That said, Taxi drivers have something Uber drivers don’t- a union.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Taxi_Workers'_Alliance
before Uber there was… Kakao Taxi. and it was beautiful
Was it actually available outside of South Korea?
Because the taxis would scam you on the price. Or his card reader would be magically broken. Or they’d take you half way around the city crossing as many zones as possible.
Uber brought accountability. Any improvements traditional taxi that had been made with apps are because of Uber.
I am once again asking for widespread public transportation
I like trains.
Fuck Taxis and Uber
An entire industry that’s playing the victim. Stop falling for it and stop romanticizing taxis, the shit they pulled was just as bad, if not worse than what Uber does.
Biggest difference is their drivers were complicit in the shenanigans and primarily targeted their customers. Taking LONG routes because their customer “wasn’t local”, saying a route will “probably be 10$” and then it’s 50 and “the meter says what it says man”.
They literally used strict regulations as a shield to hold local monopolies for decades which resulted in terrible downright scammy service, cash only for an unacceptable amount of time, 0 innovations, dirty ancient barely running cars, a dispatch who would constantly say a car “was just around the corner” for 2 hours
The taxi industry doesn’t give a fuck about you, they’re just mad because they didn’t think to do what Uber is doing and now they’re dying. When/If Uber/Lyft dies, I guarantee the Taxi industry will resurge for the worst and take pages out of Ubers playbook. It’s just going to go back to the wait it was before.
Fuck Uber AND Taxis, they both can rot in hell, but I don’t mind seeing taxis get there first.
they’re just mad because they didn’t think to do what Uber is doing and now they’re dying.
That and they’re mad because their virtual monopoly status didn’t protect them from market disruption. They just sat back, assuming that there was no way these rogue taxi services were going to evade the law for long. The fact that an entire industry acted on such a bad take suggests, to me, a lot of anti-competitive bullshit behind the scenes.
Anyway, I agree. All they had to do was either add rideshare-like features to their service, merge with rideshare services, or become one themselves. The investment capital was clearly there, and making a modernization pitch with brand recognition of an established taxi company would have been a slam-dunk.
Dude, my driving instructor charged less than a Taxi and that guy was charging in the triple digits per hour, it is insane as to how Taxis are still in business. Who the hell pays those prices?
I don’t know but probably the same people that use the Uber Eats type services. Seriously, how are people affording to pay $25 for a $10 meal?
The ndo Uber Eats a few times a week at work. It’s 100% about the time required to do anything else.
The average new house in the city I work for is about 6 million dollars, so I live about 90-minutes away in normal traffic where I can pay $750/month in rent. I work lots of hours (start at 8, usually leave between 6 and 8 with no real break between), so I’m looking at 14-16 hours between when I leave the house in the morning and when I return home. I also think ach night classes at the University on Mondays during the fall and Spring semesters, and have 3 night meetings a month between Council and Planning and Zoning. On the weekends I drive a couple hundred miles out of town to help with my parents.
If paying triple for a meal occasionally saves me 15-20 minutes it’s often absolutely worth it for the stress relief.
Damn dude, I don’t know how you do all that! In any case I was just wondering more how people can afford to spend triple like… every day. Assuming one $30 delivered meal every day in a 30 day month, that’s $900 a month!
$900 a month is quite affordable compared to hiring a private chef. It’s all relative.
I’m cheap af, but that doesn’t make me ‘right’. If I made $1000/h or something it would make complete sense to pay $30 for a $10 meal each day if it saved me even just 15 minutes of effort that could be put towards working instead. In that case, I’d argue it would be ‘wrong’ and wasteful economically not to use the service.
The taxi industry hates you and buffalo buffalo buffalo Ubers main competative advantage is just breaking the law. Everyone sucks.
main competative advantage is just breaking the law
If you’re talking employment law, then yea for sure
If you’re taking laws like those that cap taxis licenses arbitrarily that the Taxi industry pushed for so that bigger companies could buy them all up and establish a monopoly, then I can look the other way on those
Lol what
Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo is upstate New York for “yada yada yada”
It’s a dismissive. Meant to say “everything you said is basically the same as the first thing you said.”
