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Comment by seertaak | Hacker News Reader

This will probably be an unpopular opinion, but I actually thought the driver was exceedingly rude. He clearly took advantage of Kalanick being in the public eye, and thus a "target". Filming him without acknowledging it was totally immoral, it should reduce any fair person's bayesian priors as to the credibility of the driver.

I'm no fan of Kalanick, but I thought he comported himself reasonably, taking the time to explain things from his perspective. He could have just said: "sorry no time". Instead he shook the driver's hand, tried to explain the logic of his moving down the luxury scale.

The fact that the footage of him with two women wasn't cut out is frankly disgusting and a total invasion of his privacy. He didn't do anything wrong except flirt a bit. How tawdry of Bloomberg to show that material.

What is wrong with newspapers nowadays? It seems the press decides someone's "fair game" and they just engage in the most blatant character assassination.

View on HN

Kalanick's opinions and behaviour are obviously of interest to the public right now. There are quite a few anecdotes that, taken together, paint the picture of a thoroughly chauvinistic CEO with a bit of social darwinism thrown in for good measure.

His comments here further that impression: he throws around jingoism in his awkward attempt to impress his companions ("every year is hard for Uber...") and is either uninformed or dishonest with regards to the driver's complaints.

The "footage of him with two women" could not be cut out because it is the entirety of this video. It's necessary both to prove the identity as well as adding context and body language.

The women aren't identifiable and him being out & about with two women could have been observed by anybody, and was probably observed by the people at whatever Super Bowl event he was visiting.

It's also hard to judge this without remembering that Uber employees had, for years, full access to any customer's ride data, and often used it for fun & stalking. They boasted about their ability to algorithmically tag "rides of glory", set out to punish a journalist by digging up private information about her, and collect data about user's positions not directly required for their actual service.

I fail to see how this is character assassination. It's a primary source – the video itself carries the meaning, and if that is damaging to his reputation, then the flaws are his and not something made up by any journalists. Likewise, I ain't reducing anyone's "bayesian priors" because the driver's credibility is completely irrelevant. He's not making any relevant statements of fact beyond those visible in the video.

It's amazing that someone who tried to deceive poor people into taking subprime loans in pursuit of his monopolistic dumping scheme, chooses to scream "personal responsibility" at a bankrupted immigrant.

And the first thing people do is debate the ethics of recording him.

Out of curiosity, what's his involvement with "monopolistic dumping scheme"?

Looking through his Wikipedia (ok, not a fantastic reference source ;) ) entry, there doesn't seem to be any mention of involvement (employment/directorships/etc) with financial institutions.

Uber's business model is to create a monopoly on a variety of transportation services using VC cash to dump the market, drive out their competitors, and then jack up prices:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dumping_(pricing_policy)

Here's the info about their subprime lending:

http://www.theverge.com/2016/6/3/11852940/uber-subprime-auto...

Interesting, thanks. :)

I get it, context is everything. So yes, given the current climate, it seems initially acceptable to show the entire video.

The problem is, I can't help but wonder if the current context for Uber, puts such emphasis on Kalanick's behavior, that even a normal night out with 2 women is judged negatively. I mean let's face it, he really didn't do anything wrong in the video. He flirted a bit, and tried to have a reasonable discussion with the driver.

When the conversation got out of hand, he left.

It's sad how often people with pitch forks look to even the most normal of behavior, to crucify someone.

> "Kalanick's opinions and behaviour are obviously of interest to the public right now.

Not really. Uber's actions are, certainly, but the opinions and actions of the CEO in his personal life are only of interest here because technology executives are the celebrities of Hacker News readers.

> This will probably be an unpopular opinion

Well what do you know, at the time of writing this, it's the top comment!

> The fact that the footage of him with two women wasn't cut out is frankly disgusting and a total invasion of his privacy. He didn't do anything wrong except flirt a bit. How tawdry of Bloomberg to show that material.

It's relevant because he said things like this:

“That’s kind of how I roll. I make sure every year is a hard year. If it’s easy I’m not pushing hard enough.”

at a time when we're supposed to be trusting that Kalanick is fixing his company's culture...

> the most blatant character assassination

Where was the character assassination? They just reported on what happened in the video. The video is relevant to the public interest. Do you have a right to not be filmed in an Uber... maybe? I don't know. It's not my car, and the driver could need the film for their own protection. I think I would be okay with being filmed as long as it wasn't secret.

Obviously, he did not know he was being filmed...so it was a secret.

What makes you say that? The camera looks like it's in a place where you should be able to see it. Either way, I don't think a conversation I have in the back of someone else's car is private.

