PR firm pushing anti-Google message for undisclosed client - <AUTHOR> http://pastebin.com/zaeTeJeJ

<comment><USER2> Seems like a good time to revist Paul's essay "The Submarine:"

 _PR is not dishonest. Not quite. In fact, the reason the best PR firms are so effective is precisely that they aren't dishonest. They give reporters genuinely valuable information. A good PR firm won't bug reporters just because the client tells them to; they've worked hard to build their credibility with reporters, and they don't want to destroy it by feeding them mere propaganda._

 _If anyone is dishonest, it's the reporters. The main reason PR firms exist is that reporters are lazy. Or, to put it more nicely, overworked. Really they ought to be out there digging up stories for themselves. But it's so tempting to sit in their offices and let PR firms bring the stories to them. After all, they know good PR firms won't lie to them._

 _A good flatterer doesn't lie, but tells his victim selective truths (what a nice color your eyes are). Good PR firms use the same strategy: they give reporters stories that are true, but whose truth favors their clients._

<http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html>

<comment><USER3> Selective truth != truth. I'd say selectively presenting one side is dishonest. I don't have anything against companies who are dishonest, but let's call a spade a spade: PR companies are spin doctors. They're dishonest. That's not quite straight out lying, but to me the very definition of dishonesty is not presenting all of the truth if you can.

<comment><USER4> >I'd say selectively presenting one side is dishonest.

do you vote with your dollars in this regard?

If there was a bigger PR penalty for not revealing unpleasant truths and maybe more support for a company that does reveal unpleasant truths about itself, more companies would be more open.

<comment><USER5> Whether he votes with his dollars or not is irrelevant to the fact that selectively presenting the truth to influence people is dishonest.

<comment><USER4> right, but it has everything do do with the profitability of honesty.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This is pretty standard -- get anti-Google (and Microsoft, and Apple) pitches all the time. About the only thing that isn't standard is the fact that the PR firm won't say who their client is. That pretty much never happens (at least to me). So the fact that they won't say who it is makes it kinda interesting, but it could just be some nutjob somewhere who decided to spend his money on hiring a PR firm.

<comment><USER7> Was it you ms-redmond ?

<comment><USER6> ;-)

Nah, I'm a journalist, on the receiving end (and also, being a journalist, poor).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> John Mercurio is the the Director of the Media practice in Burson-Marsteller and more interestingly, _"a leading political expert on national politics, campaigns and Capitol Hill"_

[http://www.burson- marsteller.com/newsroom/lists/PressRelease...](http://www.burson- marsteller.com/newsroom/lists/PressReleases/DispForm.aspx?ID=759)

</comment><comment><USER9> Google crawls publicly available data and uses it -- scandal! This is getting old, but it seems like some people still need a reminder: If you submit information about yourself that you know will be publicly viewable, you have no right at all to anger. I think that some people truly still do not understand how the internet works, and think that login page == walled garden privacy.

</comment><comment><USER10> related: "Google deflects PR firm's attack of Gmail privacy" <http://www.usatoday.com/money/media/2011-05-06-google_n.htm>

<comment><USER11> From that article:

>The service also privately sends each Gmail user the names of "secondary connections," a listing of the people each direct connection happens to be following publicly on the Web.

So it will show me the friends of my friends? What is this obsession with degrading privacy in this way? Didn't Google learn lessons from the way Buzz exposed your friends to other friends? Why can't email and chat be just that? If I want social networking I will use a social networking site.

If this continues, I will look at making another email service my primary email.

<comment><USER12> It's only showing you information that is already public (the people your friends are _publicly_ following).

<comment><USER11> Still, Google needn't make it easy by aggregating it and presenting information about me to my friends.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> "Caught" seems like a funny word to use.

They pretty clearly lay out a case that this is an interesting story, and all's fair in love and PR.

In fact the email they're sending seems relatively benign compared to what I expected to see.

And the juiciest part of the story - who's paying the PR person - is missing.

Wondering why this wound up @ the top of HN as a result?

EDIT - Slightly more interesting (err, predictable) if MSFT is the culprit? [http://www.catchingflack.com/2007/09/burson-marsteller- outed...](http://www.catchingflack.com/2007/09/burson-marsteller-outed-as- microsofts-sock-puppet/)

<comment><USER11> More likely to be Facebook, since Social Circles seems to be directly competing with them, not Microsoft.

