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Two More Executives Are Leaving Uber, Drivers May Unionize (nytimes.com)
First the resignations. "The beliefs and approach to leadership that have guided my career are inconsistent with what I saw and experienced at Uber," the company's former president told Recode on Sunday, announcing his resignation. "The departures add to the executive exodus from Uber this year," writes The New York Times. An anonymous reader quotes their report.
Brian McClendon, vice president of maps and business platform at Uber, also plans to leave at the end of the month... Raffi Krikorian, a well-regarded director in Uber's self-driving division, left the company last week, while Gary Marcus, who joined Uber in December after Uber acquired his company, left this month. Uber also asked for the resignation of Amit Singhal, a top engineer who failed to disclose a sexual harassment claim against him at his previous employer, Google, before joining Uber. And Ed Baker, another senior executive, left this month as well.
Jones left Uber after less than six months, though McClendon's departure is said to be more amicable. "Mr. McClendon, in a statement, said he was returning to his hometown, Lawrence, Kansas, after 30 years away. 'This fall's election and the current fiscal crisis in Kansas is driving me to more fully participate in our democracy -- and I want to do that in the place I call home."
In other news, the Teamsters labor union plans to start organizing Uber's drivers into a union, after a Washington judge rejected Uber's attempt to overturn a right-to-unionize ordinance passed by the city of Seattle.
Jones left Uber after less than six months, though McClendon's departure is said to be more amicable. "Mr. McClendon, in a statement, said he was returning to his hometown, Lawrence, Kansas, after 30 years away. 'This fall's election and the current fiscal crisis in Kansas is driving me to more fully participate in our democracy -- and I want to do that in the place I call home."
In other news, the Teamsters labor union plans to start organizing Uber's drivers into a union, after a Washington judge rejected Uber's attempt to overturn a right-to-unionize ordinance passed by the city of Seattle.
It appears that the media has decided to dig up every little thing to kill them. So it only matters if consumers stop using it.
I think the people who are going to drop Uber already have. But I also don't think most people really care that much right now.
Honestly it matters quite a lot if Uber was really actually profitable, or if it was only profitable because a certain class of employee (ie, the driver) was willing to be hoodwinked into basically not even making cab-driver wages while suffering wear and tear on their own personal vehicle, versus actually being profitable with its own model.
It seems that Uber's long-term goal was to do away with having drivers operating their own cars, but unfortunately for them, they've tried to define the self-driving car market as-implemented too long before it's really ready to be implemented. They've gotten caught with their hand in the cookie jar too, as it appears they stole self-driving technology developed at great expensive by someone else, and if they can't use any of those self-driving developments then they're probably doomed.
I can see the appeal, summon a self-driving car and it takes you where you want to go, then summon another one when you want to return. I can see trying to be the one to get out in front of it too, to ride the wave of success that might well come from it. You've got to get the timing right though, and the timing isn't right yet.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
Alternatively, once a company is circling the drain, the most skilled employees who can get jobs easily elsewhere are the first to jump. The plodders go down with the ship.
Having witnessed the rise and now beginning of the fall of the company it's really amazing how at so many points they've done the bad or nefarious thing.
They basically lied about what the purpose of the app was, calling it a ride-sharing service when it's a taxi service.
They lied about the profitability of working for them, and doubled-down by getting people into paying for cars that they had no business buying and arguably couldn't afford because their incomes did not match the advertisements.
They lied and operated their unlicensed taxi service in places where this is illegal.
They've made efforts to avoid investigators into their illegal passenger livery practices.
They've attempted to call their drivers contractors while forcing them into working models that demonstrate that they're employees.
They've essentially stolen technology developed by others in an attempt to jumpstart their self-driving car business.
I get that in many cases existing taxi services aren't so great. On the other hand many of the laws governing taxis and sedan services are reactionary to some bad thing that happened and demonstrated a need to regulate for passenger safety. Perhaps some of what Uber and its ilk have come up with may end up as part of future regulations; the idea of determining the fare based on computer mapping is not a bad one and could be added to existing services if there was a strong enough interest.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
Taxi services are terrible because it is hopelessly expensive to drive a vehicle point-to-point and the amount of money that the government allows them to charge is not enough to actually pay for repairs and improvements to the vehicles. Uber only "works" because:
The unionization threats are happening because a large enough percentage of the drivers are recognizing Uber for the complete scam that it is. By many estimates, the minimum price at which Uber will be profitable while providing the current level of service is about 4x their current prices. That makes taxis look downright cheap. Increased competition can't ever reduce the cost below a floor set by certain unavoidable costs for things like gasoline, brakes, etc. Well, I guess technically you could have a taxi service with no brakes, but I wouldn't recommend it.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
It's very simple - if you are asking people to work unpaid overtime - you're an asshole. If there is too much work for the current people to do in 8 hours a day - then you're obligated to your share-holders to hire more workers, NOT to overwork the current staff.