Because I find it incredibly hard to believe that he would engage like this if he believed there was a possibility of the conversation being made public. Sure, I could be wrong, but I am of the camp that the driver will find legal repercussions to this.

You mean he only behaves this was when he thinks there are no witnesses?

Apropos of nothing all of the sites that talk about driving for Uber seem to recommend a recording setup both a dash cam and 'passenger cam' to provide backup in the event of a dispute or accident. I would be really surprised if he didn't expect this to be recorded at some level.

> I think I would be okay with being filmed as long as it wasn't secret.

Would you be OK with the video being published on a major news site?

I have to say, that would be interesting, as my conversations are not usually relevant to the readers of bloomberg. I might not be happy about it, but I'm not sure that a law was broken or that I would have any recourse...

Nobody is saying a law was broken.

That doesn't make it right. Clearly you would not be happy about it either.

I think the interesting part of this story is not Kalanick's character based on the video, but rather the business decisions Uber made and how that has impacted their drivers.

It appears Uber has benefited from people investing in fancy cars. If it was their business plan to mislead people into doing that and then force them to take Uber X rides, then that is wrong, though not illegal.

Whether I would be happy about it or not does not make it right either. My unpopular opinion is that this video is in the public interest and that matters more than whether or not the CEO of Uber is happy about it or feels like their privacy was violated.

I don't support the idea that our culture would be better off by sharing more videos of each other when we did not expect we'd be speaking to the entire world.

It's why we don't get to see Trump's or Congress' tax returns without some kind of court case.

If they're forced to do it by law, it will be forced upon you too, and boom, everyone knows all your financials.

We can decide what we want to add to our culture. Secret videos don't need to be part of it.

Another unpopular opinion here: I think people in power should be held to a higher standard than lowly peons like me.

Imagine yourself as the driver. If the video had never been published, he would never have even gotten an apology from Kalanick. I sympathise with those who don't have the kind of power that the CEO of of Uber does. He is a serf in the hellish gig economy that Kalanick has made himself a billionaire many times over. This is the most meaningful political impact he will probably ever make in his life. Kalanick, meanwhile, will probably be okay, even if this leads to a chain of events where he is fired.

I want to choose a kind of culture where the working class are not so powerless against the rich. Just because one thinks it should be the law for the president to release their tax returns, doesn't mean that they think every single person should be subject to such an invasion of privacy for no reason.

News and paparazzi are kind of an unfortunate consequence of being a public figure. You're not in a private place in someone else's car...

I'm not sure you're right, legally speaking. At the very least it's a grey area. I certainly have the "reasonable expectation of privacy" (the legal test) in a hotel room that I don't own - a hired car doesn't seem that different to me. When you see an actor get into a car to avoid the paparazzi - they rarely own the car, and reasonably expect the driver not to film them and upload to TMZ or something. (IANAL, TINLA)

Uber cars aren't technically owned by a business like a hotel is though. If you stay the night at my house, there's a DVR system in some of the rooms. Deal with it.

Edit: Also, you probably are being filmed elsewhere in any major hotel (lobby, halls, etc). And I've seen plenty of that footage end up on TV.

Again though, you're not applying the proper legal test. The law isn't "who owns the property you're on" or "is the property owned by a business or individual," it's "do you have the 'reasonable expectation of privacy' on that property?" The former may factor into the latter, but it's not as cut-and-dried as your comments would make it seem.

edit: here's some precedent that may suggest you do have expectation of privacy as a passenger in someone else's car, though the scenario is different http://digitalcommons.tourolaw.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?artic...

Technically most hotels don't own their buildings either...

There's also another person there. In public you're supposed to find a secluded spot, not sure how much privacy you can expect in that situation.

Uber's position is that its ride sharing, and that's why the drivers are employees. Arguing that they have a reasonable expectation of privacy now that it would benefit Travis is just arguing out of both sides of the mouth.

Uber isn't even a public company. How did he become a public figure?

I think its unfair to say that simply by doing business with the general public, every CEO becomes a public figure.

If my character and ethics were newsworthy over the recent term, I'd hope to be prepared for it. Other celebrities are.

"Character is what you do when you think nobody will find out."

If I happened to be CEO of a ~ $60 billion company, you're damned right that I'd be okay with Bloomberg publishing a video that brought both my character and competence into question.

There is no such thing as privacy when you get to be that big. And frankly, any leader competent enough to run a business that big should already know that.

Exactly, even if there was no video, the driver could have written a viral medium or Facebook post and quoted his words. A conversation with one of your "employees" is not private!

I don't think releasing the video was right.

