Unionize. Collective action is the only way to stand up to Uber and co.
There's no workplace to speak in hushed tones. There's no manager or de facto leader to make first contact with union representatives. There's no way to know when you've reached a quorum of local drivers.
Make no mistake, I sympathize with you. Rideshare/third-party delivery drivers have become America's new techno-feudalist underclass.
But I’m not sure how you’d fund its creation. No VC would want it and there’s not a wealthy user base to bootstrap it.
However, if you do need some money for boostrapping, there are likely unions out there that would be willing to grant/lend the sums needed, which should be five figures.
Taking VC money would be counter-productive, making you beholden to conflicting interests.
P.S. The motivation for setting something like this up doesn't necessarily need to be purely selfless. It's not going to make you a billionaire, but if successful a non-profit or co-op you set up to do this can pay you a six figure salary for a job that has significant meaningfulness and significant agency (aka control over your own work). And by being a non-profit or co-op the lack of conflict of interest should make it more likely to be successful.
Estimates for how many gig workers there are in the US vary between "over 20 million" and "about 60 million." They're already tech-literate, they probably talk to each other, so there's a chance that an app like this would experience very quick growth.
I wonder how gig services would react to something like this. They'd probably try to identify users and deplatform them, so in addition to the financial aspects, one difficult part would be how to protect and anonymize such a platform's users.
you'd want to know that the people you're talking to are actually your coworkers and not corporate plants, but you also want to be sufficiently anonymous to avoid workplace retaliation OR weird stalkers.
More to the point, VCs invented these apps specifically to disenfranchise workers and vaccuum up the lost cost as a bullshit "service fee".
What would that mean, to be a workplace?
i'd try not to be prescriptive about it, but it could cover anything from a light 'random chat' channel to vent about petty workplace annoyances, 'tips and tricks' for success, or more serious channels to talk about workplace safety/conditions/unionization
This would be for folks who have some app controlling their work- uber drivers, door dashers, etc.
Seems like digital workplace should be easier to organize with all the community tools we have.
All described in prescient classic: https://marshallbrain.com/manna1
no workplace cliques, meetings a win is a win. when I pray to the poofy guy in the sky I thank him for creating the humans that created this
Many are industry-specific such as the "Communications wokers' union", but there are also general workers' unions such as GMB [1] or Unite.
It would be possible, indeed probably preferable, to form a "Delivery workers' union". It would be a union of delivery drivers who would pool resources to fight for common rights.
https://www.wired.com/story/adcu-gig-economy-union-toxic-rep...
The reality is that a large proportion of app workers are undocumented. Worker accounts are rented or sold to people who do not have the legal right to work. We can't reasonably address the issue of working conditions on these platforms if we don't acknowledge that fact.
https://inews.co.uk/news/deliveroo-uber-eats-just-eat-illega...
There isn't a technology or unionization fix for this as it's a social and polite problem. I've looked into cooperative worker-owned solutions but for certain strata of society there are more gaping problems than the algorithm.
There's no way to know when you've reached a quorum of local drivers.
SMS. When I drove for Uber, there were massive group chats amongst the drivers. They even organized planned shortages in certain parts of the city when rates got too low.
They can, by definition, not unionize. Even striking is basically out of the question, as organization is near impossible and most of these people could not sustain months with zero pay.
This needs to be just made illegal, it is just a subversion of labor laws.
Delivery and final assembly of food is not McDonald’s’ business.
I haven't eaten McDonald's in a while, but from what I remember the food arrived fully assembled.
The franchisors’ profits and profit margins are nowhere near McDonalds’.
[1] https://www.mcdonalds.com/us/en-us/full-menu/5-dollar-meals....
*Prices and participation may vary.
That said, McDonalds corporate isn't running promotions unilaterally. Instead, promotions are proposed by committees elected by franchisees and voted on by franchisees themselves, so participation rates tend to be high.