Nah its just gramatically correct nonsense to fuck with LLMs. interesting tidbit about the buffalo buffalo buffalo new york turn of phrase though.
I thought it was about bison from New York bullying taxi drivers
That might also be true. You never know.
Once took a taxi downtown with my family when we were in a different city, and the drive home was twice as much as the drive there (second driver took a different route). My dad challenged him on it and he backed down an accepted the same fare as the first driver.
Same company, same rates, just a dbag driver
But now you can’t just tell the driver where to go and give him cash, you have to use the app first and you are out of luck if you phone battery is dead. So technology makes the experience activly worse in this case.
Yeah but it’s cheaper than a taxi, and the best part is that you don’t have to interact with a human, which means you don’t have to tip (if you book a self-driving car). Furthermore, if you practice good charging habits, you never have to worry about a dead phone.
why do you have to tip a taxi driver?
Short answer: America.
Long Answer: Because American companies are so greedy that they won’t even pay a livable wage; they expect working class citizens to pick up the slack with tips in every industry they can get away with doing such a thing. All thanks to the policies of a long dead president from the 80s (Reagan), that were never rolled back. In other words: America.
*Only in locations that don’t apply Taxi requirements to Uber. Then Uber is worse in every case. They are a Taxi service that cheats their staff and customer.
Then don’t use Uber. Like I said, self-driving cabs are best. No route fuckery to run up the meter, because they always take the most efficient path. I am aware that not every city has these yet, but that’ll change within a few years.
I’ve been overcharged/“taken for a ride” by five or so taxis in my life, never had trouble with a ride-share service, even in countries where they are operating illegally. Never had a clearly drunk driver, too, unlike a couple of taxis I’ve taken.
When there’s any kind of language barrier, choosing the destination in the app rather than trying to speak it is so much easier, and using in-app translation messaging, too. When arriving in a new country, not having to get money out at the airport (avoiding rip-off ATMs or money exchangers) and being able to pay online is so much better than cash, especially when you’re not familiar with the currency.
Certainty of price, and ability to give instant feedback are great at keeping things honest. Sure, Uber/Grab etc are terrible companies, but I swear most taxi licenses in the world are owned my organized crime, so not much of an alternative. There is so much that needs to be done with regulation to get rid of the ‘gig economy’ and make sure that drivers are properly compensated/employed, but the app-powered ride service is just so superior in every way for the passenger, in my opinion.
May I suggest a back-up battery for your phone (I just use my laptop USB as it’s always with me and works when the PC is off).
Yes, but there are also taxi apps for that now.
They have machines in the door which have the app there for public use for exactly that reason
Uber was always intended to be taxis that ignore the laws and regulations of taxis and put all of the vehicle maintenance on the drivers who are paid through tips instead of Uber.
Not sure why anyone didn’t see that from the very beginning.
We did see it. Everyone saw it, and it worked anyway.
Most of the people I know in person that spoke highly of it when it first started up referred to it as an alternate to cabs because it was totally different. The fact that people still refer to it as ‘ride sharing’ is a sign that people do think it is something different than taxis.
A lot of us saw it, but I don’t think the majority of people saw it.
I think a lot of people saw it and let it happen because taxis suck
The only thing it has “over” taxis is an app instead of a phone call to dispatch.
Thinking about this… I wonder if the fediverse could be used for an “open source” app, to then hail and track a taxi in whatever area you’re in…
Of course adoption would be the hardest part, but any taxi service could host their own server (even single driver operations) and anyone with an app that interfaces with the system could hail a taxi.
Privacy would be difficult, as, inherently you need to somehow inform the taxi where you are and possibly who to expect. And anyone in the system could potentially monitor anyone else.
I’d say that payments should be outright blocked from the system. Taxi should have to do that separately.