<comment><USER14> Which is kind of funny, comparing GOOG's privacy with Facebook's privacy.

<comment><USER15> Google has far more sensitive information on me than Facebook. Facebook only has publicly facing information, stuff that you've already shared with other people.

Google has my searches, and what I've clicked on. And good luck trying to get them to forget those logs.

<comment><USER16> _"Facebook only has publicly facing information, stuff that you've already shared with other people."_

Ummm, and maybe every site you ever visited whose owners display those funny "like" buttons.

<comment><USER15> The "like" button is for publicly sharing your interest in a web page.

And for tracking where I've been, Facebook is no worse than any other ad agency; that they show me that they're tracking me is no worse than DoubleClick's or Google Ads' tracking.

<comment><USER17> Facebook has a lot more than you're giving them credit for.

You're only counting data given to them directly, as if the things you tell Facebook are the only things there. They also have a lot of data based on what they infer from your behavior. The most visible aspect of that would be when they recommend people for you to friend.

And then there's all the data other people give them about you. Oh, sure, you can untag the photos or whatever, but who knows if Facebook really forgets? I can just imagine the uprising if Facebook ever sorted through all the photos where the tag was removed, compared them to the tagged photos to make sure it was the right person, then started selling "X's Embarrassing Photo Collection" or something. No, they'd never do that for obvious reasons, but they still have that kind of data.

What I'm trying to say is that they have more information than you realize. I'm not saying that they will or won't do anything bad with it, just that they have it. So whether you care or not depends on how much you trust them.

For the record, Google has plenty of data, too. I personally trust Google a bit more than most companies, but that's just my opinion and it could always change.

<comment><USER15> That's kind of patronizing, of course I know that Facebook has all that information. (And though I'm annoyed at the moment, thanks for engaging me, this is an interesting discussion)

You're still missing the point: when information is put into Facebook by me or others, the intent is to share it with others. Facebook is not a vehicle to do things in private, the entire purpose of it is to share with others, whether that be your list of connections, your photos, how much time you waste on Farmville, or how frequently you communicate with Aunt Tilly.

Facebook is the anti-privacy, it's a public space, a place to get things out in the open. There's nothing private at all about Facebook, and that's the _entire_ point of it. It's what Tim Berners-Lee envisioned the web to be, and what it would have been had he been able to put useable authoring tools into the hands of the masses, instead of HTML being limited to the benighted few that can afford the time investment to learning it and working with a web server.

Google, on the other hand, pretends to be an ISP with implicit promise of privacy, but will exploit the fuck out of your private email recipient list just to try to do what Facebook is doing. Google's core business is the same as Facebook's, advertising, but Facebook goes about gathering data about you in a far more transparent and clear manner than Google.

When somebody gives all that juicy personal information to Facebook, they're doing it with the intent to share and are making it public of their own volition for their personal social benefit. When somebody gives personal information to Google, they're not giving their search terms to Google in order to share search terms, they're doing it get something else in exchange, but may very well wish they could keep that juicy personal information completely private.

IMHO, trusting Google more than Facebook or Microsoft or Apple is extremely foolhardy, and a testament to how far a catchy slogan can go on the PR front. It doesn't matter how well-intentioned the people at the top of Google are, failures to adhere to policy will happen, and the Buzz incident is just how flagrantly Google will fail at "not being evil" when they're desperate.

I should note that my Facebook account sits idle because of my paranoia about it. But at least everything Facebook has, I wanted to be public. Google has me by the balls.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I am very surprised this is the first time someone try to get everyone's attention on this practice (if that's the intention of the poster/submitter). It's quite easy to spot recently there are well-timed attacks on Google or Android which are oddly fueled with passion. I suppose any money spent on this (which should be significant) would be way better used if it's used to improve whatever product the client have in competition with Google, really. End users, ultimately, won't benefit from these.

</comment><comment><USER19> Just from the standpoint of better understanding the value of PR firms makes me glad I read this.

</comment><comment><USER20> Related

True Enough - The second age of PR <http://www.cjr.org/feature/true_enough.php>

</comment><comment><USER21> In other news, undisclosed client employs Chiat\Day to push anti-Microsoft message over a period of one decade.

</comment><comment><USER22> Don't see how this is a "scandal" of any kind. These tactics aren't uncommon.

<comment><USER23> That doesn't make it right.

