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Comment by jasode | Hacker News Reader

This essay has some interesting analysis contrasting the differences between the model of licensing/guild vs crowdsourced reviews.

However, analyzing that aspect misses the point.

The heated issues around Uber is economics and how the pieces of the pie are cut up. Explaining how new technologies allow a different trust model to emerge is irrelevant to the French taxi driver throwing bricks at Uber cars or DiBlasio's proposed cap to curb congestion.

In other words, this essay is more relevant to a potential passenger of Uber who wonders how he/she can trust a car that doesn't have a government medallion.

One needs to write a totally different type of essay to appeal to angry taxi drivers and angry politicians.

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(author of the post here)

There are issues on a number of levels. One is "public safety" which is essentially the licensing issue. Another is externalities like traffic, which aren't about licensing for safety but more about regulating for other impacts. Then, there are the economic / labor issues, which deserve their own consideration.

Yes, I agree with that and also the analysis in your essay.

My point is that your content (though intersting) does not live up to your ambitious (and generic) title, "A Solution to the Uber Problems".

Talking about "real time data sharing" with mayor of NYC is interesting but the "congestion" problem, which could be perceived or real, is not what comes to mind when people discuss "Uber problems." Traffic congestion caused by Uber is a relatively minor debate so far in relation to other problems it has.

The following google search for "Uber congestion" is 504,000 hits:

https://www.google.com/search?q=uber+congestion

The following searc for "Uber labor" is 11,100,000 hits:

https://www.google.com/search?q=uber+labor

You've just brought up a second issue, partially related to the author's topic. I don't understand why you think the author's missing the point.

Because one can type "Uber" into the HN search box and read all those threads. Look specifically at the angry posts and frequent rants.

What is the recurring theme in all those angry posts?

It is not about people wondering about trust. The nastiness is all about economic unfairness.

"Trust" is orthogonal to "Economics".

The authors essay is not a "solution" to the issues people are actually debating. Also, the specific issue with DiBlasio was congestion and vehicle caps and not "trust".

The author doesn't need to address all problems at the same time. He's not missing anything just because he doesn't discuss what you and HN want to discuss.

As my other comment to the author states, his essay in isolation is fine.

The mismatch is that his article's content (which is ok) underdelivers on the title which it oversold as "a solution to Uber's problems".

In other words, I'm not asking for his article to solve all of Uber's issues and solve world hunger. I also have no desire to discuss Uber labor. My point is that the article doesn't match the title. A more accurate title could have been, "A solution to let NYC monitor freelance driving services". (Admittedly, that type of title wouldn't attract as many clicks.)

While the issues of economic unfairness and trust are both important, indeed weighty enough to merit much more substantive discussion, the issue that Nick Grossman is debating in the article is regulatory oversight. The same issue is expanded on in a recent a16z podcast.

http://a16z.com/2015/07/21/innovation-regulation-policy/

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