Your supposed to meet demand WITHOUT being a dickwad.
Unions are one of the key ways we try to ensure a company that needs 16 hours of work done a day hires TWO people instead of just one (which actually CREATES jobs by preventing over-work of the existing staff). Frankly if your company needs to operate 24/7 and you have less than 3 people per role then you're an asshole who deserves to be out of business (in order to open up the market for a non-asshole company).
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
And that's why libertarianism is a crime against humanity and the market CANNOT be allowed to set wages unregulated - because wages are NOT just another consumable in a market. They are parts of people's LIVES. Human BEINGS.
You know what the key thing about human beings is ? THeir the PURPOSE. Their why we have economies. The economy exists to serve the people NOT the other way around. And never EVER denigrate workers for being greedy - because you know what ELSE workers are ? Consumers.
Good fucking luck selling ANYTHING in a market full of underpaid workers - because underpaid workers = consumers without money = no demand = no customers = bankrupt business.
Labour, like everything else in the economy - must be sold at a profit to be sustainable - and if the market won't pay a profitable price for it - then it cannot be sustained. But UNLIKE everything else in the economy - if the labour market collapses because the demand is too low -then EVERY OTHER BUSINESS COLLAPSES WITH IT.
Because labour is not JUST a commoddity - it's also the business that provides all the buying power to consumers, the business that pays nearly all the taxes and funds all the government services and infrastructure - including roads and the military and the police and the judges. It's the fundamental business upon which all other economic activity relies.
Make it unprofitable - and there is no economy, because you cannot have an economy without customers.
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
It's very simple - if you are asking people to work unpaid overtime - you're an asshole. If there is too much work for the current people to do in 8 hours a day - then you're obligated to your share-holders to hire more workers, NOT to overwork the current staff.
Your supposed to meet demand WITHOUT being a dickwad.
Unions are one of the key ways we try to ensure a company that needs 16 hours of work done a day hires TWO people instead of just one (which actually CREATES jobs by preventing over-work of the existing staff). Frankly if your company needs to operate 24/7 and you have less than 3 people per role then you're an asshole who deserves to be out of business (in order to open up the market for a non-asshole company).
Tough. When work doubles for a 3 month period I regularly work 60 to 75 hours a week every year. That is normal and not fair to the shareholders or to the new hires to hire them train them and fire them again? I worked at an amusement park when I was younger. Guess what? Summer nights 16 hour days. I worked at Staples later. Back to school I slept at the store and worked double shifts for a month. Recent job I did the same as YOU NEVER SAY NO to a client. Management wanted to secure the deal and we already promised the client and it would be un us and be fired if I didn't make it happen.
Your name says silent coder. Are you telling me in your coding career you never had a client demand something or had a requirement change at the last minute or had the sales team promise another feature? Ever?
I am not saying all the time. I am saying it happens and part of being professional is to show loyalty and dedication to your objectives. If a company sucks people quit. But that is not always and if it is then the top talent eventually leaves.
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There's a huge difference between "sometimes when it's an emergency" and "all the time" - trouble is that "all the time" is the norm when unions are not there to prevent it.
More importantly - on those occasions when the company requires me to fix their bad management by working overtime, I demand the right to get paid double-time for doing so. All people deserve that. You take away my time with my daughter -you had better compensate me for that - double.
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
Mathematically you are incorrect.
LOL nope.
You can prove whatever you want if you choose the axioms. If your assumptions about human behaviour are not modelled correctly then your proofs may be mathematically consistent but they won't have any bearing on the real world.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
I think you're seriously overestimating the strategic thinking capabilities of the people behind Uber. They haven't, up until recently, had even an R&D interest in developing driverless cars, and there is little chance they can realistically compete with Tesla, Ford, Google, VW, etc, even if they could raise another couple of billion in cash to burn. The likelihood of them coming from behind and beating the others to a viable driverless car solution is zero.
Further, what exactly do they have that will maintain their market position? An app? How easy is it for Google to turn the 'book Uber' button in google maps into a 'book google car'? If anything, they have worse than nothing - they are beholden to the company that is well ahead of them in the technology they desperately need to have a viable business model.
What I think Uber has been for quite a while now (granted, I don't think this was the original plan) is a financial bubble milking machine. Unless the board is actually delusional, the only viable strategy behind them entering the driverless car development race was to keep the IPO price at stupid levels. And if it wasn't for the PR disasters coming out of Uber on an almost weekly basis now, they would have been obscenely successful in achieving this.
You know the kind of comment for which we have an 'insightful' mod ? Yeah, yours was the exact opposite of that.
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
Like Enron?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Au contraire, billion-dollar businesses can disappear in a flash. Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC is one such example - he owes $170 billion in restitution, based on a fraud of over $60 billion. At one point he was the largest trader of NYSE-listed stocks in the world, doing up to 15% of all trades. $740 million a day in trades isn't chicken feed.
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.