Regarding Uber black, another HN user points out,

> Travis is right on a technicality they did not lower Uber Black prices much if any. What they did instead was coerced Uber Black drivers to take Uber X request. Yes drivers can reject Uber X request, but if you reject a certain amount of Uber rides, they kick you off their system. Probably why the driver is complaining about going bankrupt, you need a luxury car to drive Uber Black, but if you're stuck picking Uber X fares you'll lose money.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13758023

> Travis is right on a technicality they did not lower Uber Black prices much if any. What they did instead was coerced Uber Black drivers to take Uber X request.

That seems like semantics to me. The pay was lowered.

Why are you both unaware that the rate itself was in fact lowered. Straight from the article:

> In 2012, Uber Black cost riders $4.90 per mile or $1.25 per minute in San Francisco, according to an old version of Uber's website. Today, Uber charges $3.75 per mile and $0.65 per minute.

Nip arguments in the bud, not at the leaf.

> Nip arguments in the bud, not at the leaf.

I like that attitude.

But there's no indication that this has anything to do with how much the driver receives. This number is how much Uber receives.

If the consumers are voting with their wallets that they want more Uber X rides and less Uber Black rides, well, that's what should happen. To bring supply back in line with demand, some drivers who used to drive Uber Black should either leave or downgrade, and if they won't do it willingly, then some drivers going bankrupt is a way how the market forces "driver supply" to go in the direction where it apparently needs to go.

I'm not sure I follow as to why they have to accept Uber X requests. If there is less supply for Black cars, what's wrong with them sitting idle? What if they miss a request for a black car while they are driving their uber x customer around?

Forcing Black drivers to accept X requests invalidates any claims Uber has about their drivers being independent contractors instead of employees.

I think this is where the crux of the disagreement is. They can decline fares for UberX requests and I don't think it counts against them. Normal Uber drivers will get kicked off the system if they decline too many fares but I don't think that applies to Uber Black drivers that get shifted to UberX.

I don't think that is a good reason to say they are employees.

What happens when you look at it like this; A Uber driver must accept some % of request sent their way (any class), but if you want to be sent uber black request then you must have an appropriate car.

I feel like you are looking at it from a top down view, vs a bottom up view. I am not saying ether view is right or wrong. I just find it hard to follow the logic to how that makes them employees.

But I have struggled with the employee argument from the start, so I am a bit bias at this point.

A big part of why I think people feel the way you do is because the system is programmed, and automated. If i was a guy looking for contractors to do jobs for me naturally people who were more consistently available and that I have worked with in the past would get jobs before people who can only be available "whenever". The only difference is that was some sort of decision I made in my head vs a system who had thresholds programmed.

What I feel like uber has done is automated the process of hiring contractors for on the spot jobs. And somehow people don't like the automation of it, or the rules. I feel like the solution is simple. Don't drive for uber if you don't like the terms. Go get a taxi medallion if you want to make your own rules, or drive for one of the competitors.

> I just find it hard to follow the logic to how that makes them employees.

The IRS has guidelines: http://www.twc.state.tx.us/news/efte/appx_d_irs_ic_test.html

Arguments for drivers as employees:

Behavioral Control 1a (the relevant argument I am making), 1b (Black drivers have specific types of cars), 1f

Type of Relationship 11

> What I feel like uber has done is automated the process of hiring contractors for on the spot jobs.

That is not true because Uber dictates the pricing. In fact you as the passenger are not hiring the contractor. If you look at it from a per-ride-transaction perspective it is actually one more reason why Uber drivers are employees (Financial Control 7, Uber limits the extent to which a driver can realize a profit on an individual ride).

Looking at Uber drivers as being contracted by the passengers does not make sense.

All good points. Thanks. I had not considered that way before.

I think 1a and 1f are the strongests points. I do feel 1b is a bit of a stretch. I don't think somebody becomes an employee because they require you to use a hammer and not a rock to push nails into wood when building a house. While that is not the best analogy I think you should be able to expect the contractor to show up to work with the right tools to do the job.

I would really like to see a system that was more like a real time Angie's list. In such when ride request came in drivers made bids, and requesters could pick from the bids. The bids might also have information about distance from pickup location (or expected pickup ETA, along with price). Maybe have a default setting to pick lowest bidder and shortest ETA. But other things like car styles or types could be part of the system too.

In any case thank you for your reply. You have given me some things to think about.

> I don't think somebody becomes an employee because they require you to use a hammer and not a rock to push nails into wood when building a house. While that is not the best analogy I think you should be able to expect the contractor to show up to work with the right tools to do the job.

