Portland lobs fair-trade gluten-free artisan SUEBALL at Uber

The US city of Portland, Oregon, is suing taxi-booking app maker Uber for operating unlicensed cabs. Officials with the city's Board of Transportation said on Monday that it was going to court in order to enforce its regulations on for-hire car companies: for one thing, it's claimed Uber needs a license to run a taxi company …

[Mitoo Bobsworth]

$41bn?

a) Who the hell comes up with these ridiculous valuations?

b) The investors are either incredibly canny (inside knowledge, financial jiggery-pokery) or incredibly stupid (good old blind greed) to bet on this company - I'm leaning toward the latter.

[silent_count]

Re: $41bn?

a) https://www.fourmilab.ch/hotbits/

b) For the investors, it's too close to call. But the succession of "Uber banned in x" stories is making it increasingly clear that the management are incompetent. They're not even greasing the right pollies!

[Anonymous Coward]

Interesting

that Portland sues rather than presses charges for having their regulations violated. Let an average person try that and see what happens.

Proof that, as usual, America's justice system is a double-standard: for those with money, no one ever goes to jail.

[Ian Michael Gumby]

AC you have it backwards... Re: Interesting

"that Portland sues rather than presses charges for having their regulations violated. Let an average person try that and see what happens."

Portland set the laws and regulations for their community. They are the government and its their job to do so.

Uber doesn't like the laws, the burden is on them to attempt to change the laws or comply with the laws.

Uber does neither and hence they are getting slapped with an injunction.

Right or wrong, Uber is going to have to play by the cities' rules until they can change them.

[Gray]

A simple misappreciation

America is based on the free enterprise system: if you pay sufficient license and operating fees to the municipal authorities, you're free to engage in enterprise. Anarchist scofflaws fail to appreciate the finer points of our American system of freedoms.

[Phil O'Sophical]

Re: A simple misappreciation

This is why it's called The Land of the Fee, I suppose?

[Preston Munchensonton]

Re: A simple misappreciation

If you have to pay someone to engage in the "free enterprise system", exactly where does the "free" bit enter the equation? Me thinks you misappreciate the meaning of the word freedom.

[Mark 85]

PR BS?

we remain hopeful that the city will listen to Portlanders who want safe, reliable, hassle free ride options now.

Portland is one of the most accident prone cities in the US to drive in. Traffic is a nightmare when it rains (as it does much of the times) and not much better when it isn't. So Uber uses "regular" folks as drivers... I think I'll just avoid Portland all together from now on.

[solo]

Re: Portland is one of the most accident prone cities in the US

I'd like to add to what you said. New Delhi as the most unsafe city for women in India, as alleged by the media there. Still Uber allowed a taxi driver (without background checks, as mandated by local authorities) jailed for a prior case of raping driving a girl home in his taxi (just 2 years back). The excuse by them, Uber is just an "aggregator" not a cab service provider. So, they are free of obligations.

Even if we consider it just as Facebook of drivers, how come they justify the claim to be safe?

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/09/world/asia/new-delhi-bans-uber-after-driver-is-accused-of-rape.html

[Steve Davies 3]

Uber : the new 4 letter word

$4B valuation might start to look a bit 'pie in the sky' if more cities follow Portland's example.

[Charlie Clark]

Re: Uber : the new 4 letter word

The blanket ban in Germany, which is likely to come through the courts, will probably be the deathknell but I guess investors are hoping to have IPO'd (sell the shares to unsuspecting schmucks directly or through their savings accounts) before then.

The innovation of most of these OTT services is using location technology to improve efficiency. Unfortunately for them this can be replicated easily so they add casual, unlicensed labour to it to improve margins. This would be financial suicide if the business model was anything than an inverted pass the parcel: no one wants to be left holding the shares when the business fails.

[tom dial]

Re: Uber : the new 4 letter word

"The innovation of most of these OTT services is using location technology to improve efficiency." And that could be done easily and fairly inexpensively by the present franchised cab companies. But it is even easier and cheaper for them to engage in the rent seeking behavior typical of regulated entities that have coopted their regulators (and that would be the great majority of them).

[Anonymous Coward]

Cherry picking and public responsibility

Companies like Uber are only after the cream.

They have no interest in the greater good or real public service.

Mind you, the legit Taxi companies probably don't give a rat's arse about customers either.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Cherry picking and public responsibility

Try getting one of those bastions of decency and public protection who drive black cabs in London to venture sarf of the river after 9pm and you'll find out all about cherry-picking.

[Preston Munchensonton]

Re: Cherry picking and public responsibility

Given that for-profit enterprises are in it for profit, how does it still come as a shock to anyone that for-profit enterprises are not attempting to be more altruistic?

[ukgnome]

Uber is quite pants

I recently carried out a comparison between Uber and a local firm.

Hotel to train station via a local firm was £4.50

Hotel to train station via Uber was a baffling £13

I don't think the little guys need to worry

[Anonymous Coward]

Why such large local differences?

In New Delhi they'll sign up convicted rapists, it seems, in other cities we read stories about lack of insurance or background checks. Yet in London you need a private-hire licence (which comes with background checks), commercial/hire and reward insurance, and a pretty decent car with all the relevant documentation. Do they think they can bully their way in to some cities, but play nice in others?

[Anonymous Coward]

Too many people fail to 'get' Uber. I assure you, I'd much rather spend the flat rate $45 on an Uber from home to the airport because the $29.50 plus tip in a cab is spend in a rattling, shaking deathtrap versus a trip in an Escalade, a Town Car or a 300. Sure, it's a little more expensive but I get there in comfort and, dare I say it, a bit of style before drudging onto the cattle truck to somewhere dismal. If I was in London would I take an Uber? Bloody unlikely given the plethora of black cabs. Cabs in the US are invariably shit, or worse, so Uber has a great market opportunity. Once Uber hire the right lobbyists and pay the local politicians the right sized brown envelope it'll all be good.

[User McUser]

I think Uber fails to "get" the laws in the locations where they operate so now they "get" to be sued.

[Anonymous Coward]

redefining "disruptive" Newspeak style

Uber is only "disruptive" if we count drug dealers and gun traffickers "disruptive" to their respective industries.

Whether or not one agrees with the regulations, "disruption" is about dodging those regulations. Nothing Uber or Lyft is doing is nothing cab companies weren't already doing, in my experience, except trying to dodge or game the system by passing the expense and risk of business onto the "drivers".

It'd be like saying I had a "disruptive" business plan by not hiring clerks for a retail store, but having "workers" come in on their own as "independent contractors" who supply the registers, the labor and the inventory. All I do is supply the advertising and the pricing, and then can blame poor customer service on those "independent contractors".

No one would accept that BS in other industries, and I think only appear to accept this because many of the initial investors are also controlling interest in the very media sources that praise them.