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Comment by olivierduval | Hacker News Reader

French Taxi drivers are knowned to be unfriendly and not quite honest, and lazy. They're trying to keep their business protected instead of trying to get better. Now, they even use violence against Uber-drivers & Uber-customers. BTW, they don't give a shit of their own customers...

At the beginning, when Uber opened in France, I could understand their problem. But now, they just went to far: instead of being better to keep their business, they just want to keep their business by being the only players, leaving no choice to customers but to use them. And that's plain wrong for me...

In fact, I think that I would support an action from Uber against Taxi syndicates & French government support, either in the street or in the European Court of Justice

Disclosure: I'm a french parisian and never used Uber (yet) but used Taxi from time to time... ;)

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Same here in Chicago. The primary reason I avoid cabs and prefer uber.

1. They are rude.

2. They don't accept credit cards and often lie to you about their CC machine not working.

3. Cabs Stink.

4. They have annoying little screens with ads in the backseat.

5. Some of them have no air conditioning.

2. They lose money and have to wait in long lines to get their money when you use a credit card. Don't blame the worker.

4. Sure, kind of annoying I guess...

I've had far more really enjoyable cab rides with Chicago drivers than I have had ones that are even slightly uncomfortable or rude.

Who cares if it's their fault or not? All that matters is that the service sucks and there's a better alternative.

> instead of being better to keep their business, they just want to keep their business by being the only players, leaving no choice to customers but to use them.

At least in the states it's impossible for traditional taxis to compete with Uber because they're so heavily regulated and Uber just like transportation laws don't apply to them.

> french Taxi drivers are knowned to be unfriendly and not quite honest, and lazy

Both the french government and the taxi drivers are responsible for this situation. So both need to come up with a "fair" solution. Medallion selling shouldn't be a business, I can't sell my driving license to somebody else so the gvt shouldn't have allowed it at first place.

I'm not a fan of Uber. Never used it and neve will. But the medallion system is just wrong. And right now, like on many many issues in France the government refuses to take responsibility for its mistakes.

It's a typical aggressive reaction when an old system is under threat. Easier to attack than to evolve. In time Uber will probably have to submit to adapted laws, while Taxis will trim fat, improve their service and behavior, and things will balance out.

yes but... as stated, current taxi drivers won't sweat a bit to actually improve their services, which are generally deemed as sub par to be polite. but they will go great lengths to hurt any sign of competition, even users who show interest in it.

how much more rotten their behaviour must be for you to start caring about customers more than them? of course it's not black & white, but this industry is in grave need of disruption, and one is coming. i don't care about them any more than they do care about me, fair deal.

I .. empathize with Taxis anyway, even though it's hard to justify violence of that kind (beatings, fires). They do suck a lot more than they should, like many many old businesses[1]. Don't forget the burden of being a legitimate business too, it's risky and costly.

How would you feel if all of a sudden anybody can play in your field for free while you paid 100K, and have to comply to a lot of legislations for the same rights.

[1] reminds me of Air France, it's easy to think RyanAir is better, but in reality AirFrance offer you a lot more. I believe Uber falls under the same issues, sure they're cheap, but they don't give any insurances. They did benefit from a nice technological mastery that made the service interface far better than the old system.

In fact, Taxis GAVE their businesses to Uber by despising their own customers... If they has been good enough, Uber wouldn't have had so much momentum here.

I'm really sad for the few taxis working hard to be better because they're thrown now in the same bag as the average bad taxis. Hopefully, most of the time, good taxis have loyal customers (and no problem with UberPOP for that same reason).

BTW, I'm working in computer science so... disruption is at the heart of my field!!! :D

I'm into CS too, and was all about progress but I've tamed my ideas.

Do you really think that bad Taxis drove customers away or was it the system bottleneck (waiting so long, difficulty in finding a cab when you need one) and seemingly lower prices. Again, Uber give you less, AFAIK you're not insured if something happens, you dont even know if the guy has an insurance for himself, there's no check of any kind (as a CS guy you should be afraid of that), so prices can appear lower.

I don't know, I only took a cab twice in my life.

> I .. empathize with Taxis anyway, even though it's hard to justify violence of that kind (beatings, fires).

Welcome to French leftism! It's a bit of a unique brand, as France has been culturally skeptical of movements like international communism (to say nothing of the globalization economy), and it has a distinctive nationalistic style. This sort of protest is, beyond its immediate targets, an exercise in patriotism, and par for the course - if I recall correctly, some strikes a while back were even taking management hostage (Goodyear, 3M, etc).

Fortunately France moved on from guillotines quite some time ago. :P

Hehe :)

I'm being honest. I've felt that working in a company hiring people under interim contracts (better paid) making historical employees work twice (your job, teaching others that don't care, correcting their mistake down the pipe just before they leave with a lot of unfinished things) for lower salaries, and it felt wrong. You want equality.

Uber isn't a surprise, it's a known model of disruption, spread faster than the law can react and when you have momentum, newcomer and authorities find a compromise.

They did bring something to the table, a nice kick in the butt, and a newer and far better user interface. That said they (and others) are still operating illegally through the pressure of times (people are busy and low on money, an illegal driver is better than no driver at all)

edit: additions.

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