This is actually a relevant distinction for the building trades. A contractor will have their own nail gun with a brand-specific feeding system, or might even choose to use an impact driver in certain circumstances. When a construction firm requires all its subcontractors to have a particular model of nail gun that would be an argument for them being employees.

> I would really like to see a system that was more like a real time Angie's list. In such when ride request came in drivers made bids, and requesters could pick from the bids. The bids might also have information about distance from pickup location (or expected pickup ETA, along with price). Maybe have a default setting to pick lowest bidder and shortest ETA. But other things like car styles or types could be part of the system too.

This was how a lot of people expected Internet commerce to work in the early 1990s - the research term for it was agents/multi-agent systems. The passenger would have their agent put out a call for bids for a ride from one location to another. The driver's agents would reply with bids and the passenger agent would take the lowest one. The driver's agent would base the bid on some function that could take into account things like distance, predicted driving time based on current traffic conditions, predicted mileage cost based on MPG estimates based on data from the car's OBDII sensor data, etc.

That would be a market system. Uber and Lyft are a duopoly from the point of view of passengers and monopsonies from the point of view of drivers.

Here's a comparison. With advertisement sales, often companies will say you must provide at least X impressions, even if we won't guarantee premium pricing for you.

Sometimes, maybe even most of the time, you'll get a high CPM (like Uber Black). Sometimes you'll get a low CPM (compare this to Uber X). Regardless, you have to do X amount of business with them or else they drop you.

Sometimes this means taking higher quality traffic (thus potentially higher CPM), and funnelling it to a certain advertiser at a lower rate simply to maintain your impression level.

That doesn't make web site owners, employees of ad companies even if they're solely dependant on a single ad company for their livelihood.

Well, it's basically that "Uber Black" no longer exists as a distinct service. That has screwed drivers. But still, that was a risk they took.

Sure, but the way Uber is set up means the costs from that adjustment are bourne entirely by the driver, who was probably advised by Uber to take our a lease on an expensive luxury car in order to pick up expensive fares.

Bear in mind the start of this thread was discussing the driver being rude. You can call it "market forces" as much as you like, but if Uber is happy to sit back and let its drivers pay the price, its CEO can expect to be given a hell of a lot of abuse in return. And he'll deserve it. Don't expect to be treated well when you don't treat others well.

This is the free market. Uber Black is one thing, but you do know Uber is aggressively working towards autonomous vehicles, because Uber wants to provide transportation in the future, and not just now. A $69 billion dollar company must always be thinking of the long term if they want to stay relevant.

Uber isn't a charity. I don't condone Uber's culture or whatever the CEO may or may not have done to create such a workplace but you have to understand that Uber is a business, like any other, out to maximize profits. Everyone seeks to maximize profits, and if the market calls for changes, then you make those changes lest you give up market share to your competitors.

> Uber isn't a charity.

No, but it functions in a society, and shouldn't be under the mistaken belief that it is immune to societal change.

We can all agree that self-driving cars and automation in general are a positive technological development. But what if it results in mass unemployment? It's short sighted to say that Uber only has to seek to maximise profits - it also has an interest in there being a large customer base with money available to use their product. Presumably it would also prefer that those customers are not rioting and trashing vehicles in the street.

This is a mini version of that. Uber has screwed over this driver, and he is justifiably angry about it. "Well, we'd lose market share if we don't do it" is not a winning argument to anyone except other advantaged rich people.

Let's keep in mind that Uber Black was meant to be a replacement for renting limousine by the hour. It was meant to take something that used to be $135/hour with a 5 hour minimum, and turn it into $50 per 30 minute ride so limousine owners could profit off their spare time.

This is hardly something that is for the common man, and has little to do with self-driving cars or automation.

> Let's keep in mind that Uber Black was meant to be a replacement for renting limousine by the hour.

WHAT?! How are the vehicles on this site even close to a limousine? http://uberestimate.com/what-is-uber-black/

Private car services offer 4 seater and SUVs as well as the typical looking limo. That's what most of their business is... Driving people to and from locations like nightclubs in SUVs.

Uber is not immune to societal change, they fully embrace this, like any company must if they want long term success.

Every corporation seeks to maximize profits. They may make investments, but every company expects a positive return on those investments in the long term.

I think we are responsible for our own actions. No one forced this driver to use Uber. Uber and Lyft always had very open relationship in the sense that drivers routinely double dipped in the pool without legal issues. There is absolutely no expectation that the terms under which the drivers are operating are set in stone and they aren't going to change in the future.

You have to look at things within the legal framework. $97k is a lot of money and people sue for much much less. That driver probably had no case at all.