<comment><USER24> But it's nothing new. :P

<comment><USER25> Scandals rarely are. Someone gives or receives money, favors, or information inappropriately. It's the perceived degree of impropriety that makes something scandalous, not how commonly it occurs.

That said, this one does seem pretty tame.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I don't care who is slinging the mud, but I do agree with the message.

Where in the hell do I opt-out of "Social Circle"?

</comment><comment><USER27> [http://www.smh.com.au/technology/security/facebook- exposed-u...](http://www.smh.com.au/technology/security/facebook-exposed-user- data-to-advertisers-security-firm-20110511-1ehy1.html)

Counter-PR?

</comment><comment><USER28> Perhaps this guy's promoting his book:

[http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/may/9/e-totalitaria...](http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/may/9/e-totalitarianism- at-google/)

</comment><comment><USER29> Ho... now it makes sense.. <http://techcrunch.com/2011/05/12/swallowing-puke/>

</comment><comment><USER30> I'm glad that this sample is available, there were always the rumors about another big PR firm 'Edelman' hired for this sort of thing, the subject isn't always privacy they are also beating the antitrust drum, Google spokesman in DC called it then an 'Anti-Google industry complex'.

</comment><comment><USER31> In other news, Google fanboy is caught pointing fingers on people disliking Google.

<comment><USER32> Do you even know who Christopher Soghoian is?</comment></comment>


Uber CEO says its service will probably shut down temporarily in California - <AUTHOR> https://www.cnbc.com/2020/08/12/uber-may-shut-down-temporarily-in-california.html <comment><USER2> I work at Uber outside of the rides/eats business and observed many feature releases to adjust the business after AB5.

What I saw released:

\- Enabling drivers to see where a rider is going before accepting the trip [0] [2]

\- Removed a main penalty for declining rides, "No More 85% Acceptance Rate Requirement For Uber Pro" [2]

\- Drivers get set their own fare with a multiplier [1] (the article details screenshots and backend balance rules)

Now every dollar coming in seems to very clearly go from rider to driver.

\- removed upfront pricing in California and once again charging riders the precise trip amount based on time and distance. [0] [2]

\- A new driver incentive was released too tied to purchasing the service fee at a lower rate [3] (since every dollar is supposed to flow clearly from the price breakdown)

\- "Favorite Driver Feature", so even if they set higher fares, riders will be able to request one of their favorite drivers if they're nearby [2]

These seemed primarily to try to address the flexibility evaluated by "Prong A" of AB5, however some public experts were concerned it wouldn't address "Prong B", which requires the "drivers' work is outside 'the usual course of the company's business,'" [0]. This might have been where the judge focused their ruling.

Other companies didn't make changes for drivers, "Lyft [also afaik Postmates, and DoorDash] continues to operate as if it's business as usual." [0]

[0] [https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/story/2020-02-03...](https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/story/2020-02-03/uber- ab5-driver-app)

[1] [https://therideshareguy.com/set-your-own-rates-uber- feature/](https://therideshareguy.com/set-your-own-rates-uber-feature/)

[2] [https://therideshareguy.com/uber-rolling-out-new-driver- feat...](https://therideshareguy.com/uber-rolling-out-new-driver-features/)

[3] [https://therideshareguy.com/uber-drive- pass/](https://therideshareguy.com/uber-drive-pass/)

<comment><USER3> This is horrible for customers, the worst part is when drivers don't want to pick you up.

<comment><USER4> Here in Germany proper Taxis have to pick you up (as far as I know, I almost never need one). That's apparently the main reason they offer why they should be protected against services like Uber.

<comment><USER5> That's the law in most places in the US, too. Uber was founded because it wasn't really true in practice. You couldn't order a taxi in most places without giving your destination, and frequently they just wouldn't show.

Uber was, and remains, a huge improvement over the pre-Uber status quo.

<comment><USER6> For drivers or riders?

<comment><USER7> Both. As a driver, no medallion mafia and astronomical prices to deal with. As a rider, no taxi drivers and their horrible service to deal with.

Taxi companies are monopolies allowed by the state, it sucks for the last ones who paid $300,000 for a license to operate just before Uber took off, but technology finds its way.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Well this just sucks. As a frequent SF visitor, Uber/Lyft used to be my primary way of moving around. I don't drive.

I also don't see who benefits from this. You had a well functioning service for the users that will be disrupted. You had a flexible way to earn for drivers that will be disrupted.