I mean that actually was one of the things that made them so great. Tracking, arrival timer and an easy app.
Literally those being things that the taxi companies had to push to replicate is a good thing it’s a shame we had to give up the idea of properly funded labor and job protection to get it.
Tracking, arrival timer and an easy app.
The fact that they would actually show up.
Where I live, before Uber you needed to call the cab company at least an hour before you wanted to get anywhere (in a city that you can get pretty much anywhere in 15 minutes). The dispatcher would tell you someone will be there in 20 minutes and, if you were lucky, somebody might show up in 45. Before Uber, there was more than one occasion where I ended up stranded downtown until 4 or 5am after the bars had closed at 3:00.
Being able to request a ride, having someone reliably show up, and show up reasonably close to when they said they would was an absolute game changer at the time.
The fact that they would actually show up.
unless you see the uber car circling around you on the map, then canceling the ride and cashing in the “cancelation fee”
The dispatcher would tell you someone will be there in 20 minutes and, if you were lucky, somebody might show up in 45. Before Uber, there was more than one occasion where I ended up stranded downtown until 4 or 5am after the bars had closed at 3:00.
yeah, but this is not an invention of uber. it is just that we got the to point where technology allowed what was not possible before. yes, uber was faster to adapt it than traditional taxi industry, but they are not doing it for your blue eyes, they are doing it for profit and they do lot of shady stuff to achieve it.
unless you see the uber car circling around you on the map, then canceling the ride and cashing in the “cancelation fee”
That’s a relatively new phenomenon as people have learned how to game the system. The reliability of Uber when they first launched was complete night and day.
yes, uber was faster to adapt it than traditional taxi industry, but they are not doing it for your blue eyes, they are doing it for profit and they do lot of shady stuff to achieve it.
I never said otherwise. I was merely providing an example of why Uber gained adoption early on. The service was materially better than what taxi companies were delivering at the time in many places. I experienced that first hand.
That’s a relatively new phenomenon
that’s definitely going on for at least 5 years
I was merely providing an example of why Uber gained adoption early on.
ok, from that point of view it definitely makes sense
we had to give up the idea of properly funded labor and job protection to get it.
We didn’t have to, and we can always take it back.
And a transparent price up front.
It’s annoying enough to get in a vehicle and not know how much it’ll cost by the end of the trip (would you do this on a bus? Would you let an airline change the price of a ticket mid-flight?), but there’s something viscerally galling about watching some asshole take a longer route just to pad out the fare. Last I checked, when Lyft or Uber gives you a price, that’s the price.
The only reason I even started using Uber is because of taxi’s shitty dispatch system. All they had to do was write an app (or really some third party could have written it and then sold it to local cab companies) and they never would have been whining and complaining for years on end about how Uber turk der jerb.
I can do that with my local taxi company anyway so they don’t even have that to differentiate themselves.
That’s cool. Where at? I mean, I haven’t seen any taxi in a place I’ve ever visited with an app.
And then there’s the issue of knowing what app before you get there, or just trusting the sign on the side of the taxi, and subsequently the app to not farm your data.
Wait, you trust cab companies less them uber?
I don’t trust Uber either.
When Uber first arrived, fuck yeah. Taxis would take stupid routes to run the meter up to overcharge you. Often the drivers were extremely belligerent or ornery for no same reason. Using taxis has been a terrible experience for many.
the other issue that Uber helped with in the beginning was mess with Mob controlled taxi cartels that used regulation as a shield that’s why service was so poor. By skating those laws it put some market presure to improve slightly. but now that they got so big it’s back to being cappy again and the mob has moved into that market as well now.
the mob has moved into that market as well now.
Do you have a source for that?
Is it some niche thing or widespread?
You mean the mob has moved into the Uber market?
Fuck yea, fuck Taxis
An entire industry that’s playing the victim. People around here are romanticizing taxis, but the shit they pulled was just as bad, if not worse than what Uber does.