It's not a problem if their driver recruitment material reflects that. If the message was "Drive a black car for occasional UberBlack fare, beware that you must accept a certain percentage of lower UberX fares, and that at some point you will be replaced by a driverless vehicle", it's truth in advertising and drivers get what they sign up for.

Driver ads, however, display successful-looking models quoting some unrealistic (as frequently pointed out by quite a few news sources) dollar amounts, and let's face it, the clientele it's targeting is very removed from robotics/AI development, unlikely to have an economics degree (or speak fluent English, for that matter) or disposable income to trade up / trade down their vehicle of choice to reflect the strategy of the day.

Your argument can be rewritten to apply to Countrywide Mortgage and fake Viagra peddlers, does that make those businesses right?

> Uber isn't a charity.

By that token, their drivers aren't charity workers either. If we put aside the inter-personal aspect of the video (which is contentious to say the least) this, to me, espouses the fundamental flaw in Uber's approach to their business: they have no respect for their workforce.

Unless they can get their self-driving cars working in time (which is another contentious subject), I suspect their eventual failure if it comes will be due to how they treat their drivers. Personally, I use Lyft because (a) in SF Lyft and Uber availability is more or less fungible and (b) I got tired of Uber drivers giving me an earful on how badly Uber treats them. Lyft drivers, in my experience (which is anecodtal, but I take at least 5 Lyfts per week and often 10+) are reasonably happy about their work. After the recent news I went ahead and deleted my Uber account, but that was an easy decision to make since I never use them anyway.

IANAL but my understanding is that this sort of are claiming Uber drivers are employees vs. contractors. If they are contractors then they should be able to refuse rides from a different class freely and without any sort of punishment.

I'm following till "without any sort of punishment", there I'm lost. If I have a contract with a gardener that is servicing me for watering my yard, but then I also need to have my lawn mowed. If I ask him about providing this service and he declines, what's wrong with finding another gardener willing to provide the service I need?

I agree with you but I wonder if a court might say it's more like hiring a gardener to water your flowers and then when he doesn't want to change your flat tyre you cancel the contract. At the end of the day though short term/casual contracts are cancellable. I don't think anyone wants a world where you can't get rid of contractors when you want or need to.

In that specific case he might still be ruled a contractor, sure.

But if you expanded the list of duties to be sufficiently large and indefinite ("gardening and whatever else I need"), then a court might rule that you have created an employment relationship and are responsible for providing various other benefits.

So it would seem to favor the "employee" classification if Uber had a long history of "oh, and you also need to take these other requests ... oh, and support spotify integration now ... oh and you have to auto-accept requests before you're done with the current."

In a properly functioning market, drivers would be going bankrupt due to not having enough fares, not by being forced to take unprofitable fares.

If customers are voting with their wallets that they want more UberX and less Uber Black, then Uber Black drivers should be faced with a choice of chasing volume or margins, not forced to subsidize customers.

They're not being forced to take unprofitable fares, though. They're being offered UberX customers when there are no Uber Black customers available. Whether or not they have the ability to change that priority is the question here. It seems that taking a slightly lower fare is better than taking no far at all at a higher rate.

If they refuse too many UberX fares, they'll be dumped. I'm sure Uber will argue that doesn't qualify as "forced," but it does to me.

That's not true with Uber Black. If you refuse an Uber X fare as an Uber Black driver, you're just marked as inactive temporarily (as you've declined a legitimate customer when there were no Uber Black customers). You can mark yourself as active again and take fares, but you are not forced to take Uber X fares as an Uber Black driver.

In that case I agree this is a non-issue. I was going from the comment earlier in the reply chain that said they'd get kicked out.

If it's as seamless as you describe it to be, it's not an issue. An external source here https://pando.com/2014/09/04/uber-continues-to-screw-its-par... claims "Uber drivers are required to maintain a minimum 80 percent ride acceptance rate to remain in the company’s good graces – the best performers exceed 97 percent, the company tells its drivers. Ignore too many inbound ride requests when you are the closest vehicle and the result could be some combination of reprimand/probation, lost bonus income, or, in extreme cases, deactivation of the driver’s account".

I don't have any personal experience driving, would be nice to have a clarification on that.

This only applies to drivers that decline fares in their current rate class. Standard Ubers, Uber XLs, etc. Uber Black drivers that decline UberX fares when there are no Uber Black customers are simply marked as inactive. They can set themselves as active again and accept fares again almost immediately. If they continue to do so, then there is a wait time simply because they're not offering the service they're contracted to do and they're creating a longer wait time for Uber customers.

They get marked as inactive which they accept, and go back to their normal business of being a private limo service for the wealthy at $135/hour.

