Techdirt. Stories filed under "cabs" Easily digestible tech news... http://www.techdirt.com/ en-us Techdirt. Stories filed under "cabs"http://www.techdirt.com/images/td-88x31.gifhttp://www.techdirt.com/ Tue, 14 Aug 2012 15:23:21 PDT Boston Shuts Down Uber Because Massachusetts Doesn't Approve Of The GPS Mike Masnick http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120814/14441720049/boston-shuts-down-uber-because-massachusetts-doesnt-approve-gps.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120814/14441720049/boston-shuts-down-uber-because-massachusetts-doesnt-approve-gps.shtml fight in DC about some regulations that would have hindered Uber by forcing it to charge high prices. Up in Boston, things are even more bizarre. The company has been effectively told to cease and desist from offering its service. This has happened elsewhere, due to various silly regulations regarding cab and livery services, but in Massachusetts they seem to do everything in an especially screwed up manner and this is no exception.

The reason Uber can no longer serve the Boston region: Because they were making use of this crazy newfangled technology called "GPS" to measure the distances that cars traveled for the purpose of billing users.

It seems that the Massachusetts Division of Standards, and its laws covering "weights and measures," is so out of date that it has not been updated to recognize GPS as an appropriate "weight and measure" system for distance. As if to prove just how incredibly out of touch these folks are, in the official letter ordering Uber to stop service, they repeatedly refer to the iPhone as an "I phone." They also refer to the Global Positioning System as the Global Positioning Services. These are the people in charge of killing off innovation. Incredible.

Basically, the state had someone sign up for Uber, take a ride in the car as a "sting" (one of the people in the car's job title is -- and I'm not joking -- the "Sealer of Weights & Measures") and then cite the driver after seeing that he (*gasp*!) used a GPS device on his phone to measure the distance traveled. When Uber pointed out that GPS has been around and widely used for decades, the Massachusetts Division of Standards argued that may well be... but since GPS is not for commercial purposes they can't accept it. Seriously.
Global Positioning Services (GPS ) technology is not an issue as it is and has been widely used in non-commercial applications for a number of years. However, GPS has not been used in commercial applications for assessing transportation charges until Uber Technologies, Inc. introduced its use for this purpose. The major problem at this time is the fact that there are no established measurement standards for its current application and use in determining transportation costs similar to that of approved measurement systems for taximeters and odometers. Massachusetts law does not sanction unapproved devices for use in commercial transactions.
The idea that GPS isn't used in commercial applications is silly. GPS has been widely used by the military for decades and has been used in commercial applications for quite some time as well. It's beyond silly to think that because some clueless "Sealer of Weights and Measures" is still focused on last century's technology that GPS is not a viable (or even common) technology for this purpose. This seems like a clear case of a totally out of date bureaucracy actively hindering innovation for no reason other than general luddism.

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]]> no,-seriously http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20120814/14441720049 Tue, 10 Jul 2012 03:03:00 PDT DC Seeks To 'Legalize' Uber... By Forcing It To Be Way More Expensive Than Cabs Mike Masnick http://www.techdirt.com/blog/innovation/articles/20120709/22540419635/dc-seeks-to-legalize-uber-forcing-it-to-be-way-more-expensive-than-cabs.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/blog/innovation/articles/20120709/22540419635/dc-seeks-to-legalize-uber-forcing-it-to-be-way-more-expensive-than-cabs.shtml NYC cab medallions last year highlighted just what a ridiculous system this is. It's almost impossible to find an economist who thinks this setup is good for the public. And yet it's quite common.

Over the last few years, a few startups have tried to disrupt this market -- and they always get attacked for it, either by local cab/limo services or the local officials in charge of regulating the market. The most well known of these companies is Uber, who is looking to really disrupt the market with a service that they admit is more expensive, but which provides really amazing convenience and service in exchange. Users of Uber love the service, in my experience. A couple weeks ago, I was in Chicago to speak at a conference, and Uber's CEO, Travis Kalanick, spoke at the same event, with a really entertaining talk -- much of it about how every time he tries to disrupt a market, legacy players get really, really pissed off at him.

