers causing missed rides, multiple drivers showing up to the same rider, etc. Fasten paid the best, but it still would only be marginally better if not the exact same as I was making with Uber or Lyft.

As far as what happened in Austin, there were absolutely no good replacements and us drivers (at least the ones I talked to) were very happy when they returned.