Uber Black in Washington D.C. is basically exclusively run by private limo operators driving Escalades. Owners of recent model $70,000+ cars are not your typical Uber driver, and do have other sources of income.

Almost every Uber black driver I've taken has handed me their card and proceeded to upsell me on their services outside of Uber.

> It seems that taking a slightly lower fare is better than taking no far at all at a higher rate.

That is not how capitalism works. Uber drivers are responsible for both fixed and variable costs. The marginal revenue of a fare might be less than the marginal cost and the decision to accept a fare needs to be made by the driver. If Uber drivers do not have the ability to make revenue management decisions they cease to be contractors. Uber is misleading its drivers and the IRS by labeling its drivers as contractors and passing losses onto them.

But even so, what's the point in pretending that fares aren't going down?

What a bizarre way of looking at it. There's vastly more economy class passengers on a plane; but it doesn't mean that first or business passengers don't exist.

You are right that some drivers going bankrupt is how the market would correct, but forcing them to take uberx fares at below cost is a dreadful idea and definitely not free market economics. If anything, it's like a govt regulation that requires businesses to do some stuff below cost to still be in the game.

Im not disagreeing, can you explain why (or point me to reading material)? If customers aren't traveling business, won't the airline company either have to give away seats or keep them empty?

Uber is the plane, and drivers are the seats.

Uber works so that each seat (or pair, or row of seats) is operated by a single driver, mostly at their own personal risk – with the operator of the plane controlling a lot of the equation.

Normal airlines assume an aggregate risk of the entire demographic and seasonalities of air travel. If customers suddenly stop traveling business, the airline can do something about it (lower prices, improve service, better marketing, and so on). With the Uber model, there's not so much a single driver can do, but they carry a lot of the risk.

UberBlack drivers never signed up to accept UberX fares. That wasn't part of the contract, which is why so many feel cheated, an equivalent of a cable company selling you a promotional $19.99 rate and then upping it to $79.99 once you bought the equipment.

> To bring supply back in line with demand, some drivers who used to drive Uber Black should either leave or downgrade

Sure, or some passengers who used to want a cheaper UberX but find it unavailable should either resort to alternative methods or upgrade to UberBlack - market equilibrium can be found in either direction.

> This will probably be an unpopular opinion, but I actually thought the driver was exceedingly rude. He clearly took advantage of Kalanick being in the public eye, and thus a "target". Filming him without acknowledging it was totally immoral, it should reduce any fair person's bayesian priors as to the credibility of the driver.

Why? If I were a driver, you can be sure I would be filming everyone. Does that mean I would have no credibility?

Here in London I've assumed that cabs are always filming.

They would not be able to publish the video, however. That would be illegal.

Why?

look up 2 party consent laws in California.

that's for use of a recording in court, not sure it applies to this situation

What? No.

> The statute applies to "confidential communications" -- i.e., conversations in which one of the parties has an objectively reasonable expectation that no one is listening in or overhearing the conversation. See Flanagan v. Flanagan, 41 P.3d 575, 576-77, 578-82 (Cal. 2002). A California appellate court has ruled that this statute applies to the use of hidden video cameras to record conversations as well. See California v. Gibbons, 215 Cal. App. 3d 1204 (Cal Ct. App. 1989).

If there's a reasonable expectation of privacy, all parties must consent to the recording.

"Here in London..."

Not sure referring to California laws follows here. It's for a different reason.

In the UK specifically, it would fall under the Data Protection Act. You need to make sure that the data (video) is used fairly and lawfully and for a defined purpose. In this case, the purpose of collection is safety, not for publishing on Bloomberg.com.

> And the gig has gotten harder for longtime drivers. In 2012, Uber Black cost riders $4.90 per mile and $1.25 per minute in San Francisco, according to an old version of Uber's website. Today, Uber charges $3.75 per mile and $0.65 per minute. Black car drivers get paid less and their business faces far more competition from other Uber services.

Considering that he did change the price from under the driver, and that is very likely what did indeed bankrupt the guy, I don't blame him from acting out in any way he can.

The fact that the CEO just screams out "BULLSHIT" when he points out the price decrease which affected him and that his only response just makes me lose respect for him completely.

He's only saying "bullshit" to the guys claim they were originally making $20/mile... Sounds like from info you posted that both the $20 and the $2.75 per mile claim are completely wrong.

Kamel: “We started with $20.”

Kalanick: “Bullshit.”

Kamel: “We started with $20. How much is the mile now, $2.75?”