As part of that talk, he discussed the situation in Washington DC, where the local Taxicab Commission Chairman, Ron Linton, ran a "sting" to claim that Uber was violating DC laws. Since then there's been a lot of back and forth in the fight in DC, leading to a new set of regulations that are being introduced. Of course, as is typical of taxi/limo regulations, they often say one thing but mean the exact opposite. In this case, the Taxicab Commission appears to be positioning the new regulations as being designed to make Uber "legal,", but, as Uber's Kalanick notes in a blog post, it includes some really poisonous provisions that require Uber to charge at least 5 times what a taxi charges. They're not even subtle about this. As the text of the bill reads:
(c) (1) The minimum fare for sedan-class vehicles shall be five times the drop rate for taxicabs, as established by 31 DCMR § 801.3 (a).

(2) The time and distance rates for sedan-class vehicles shall be greater than the time and distance rates for taxicabs, as established by as established by 31 DCMR § 801.3 (b) and (c).
The DC Taxicab Commission claims this is to "ensure that sedan service is a premium class of service with a substantially higher cost that does not directly compete with or undercut taxicab service." But why? We don't do this in any other market. We don't tell nice restaurants that they must charge more than fast food restaurants, so as not to compete. We don't tell Apple that it must charge more for computers so that they're seen as "premium" devices. We let the market work things out. That's what enables disruptive innovation and competition to take place.

What's amazing here (and, to a lesser extent, in nearly every major city in the US) is how they effectively admit that they don't want competition, they don't want innovation. They want a protected market that is artificially inflated. Why would the people of DC accept this kind of thing?

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]]> can't-have-competition http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20120709/22540419635 Mon, 25 Oct 2010 02:49:39 PDT Company Making Cab/Limo Rides More Efficient Ordered To Stop Mike Masnick http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101024/21393211556/company-making-cab-limo-rides-more-efficient-ordered-to-stop.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101024/21393211556/company-making-cab-limo-rides-more-efficient-ordered-to-stop.shtml started out as legitimate issues, involving safety and route control, but over time, almost everywhere I've gone, they've turned into pure regulatory capture in an attempt to keep competitors out. We've seen in the past how these sorts of rules have gotten in the way of innovative new startups. There was the situation in Ontario where an operation called PickupPal that set up carpool rides was deemed illegal and fined. Then there was the situation in Tampa, where some startups had started offering "pay what you want" taxi rides, subsidized by advertising, and the existing taxi regulatory committee shut it down.

In the latest example, a company named Ubercab, which lets you use your mobile device to hire a car service/limo (not a taxi) on the go, and handle all the payment through the device, has been ordered to cease & desist. The details are not entirely clear in that report, but it appears the complaint is that this service turns car service/limos into "unlicensed" cabs. Most rules forbid car services from "picking up" rides on the fly. Instead you have to book them ahead of time. But Ubercab allows you to book them on the fly. From what I can tell, it's more expensive than a cab, but cheaper than a normal car service (which makes sense). Now, the SF Metro Transit Authority & the Public Utilities Commission of California, who sent the cease & desist will almost certainly claim it's a "safety issue" or some such nonsense. But, the reality is that it's an attempt to limit competition.

Of course, all this has really done is give Ubercab that much more attention, which they're milking (as they should -- hello Streisand Effect). They're refusing to cease and desist and appear to be poised to fight this. One of the company's founders/investors has said that they'll hire any taxi dispatcher who's fired, though I'm not entirely clear how that fits. If their service focuses on car services/limos, what's that got to do with taxi dispatchers? Either way, this does seem like a case where yet another bureaucracy, fueled by regulatory capture by the industry it regulates, is seeking to block out innovative competition.

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]]> regulatory-mess http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20101024/21393211556 Mon, 9 Nov 2009 18:33:00 PST NYC Cabbies Who Resisted Credit Card Machines... Now Making More Money Because Of Them Mike Masnick http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20091108/0829116847.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20091108/0829116847.shtml resisted, complaining that it would cause all sorts of problems. They even went on strike over the issue.

And yet, two years later, having easy to use credit card readers in the back of every cab means that more people are taking cabs, because it's easier, and they tend to tip more as well. Part of that is because the machines have "preset" tip suggestions that many riders use, which often result in higher tips than average. While the article still quotes a few angry cab drivers who insist that higher tips aren't true, the reporter was able to review the receipts from a few cabs and found that the average tip was 18%, with the preset tip suggestions being used more than half the time. While it's still early, it certainly seems like this was yet another overreaction to new technology that has actually ended up helping, rather than hurting.

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