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Uber Denies Access To Harvard Startup That Compared Ride-Hailing Prices (boston.com)
In April, a group of Harvard Business School students created an app called Urbanhail that allowed users to see side-by-side real-time pricing -- including surge rates -- for different ride-sharing apps including Uber. The app received a tremendous response from users. Shortly after that, the group received emails from several Uber representatives, asking them to remove Uber's data from the app citing terms and policies. "Uber's developer terms explicitly forbid using its data in any manner that is competitive to Uber," said Chris Messina, Lead at Uber Developer Experience. This has resulted in Urbanhail removing Uber's data from price-comparison-list. Urbanhail's Amber James didn't find Uber's stance on the matter. He said: They are absolutely a champion of competition when it's them against taxi companies or them against regulators. However, in its own ride-hailing niche of the transportation market, Uber's stance is ironically absolutely anti-competitive.
I find Uber's behavior to be totally expected, and not ironic in the least. Hypocritical, perhaps. Ironic? Not even a little bit.
Uber's behavior is certainly hypocritical, but it is likely legally unenforceable. Factual data cannot be copyrighted, and it is unlikely that it can be kept secret by TOS restrictions. Urbanhail should not just cave in because they received "a few emails".
A taxi company with an app is still a taxi company.
Indeed, many cab companies now have apps -- I've booked cab rides by app on 3 continents now. Same essential features as uber... book a ride online (set time, pickup / destination addresses); see confirmations, see if a cab has been dispatched to you, see where available cars are on the map... ; leave feedback on the driver...
Its all really quite funny as uber's arguments about what make it 'uniquenly not a taxi' become even more strained and ridiculous then they already were.
what make it 'uniquenly not a taxi' become even more strained and ridiculous then they already were.
Particularly when they just changed their app to allow their employees to more easily take breaks and fill up their gas tanks.
Waaahhhh? I thought Uber drivers could pick up people whenever and wherever they like, on their own schedule. Why the need to make it easier to have a break?
Yeah, Uber isn't a taxi company. In name only.
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
Is it just me, or is the word "property" nowadays a pretty much meaningless term? Because it's hard to see how the price of a service offered to the public fits into any reasonable definition of "property".
Not that I'm complaining; the faster that particular naked emperor gets dethroned the better off we all are.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
True, but the way I see it, the airlines and third party booking sites feel it's worthwhile to have their options appear on metasearch sites. The point I was trying to make is that there are examples for allowing "competitors" to use their API. Also there's a history in the travel industry of having shared booking channels in the form of the GDS systems (Sabre, Apollo, Shares, etc).
I suppose the difference is that there are a lot more competitors than in ridesharing, where Uber is clearly the dominant player. Since most people are aware of Uber, there is not much incentive for them to participate in third-party apps since if the choice is "use a third party app and always use the cheapest" or "just use Uber since the price is probably close enough not to matter", Uber prefers the latter.
And back to the airline industry, Southwest does the same thing. You may notice their fares don't show up in metasearch or third party booking sites. They have established a reputation as "the low fare airline" so it's not to their benefit to make it easy to see how their fares compare to others.
End of Line.