Uber surge pricing kicks in during Sydney siege The central business district of Australia's largest city, Sydney, is today in lockdown after a man shut himself and around 40 people in a cafe. The man reportedly has a gun and has insisted his captives display a flag bearing Arabic script in the cafe's window. Authorities have asked locals not to visit the city. Several city …
It seems like there is no massive coordinated attack (think Mumbai 2008) , so is locking locking down large parts of the city maybe a little over-reaction? Hostage situations existed before today's terror craze. Maybe restarting the bus service might relieve the public transport situation a bit?
"Colour me cynical but don't hostage takers normally make demands? This one seems to have missed a few classes in his training camp on hostage 101."
He has made demands, he wants chocolate on top not cinnamon.
Actually demands have been made but the police have not allowed anybody to air them. He also got one of the young girls working there to tweet them as well.
It is interesting to note that he is not using the standard ISIS flag saying "their is no god (Allah) but Allah" above a white cirlce which contains the following second part " Mohammed is the messenger of Allah" . He is flourishing a black flag with the version found on other Islamic flags e.g. the Saudi one and no white circle.
Me thinks he is a loner wannabee and should have been shot on the numerous amount of times he has been seen in the window.
It may be a slight over-reaction to, but arguably the agencies-on-the-ground (police, etc) are just playing uber-safe (pun not intended). For a start, stray bullets have a habit of still being highly lethal even at very long ranges, even from hand guns (200-300 yards is entirely possible). Automated weapons can carry much, much further. It would only take one stray shot to go into a crowd or a passing distant bus for the police to be condemned.
Uber are an independent commercial venture, so I couldn't care less about the social ramifications of their pricing policy.
If I'm putting my civic duty hat on, though, I'd say that if all of the extra money is passed on to the drivers then there's really no case to answer at all. It matches supply to demand in a way that wouldn't be possible otherwise.
If they're also taking a bigger cut with no more risk then that would fall into the category some people grumble about and will lose them some PR.
If they get lambasted for maintaining a service at a time when fixed cost taxi drivers will steer well clear then that will be a clear example of the deadweight loss caused by our collective stupidity.
taxis are regulated and they cannot arbitrarily set prices for certain destinations - they get paid a set price pro kilometer.
As Uber is just a taxi that can be booked via an app, they would have to stick to the agreed prices.
That said, you can only drive a taxi here if you have a licence and you can only get commercial insurance to carry passengers if you have a taxi licence, so all Uber vehicles are operating illegally anyway.
Over here they can only be a taxi service.
Isn't the whole point of Uber that it ignores existing taxi regulations and screams and holds it's breath when people suggest it should be regulated (who doesn't want to be driven by a criminal or psychopath after all?)
Personally, I use black cabs (advantage of living in London though)
The problem in Germany at the moment seems to be that none of the drivers are registered taxi drivers and therefore they cannot get insurance. If they just use their private insurance and have an accident with a passenger on board, then their insurance is null and void - they will also probably lose their licence if they are stopped by the police, for driving commercially without insurance.
"Did you hear some gun man has taken people hostage?"
"Really?"
"Yeah, the whole place is on lock down. It's hard for anyone to get around."
"Really?! Fetch me my car!"
"Why?"
"I'm going to charge a fortune to drive people who are desperate to get as close as possible to the crime scene, or to anyone else who needs to get home in a hurry."
"How much?"
"Well add a zero on to the normal fare, should be right."
".... $65 for a $6.50 taxi ride? Where are your morals man?"
*walking to the car* "Fuck morals, there's big money to be made".
etc etc
Yeah except surge pricing in a long standing and automatic process. They didn't just decide to ramp up the prices to take advantage of those in this terrible situation.
They created surge pricing as an incentive to get more uber drivers on the road when availability is low.
So how would YOU decide who gets to travel in one of the limited available cabs and how would you motivate more taxis to service the demand ???
Ministry of taxis ??
Lots of surplus taxis circling "just in case" ??
But granted, there needs to be an "emergency plan" and it seems Uber invented one after about 30 mins.
Much as I despise Uber, it does look like they did the right thing here, as well as they could.
What were they going to do - forbid drivers from entering the city? Impractical, how would they stop them? Or forbid them from charging more? - then how would they get enough drivers to brave the traffic?
Offering to foot the bill for people's outward journeys was an act of generosity that I wouldn't have expected to see from them. Goes to show, social media is good for something after all.
What were they going to do - forbid drivers from entering the city? Impractical, how would they stop them? Or forbid them from charging more? - then how would they get enough drivers to brave the traffic?
How about a third option where Uber disables the surge pricing for emergency situations like this.
That way, drivers who are already in the area can still be paid for taking people out of the area but there is no incentive for the more mercenary, risk-taking types to go back in looking for a quick profit?
I dont think this is something that should be completely algo-decided either - it is a trade off between discouraging drivers to risk themselves (and drive more spectators into the risk area) and providing a service to help people in the area return home. I suspect each incident should be assessed on its own merits.
I wholeheartedly agree that footing the bill for outward journeys is excellent.
<snip>
"But traveling to central Sydney is demonstrably risky right now"
<snip>
Risky my arse, even if you got to within a hundred meters of the place you are probably safer there than two miles out.
I would be more concerned walking around Kings Cross at night than bimbling through the center of Sidney at this very moment. We seem to be getting risk averse and are losing the old Blitz spirit.
Next fad;
Seat belts on toilets seats so that we do not have any nasty falls.
If it all goes to the driver, then that's fine - the whole point is to get more drivers willing to offer their services when needed (though typically during say New Year's Eve and not something like this) But if it goes to Uber, it certainly is profiteering if they're making more money from something like this.
The investor fascination with Uber is something I don't understand. There are very low barriers to entry for Uber, and no network effect - what stops me from writing a meta car hire app that checks Uber, Lyft, and so on for the best pricing so riders can decide for themselves? Nothing, that's what, and I'll bet someone is already working on it (or just started after they read this - if so pleas contact me for the address to send the royalty checks :))
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