Biggest difference is their drivers were complicit in the shenanigans and primarily targeted their customers. Taking LONG routes because their customer “wasn’t local”, saying a route will “probably be 10$” and then it’s 50 and “the meter says what it says man”.
They literally used strict regulations as a shield to hold local monopolies for decades which resulted in terrible downright scammy service, cash only for an unacceptable amount of time, 0 innovations, dirty ancient barely running cars, a dispatch who would constantly say a car “was just around the corner” for 2 hours
The taxi industry doesn’t give a fuck about you, they’re just mad because they didn’t think to do what Uber is doing and now they’re dying.
Fuck Uber AND Taxis, they both can rot in hell, but I don’t mind seeing taxis get there first.
You can now… Because uber and lyft finally forced them to change
has
had
Originally it was also cheaper for the customer because it was subsidized by venture capital.
In Chicago all the big taxi companies have apps
And relieve corporate from all sorts of other liabilities, placing those on the individual drivers, too.
Workers’ Comp claims? Malfeasance (driver or passenger)? Health insurance? Paid time off? Vehicle insurance? All fall to the driver.
And they had thousands if not millions of drivers (worldwide) who didn’t give a shit about any of those things either.
So they had a ready made work force waiting to be just as shitty people as the taxi companies by not giving a fuck about those things either.
And that’s where opportunity is often found. Covered in shit
I mean, enough countries did see that and those are the countries were Uber didn’t manage to push away taxis.
Once cabbies got their own apps, the only market advantage Uber had was lower costs because of not obbeying regulations, which wasn’t there in those contries which forced Uber to obbey the same regulations as cabbies.
Not entirely true.
In some countries (UK, NZ) Uber has to give you the price of the journey up front. Whereas taxis are metered and do not.
Uber UK has competition in thin regard with Minicabs, but the minicab apps are still shit.
Capped costs for consumers is a competitive advantage over taxis, and Uber has managed to find the sweet spot between hailing a taxi, and booking a minicab.
Up front pricing is almost always going to be more attractive than metered pricing.
If you offer me metered pricing, I’m going to assume you’ll charge 20% extra.
People saw it, but if you remember Taxis before Uber it wasn’t exactly great either.
No-shows, demanding flat rates double what the meter would charge/refusing service, various forms of harassment, etc.
Turns out when there is very little competition, businesses treat their customers like shit.
Uber definitely does some things better than traditional taxis. Things like work flexibility are great, but workers still need better protections and pay (aka, a union).
I think a lot of people also forget that taxis in San Francisco, which was basically the impetus forUber’s creation, were fucking horrible at the time. Things have changed a lot since then. But the one thing I will credit Uber with is making taxis functional again.
One thing I distinctly remember from the times I was working out there was how terrified I was to be in their cars. There was absolutely no vetting of drivers, and Uber distinguished itself by doing that at the time (also pretty sure it required a higher level license, UberX came later which allowed basically anyone to drive).
Let me be crystal clear here since I know folks are going to skim my comment and think I am an apologist for Uber and just go off: fuck Uber. They are a terrible company. If you really need to ride in a car, take a taxi.
The big difference here is that I know the cost. Getting into a cab it was always kind of blind, and a cab driver definitely tried to screw me one time by driving in circles (we were very drunk, and I noticed at some point we hadn’t made it very far, so I started paying attention and it was clear pretty quickly that he had circled back almost to where he had picked us up).
Also when I lived out in Queens, cabs rarely came out there. I had to hike all the way to Queens Blvd to have a chance, and even then they would barely stop at night. Would often get told to “get out” when asking for them to take me back to Queens. I’ve even been able to get a Uber out almost out in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night.
Lyft/Uber definitely has their problems, but cabs weren’t some shining beacon on the hill.
