Court: Uber drivers are company employees not self-employed contractors

arstechnica.com

13 pointsTomte3 comments

why is that we have these good ideas, make it an app and it's cool and all, and boom it's the government wanting to take away the idea by legislating it, the idea's originators become greedy and milk the idea like there's no tomorrow, normal folks kill the coolness of the idea by demanding this idea dance on it's nose for them, and then the idea withers away ... I wonder if cool ideas can survive human nature

In principle, I agree with you.

However, we must remember that coolness isn't just coolness. There are labour laws and such that need to be in place to prevent people skirting them.

Sadly, laws don't catch up as fast as technology. I mean the only reason Uber is even decent is because of the existing shitty taxi laws across the world that allowed terrible monopolies to overcharge and not bother innovating.

The libertarian in me, wants these things to just happen. That being said, you have to respect local laws in which they operate.

It could also be the Taxi companies lobbying the government for regulations. Or taxis companies using propaganda to influence citizens in forcing government to take action.

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