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Uber's Ad-Toting Drones Are Heckling Drivers Stuck in Traffic (technologyreview.com)
Drivers stuck in traffic in Mexico city are lately seeing a fleet of sign-toting drones buzzing at them, saying (in Spanish) "Driving by yourself? This is why you can never see the volcanoes." (It's a reference to the smog that often hovers over the city and obscures two nearby peaks.) Turns out, it's an ad for UberPOOL, part of Uber's big push into markets across Latin America. From an MIT Technology Review article: Uber already does more business in Mexico City than any other city it operates in, and Brazil is its third-largest market after the U.S. and India. Uber sees Latin American countries as generally easier targets for expansion than either of its top two markets.Umm, I get that Uber has self-driving cars now in Pittsburgh, but they don't fly (at least as of now). So wouldn't they be stuck in the traffic as well?
Until now I thought those people who shot down drones were luddites and assholes. If a drone advertises at me I will use every engineering skill in my toolkit to take those bastards down. And I don't mean knock it out of the sky. But send it back to its base with malware that will fly the entire fleet into the ocean.
Uber never misses an opportunity to come of like a bunch of insufferable assholes, do they?
It's a shame, because my Uber experiences in Europe were fantastic. The cars were spotless (a BMW 535 and a Merc C63 AMG!), the drivers eminently polite, and the rates cheaper than in the US.
I guess it's not the same for commuting/ridesharing, where you don't want to pay taxi prices... but for a tourist trying to get around it was perfect ;)
What are you talking about? Is UberPOOL different in Mexico City? In SF, UberPOOL is just another mode of UberX. Same drivers, same cars. UberPOOL is a dynamic ridesharing system because the app basically finds other people on the same route when you request a ride. It's not set up in advance, and the driver doesn't set the destination. It's not like a carpool to work, it's more like sharing a taxi.
UberPOOL drivers aren't typically driving to work, they're at work. I think the point of the ads is that if you have 2-4 riders (not including the driver) in each car, then the number of cars on the road should go down, reducing congestion and pollution. Of course, making access to anything cheap and fast tends to drive up the usage, so it may actually end up with more people taking an Uber rather than walking or taking a bus.
The right to protest the State is more sacred than the State.