> Filming him without acknowledging it was totally immoral,

To me this is a very classist oppinion. Normal people are filmed as they take the bus, ride the subway, go on the elevator, walk through the graveyard (seriously), go shopping, so why should a rich person who can afford a cab be granted an exclusive right to privacy which the rest of us don't have? If we promote this case due to the expectation of privacy that only serves to create this devide between rich and poor in which only the rich can afford privacy rather than a precident in which everyone deserves it.

"Normal people are filmed as they take the bus, ride the subway, go on the elevator, walk through the graveyard (seriously), go shopping, so why should a rich person who can afford a cab be granted an exclusive right to privacy which the rest of us don't have?"

What are you talking about? Normal, non-rich people totally have the same expectation of privacy when they take a cab. Would YOU be ok if your cab driver films you without any knowledge? A taxi/uber/lyft is a rented private car, it is not the same as public transportation.

A lot of TNC drivers have cameras pointed into the car, some (but not all) with signs indicating the passenger is being filmed. It is even more standard in real taxis. The expectation of privacy is more that such footage in any of the mentioned circumstances would never be released unless it captured someone committing a crime or something similar.

> What are you talking about? Normal, non-rich people totally have the same expectation of privacy when they take a cab.

"In its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets and steal loaves of bread."

Would YOU be ok if your cab driver films you without any knowledge?

Most taxis I've been in the past, oh, let's say 15 years, have had interior/passenger cams.

usually they have signs that say so. It's illegal to not notify your passenger that they are being filmed. It's possible that this driver had signs (but no way to know from just the video).

Are you sure this is the case in all states? My understanding is that some states are 1-party consent, tho IANAL.

Edit: This seems to back up my understanding that most states are 1-party consent. http://www.dmlp.org/legal-guide/recording-phone-calls-and-co...

You're allowed to film people without their permission if they enter your property, or are in a public arena for security purposes. But _publishing_ that film is strictly immoral and illegal in many jurisdictions.

Subways, buses etc. are public spaces. A car is not, and unless the driver had a prominent sign conveying that everyone is being recorded, it is definitely an invasion of the reasonable expectation of privacy.

You seem to be implying that only rich people can afford taxis, and thus its some exclusive service no "normal" people ever avail themselves of.

This isn't true, and even if it were---cabs are private spaces; that's what you're paying for. Subways, elevators, busses are shared public space.

Also, while it's perfectly okay for the driver to tell Travis what his concerns or pain points are, it's rather rich of him to assume that he has any context to tell Travis what business decisions make sense. As if Uber won't have charged higher prices if they could get away with it.

The CEOs being disconnected with the masses is bad, but so is the masses assuming that somehow THEY know just the right thing the CEO should have done without being privy to any of the data that a CEO has access to.

It's not too different from the arrogance you see on HN.

Right, the driver didn't even know what the current Uber Black fair was...falsely claiming it was $2.75. Anyone would get annoyed when someone was telling you that you were essentially doing your job wrong but didn't even know the basic facts. In this case, these facts have a direct impact on the driver, which makes it all the more inane that he doesn't know them.

You seem really intent on defending Kalanick here so I will only post this as a reply to one of the several similar comments you've made regarding this:

You can't force contractors to take lower fare rides and then still claim the high ground of "we didn't lower your fares to X"

That's fair enough and I see that point. My intent is not to defend Kalanick, but I do instinctually defend free markets. I think Uber and its drivers found itself in a situation with falling demand amidst rising competition.

"My intent is not to defend Kalanick, but I do instinctually defend free markets."

Even when said "free markets" cause people extreme hardship?

Is there another system you know in which no one has experienced "extreme hardship?" Are you saying the driver in this article is an example of that?

Are you certain that's the case? I was under the impression that, while this is true for the normal classes of Uber, the UberX fares for Uber Black drivers do not count against them if they reject the fare and UberX rides are only offered to them if there is not a current Uber Black fare available in the area.

$2.75 a mile.

Replace CEO with King and business with country and you got yourself a winner.

It's fair to assume that Uber could have not lowered the prices in exchange for a smaller market share. Which would have been a pretty good arrangement for existing drivers.

This will probably be unpopular as well. I think Travis overreacted and lacked empathy with the driver, but the driver didn't seem to understand that TK doesn't control market forces, and doesn't "have the business model in his hand". Uber was doing well with Black Cars, but the company did the right thing by undercutting its own market so that it could survive and grow. There's also nothing wrong with "giving every person a ride", rather than limiting Uber to just black cars for the riches. Uber adapted to market forces, the driver didn't, and then he blamed the company for his problems.

Maybe teaching economics in primary school could solve this problem.