Uber can drive in circles and up your fare too… They have per ride, mile, and minute fare just like taxis. The coverage thing is just a problem with New York’s medallion system. But also, speaking from experience, rideshare drivers can and will refuse rides into places they don’t want to go. The difference is you’re talking with dispatch instead of a single driver so they get replaced without you knowing anything. Traditional taxi companies also have a dispatcher you can call and they will handle the recalcitrant drivers, but they may also negotiate a dead head fee.
But guess what? Uber and Lyft build dead heading directly into their fee structure. If you go out of the zone you pay an extra fee so the driver isn’t completely out of luck making money.
Uber and Lyft really are just digital dispatchers for privately run taxis.
I dunno about you guys, but using a rideshare app, I’ve been canceled on numerous times, by multiple drivers. Often at the last minute, when maybe he app thinks they’re taking too long to reach me? I had a driver I was watching get closer and closer to me, and when they were around the corner the app changed my driver to someone a couple miles away. That shit didn’t happen with taxis because we weren’t reliant on some shitty algorithm that is only coldly making the most rides happen per minute to get higher margins for the company.
There are definitely drawbacks to the old school cab system, but I don’t like the app system. Sure, the meter would go up as you drive and sometimes you’d have to have an idea of where you’re going to not get screwed by a dishonest driver, but the app also randomly charges way more for the same ride depending on the app’s fuckin mood.
Crazy what we’ve let private companies do just because they marginally made our lives somewhat more convenient (on the surface).
Surge pricing. Ugh.
I’ve taken hundreds of ubers and it’s always been within cents of the price I was quoted. I’ve taken hundreds of cab rides and only a handful of times was in given a price before hand.
I think it’s fair to say I know the price when it comes to an Uber and even if they can drive around to raise the price, it’s going to be obvious.
And on that note, at an airport near me there is a close by convenience store and if the Uber doesn’t want to take the fair, it’s know they will sit in there and wait for the customer to cancel it so they don’t get the hit. I’ve had it happen to me, contacted uber, and they gave me a discount on my next ride. I’m sure they don’t want to give away money, so I assume they are dealing with the driver at that point.
And I’ve had hundreds of cab rides that were just fine, and the fare was exactly what I expected. You cannot come in here comparing the excesses of one system against the normal usage of the other system and not get called on it.
“what I expected” please expand. Other than maybe having done the trip before a number of times (which would account for a tiny fraction of the rides I took), and even then time of day would affect the price, I really had very little idea what the ride would cost, especially if we’re talking within cents.
When I drove, the destination was hidden until you start the ride.
That wasn’t true in the beginning, they did that because drivers were refusing rides. And drivers still try to conflate the expected fare with distance and even cancel rides after seeing the destination. Yes they can get removed if they do that too much but that doesn’t stop it from happening.
I’ve heard from Uber drivers that a longer trip can increase the price, but I’ve never seen it happen
They don’t advertise it. I’m not even sure customers can see it.
Off topic but the worst effect of uber imo has been in poorer countries with no public transport.
First uber started and it was a rich kids thing. Then it grew and added uber bike which was cheap and uber became more mainstream.
Then came the inevitable knock offs, cheap uber alternates that give 0 fucks about quality control, allow anyone to drive on it or what vehicle is registered. Absolutely no standards but cheaper.
Then uber packs bag and leaves while people are now stuck with these terrible services.
Like sexual assault complaints by their drivers are ignored. Drivers stealing money is ignored. Uber actually took that stuff seriously.
When was Uber a rich kids thing?
2016-17 over here.
sounds like theres a good market opportunity to start a decent competitor there
Tech bros also just reinvented trains recently, so this is pretty appropriate
Except the taxi cab company has figured out how to offload the purchasing and maintenance of their fleet to their drivers. Probably pay their drivers less, as well.
With Uber drivers driving their own cars, how is Uber any different in that regard?
That’s what I’m saying. Uber is the taxi company.
Really depends on the taxi company. In the small mountain town I went to college in there was a traditional company and a co-op company. The traditional company had better cars, an app, and a nice person on the phone. The co-op had old (but clean) cars, drivers acting as dispatch, and drivers that were actually happy to be there and have conversations.