Gee how are you going to catch anyone doing something immoral if you warn them before they do it? Not sure what you are trying to say about bayesian priors, but when you say untrue things it ruins your credibility. Not sure why people are upvoting you. Yeah, bad people hate it when you talk about the things you do. Fortunately, like the PewDiePie incident, famous people can't ruin others just because they are upset they reveal the things they do.

> What is wrong with newspapers nowadays? It seems the press decides someone's "fair game" and they just engage in the most blatant character assassination.

You're peering through time with rose-colored glasses.

American history is littered with instances using the press to smear and undermine the oppositions, whoever it may be.

The Founding Fathers, a number of them with close ties or financial stakes in printing press businesses, used it regularly to peddle an agenda.

Appearance and opinion have long mattered. Because they are really the only things we have on which to judge. Everyone has their own personal view and influencing that is the goal. Not truth. Never in the history of the nation has actual truth-seeking been the goal of the powers that be in politics or media.

Ideas like we're now in a "post-truth" world are bizarre. It's nearly a truism of the species to use a pedestal to smear enemies and endear to us our fans.

There's a different standard for public figures.

A relative of mine was a chief of a fire department. During a nasty contract battle, he had people picketing his home -- a miserable experience for his family at the time.

But... he was a public figure and the protestors were on a public sidewalk.

When you're a public figure that carefully nurtures a bad-boy, asshole image and attitude of privacy bordering on contempt, you shouldn't expect kid gloves.

> Filming him without acknowledging it was totally immoral, it should reduce any fair person's bayesian priors as to the credibility of the driver.

Sorry, why should we care about the driver's "credibility" here? Are you alleging the video has been doctored?

Immoral perhaps, but not necessarily illegal. Does anyone know where this took place? I wasn't 100% certain from the article. Many U.S. states have a single-party consent wiretapping law, which permits this kind of surreptitious recording.

Every taxi I've taken in the last 5-6 years has built in cameras that film both the back seat and the passenger before pickup. There notices but I don't believe you can assume privacy from the driver when it's not a limo with the screen up or something similar.

There are legitimate reasons why this is done in a taxi: preventing people running away from payment, engaging in harassment or other bad behavior, or claiming you refused to pick them up for reason X when you had a good reason to not pick them up. From what I know of Uber, these reasons all apply to their drivers as well.

I agree. I felt the article painted a far worse picture than the video justified. You have to love a camera, the only unimpeachable witness there is.

IMO the most incriminating thing in this video Travis did is that cornball shimmying in the back seat.

"I lost $97,000 because of you."

This is exactly how entrepreneurship works - you take risks, sometimes enormous risks with huge capital investments, and it doesn't pan out. Sometimes it does work out and you reap great rewards for a long time.

The driver signed up for this and the gamble didn't work out... now he's blaming Uber?

I agree that you don't really have a right to complain when willfully you join a platform you don't control.

But driving for Uber isn't entrepreneurship. You don't control your marketing, brand, you don't acquire your own customers, no control over price or business model, etc. Drivers are really just cogs in the service, provide a car, drive the routes, get paid.

driving for Uber is definitely entrepreneurship (source: Uh, I did Uber and Lyft for a year and a half, and did quite well, too). And it's also totally okay to complain about shitty contracting relationships. For example, the entrepreneurs of company X contracts a company Y to make some hardware, and the job is totally botched, but they can't do anything because a lawsuit is not worth the time/money.... I don't think it's unreasonable for X to bitch about Y since that provides a useful signal to others to not make the same mistake.

Not identifying with Uber drivers as entrepreneurs is a very classist attitude.

I mean entrepreneurship assuming he lost $96,000 by buying a few cars and timesharing them out to other drivers... which is starting our own small business...

You can't "lose" $96,000 by being a driver...

The CEO of Uber is a public figure and has as much right to privacy as he gave Sarah Lacy whom he let Uber stalk her and family for a negative article.

He is a ruthless, greedy, ignoramus, misogynistic pig who needs his ass handed to him and Uber to crumble before his eyes!

So those downvoting me think there is nothing wrong with having a reporter stalked, allowing your female employees to be treated like dogs... stealing your competitors IP... snubbing your nose at the law to put robot cars on the road that could kill people all for the sake of winning .. this and other horrible behavior is perfectly fine and that's why your downvoting me?

> Filming him without acknowledging it was totally immoral.

It's definitely illegal. It's not immoral to film it necessarily, it is maybe immoral to release it without permission. But at some point you have to admit that it becomes "public interest" to leak information, even if it transgresses those moral standards. As an extreme example, if you had managed to covertly film Kim Jong Un, giving insight into the inner workings of the hermit kingdom, would it be immoral to make it public?

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