Only one of those companies had nearly all the same drivers the entire time I was there.
Maybe we’re all just fucking bored Kyle! and need a change every now and then to feel something, anything; to take our minds off this revolving hamster wheel of mundanity
“Wait, what are the four things on the side?”
I call them wheels and I reinvented them."Technobros and reinventing something that already exists, but worse.
Name a more iconic duo.
Thinking Uber is worse than taxis shows how little people remember about how bad they really were.
They aren’t thinking. They are looking for things to whine about to justify their failed existence.
Sour grapes, resentment, call it what you want. Easier to devalue the success of others vs achieve something of your own.
You live in a crazy reality. Taxis but worse 🤣
Name a more iconic duo.
Tech bros and inventing something superfluous that nobody asked for that will literally bring misery, suffering and death.
People have been asking for accountability with taxis for decades. Y’all have lost your mind if you actually think the service side of the industry is somehow worse.
“If only you’d listened to us!” whine the techbros as the things they did made the world worse, but they pretend to have had the solutions all along anyway.
Tech bros love reinventing old technologies with slapped on some technical jargon.
The trick is you have to pretend that you’re actually a “tech company” to avoid all the regulations that apply to companies that are honest about what business they’re in.
Pretending is easy. Make an app for phones. Always talk in tech buzz words.
We’re not a hotel company. We’re a company that leverages internet connectivity to connect potential customers with needed accommodation. We’re creating our own AI to boost…mumbles with more tech buzzwords.
Pretend your are a church to avoid paying taxes. Driving for Jesus
I hate how accurate this is
Sooo innovative… Can’t you see? They made an app that runs on a phone…
I’m actually reminded of the time James Randi refused to debunk some tech bro’s astrology app, despite him being gung ho about how well it worked… With the reason Randi gave being that because it was an app and claimed to have math behind it, it was too close to the realm of science to count as anything supernatural… Even though there’s virtually no difference between this and a horoscope in the paper, but he was fooled by there being a phone involved. So the guy DID NOT get debunked or even tested despite being full of shit he was, he didn’t get tested or in the running for the million, but he got Randi’s seal of approval… That’s a task failed successfully moment right there.
God JREF’s reputation is so overblown.
Remember: You are not immune to propaganda, you will accept anything if it’s presented in a way that seems plausible yet magical enough to you.
I keep hearing like they didn’t really do shit. When Uber did a fuckton.
1 - Reputation. If a taxi driver was a racist POS, literally nothing I can do.
2 - Agreed upon fare. You literally see a estimate of the cost. I had a taxi add extra fees the moment I sat in the car.
3 - GPS. The route on your phone is the same route they follow. How many times have taxis went on a fucking joyride to rank up more money?
4 - See when the ride is coming. “Cab will be there in 15-45 mins.” Never fucking shows up.
5 - Automatic payment. How many fucking CC machines didn’t work so they forced you to pay cash?
I can go on and on.
But to say some tech bro slapped some tech jargon onto taxis and became rich is disingenuous to all the innovations they’ve done to unfuck the taxi industry.
Its a taxi with extra steps.
And less safety.
But you get to know how much you’re paying before you even confirm it
Most taxis have that now too, and you can ask for the flat rate too. most drivers will quote you on longer trips exactly the price.
Less safe how? Not trying to disagree at all, I only have surface-level knowledge about any of this so I just want to know the reasons. I’ve had friends with REALLY bad experiences from illegal/underground taxis before Uber etc was a thing but none I can think of since then. I’m sure there are very valid reasons and just want to know them.
Cab companies have stricter safety regulations and background checks for their drivers.
Uber has criminal background checks too. In fact, they take their policy very seriously. If you find you get into an uber and your driver is Paul, but it should have been Sara… (no this has never happened to me, ever…). You just call the safety line, or i also think there’s an in-app function.
Still supporting cabs first, but i felt it needed to be clarified.