I chat with drivers a lot (to practise my English) and lots of drivers really like chatting too ( A lot of them were recent immigrants as well and perhaps like to practise their English with a non native). Many drivers were doing this as a part time thing. Or doing this before they went on to better things. One for example was studying Architecture. I have even had a Porsche pick me up and the driver just wanted to get out of his house.

A lot of drivers were sure forced to drive for Uber for lack of other alternatives but that is not Uber's problem. They did not add to the problem. Society failed there. This law helps no one and is a clear example of no skin in the game virtue signalling trumping common sense.

<comment><USER9> > also don't see who benefits from this.

Long term society by establishing that Uber doesn't get to write the law and dodge their responsibility as an employer. It's about time they get knocked down a notch after their campaign against DeBlasio.

<comment><USER10> I agree with you but I also think that they should have waited.

Right now is a terrible time to wipe out the gig economy. So many people are turning to it and it is creating value. Economic/employment changes like this one are best suited when the market is strong because people job mobility is higher etc.

<comment><USER11> There was no choice to "wait". AB5 was passed to fix the law because of a court decision [0]. Had they (the CA Legislature) not passed AB5, the court finding in Dynamex would be just as bad for Uber.

The court doesn't have an option to "wait" just because it's a recession.

Uber doesn't have a choice to "wait" because this ruling is going to go into effect in ~10 days unless the stay is extended.

[0] - [https://scocal.stanford.edu/opinion/dynamex-operations- west-...](https://scocal.stanford.edu/opinion/dynamex-operations-west-inc-v- superior-court-34584)

<comment><USER12> The authors of AB5 took the liberty of exempting certain professions (presumably influential voter blocs and donors) from Dynamex.[1]

If you drive delivering beverages, whether you're an employee or contractor under AB5 depends on whether or not that beverage is milk.

I don't see why they couldn't have anything in there for rideshare.

[https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtm...](https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200AB5)

<comment><USER13> I detest uber. yet AB5 is an abomination, an embarrassment. sad

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> We're legally unequipped to deal well with gig workers.

They're arguably neither contractors nor employees, and shoe horning them into either category will inevitably lead to some absurdities.

<comment><USER15> I think it's more like "gig workers" were created to try to do an end run around hard won protection for workers. The idea that someone driving (or waiting for pickups) 40+ hours a week is somehow different is different than somehow different than someone (e.g.) doing tech support for 40+ hours a week is absurd.

<comment><USER16> It is entirely different, since you can start or stop your work at any time, can choose to only work when the pay is good enough, and are not committed to a single company. I don't think a job where you can start working by just installing and app, and get paid by the job, should be treated as the same as one where you are required to work some amount each week and get paid the same every week.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> > Becerra said in an interview on CNBC on Tuesday that he was unconcerned > about the potential for Uber to leave the state as a result of the order. > "Any business model that relies on shortchanging workers in order to make it > probably shouldn't be anywhere, whether California or otherwise," he said.

This type of attitude drives me crazy. These companies have paid billions of dollars to drivers, who voluntarily decided to work and earn this money. If drivers felt the arrangement was unfair, wouldn't they do something else? How is anyone better off by these companies being legislated out of existence? They're already hemorrhaging cash as is.

It's astonishing to me that government leaders believe workers are better off with fewer options, regardless of the perceived quality of them. Or maybe they don't actually believe it but are willing to inflict the damage anyway for the sake of virtue signaling.

<comment><USER18> That's a really harmful outlook.

If company A decides that they are going to pay their workers (say) $3/hr, and illegally bypass the minimum wage, it _DOESN'T MATTER AT ALL_ if they can find workers willing to work for that amount.

As a society, we've decided that certain offers aren't acceptable, even if you can find someone desperate enough to take the offer.

You shouldn't get to just ignore the law because you're big enough.

(And Yes, in practice big companies do ignore laws more than they should. That's a bad thing, and a reason to do better, not a reason to give up).

<comment><USER19> There is a floor to what people will be willing to accept -- if they can make more money from unemployment benefits than from working, they won't work.

Many Uber drivers are facing a choice between gig work and unemployment, and they chose gig work. If they had better options they would have chosen those instead, but they didn't. Clearly they prefer gig work to unemployment, and for most of them, those were the only two options.

Taking away gig work does not help gig workers. It removes the only option they had, and it forces them into unemployment. If that is the outcome they wanted, they would have chosen it already.

<comment><USER20> That's not the way UI works. Benefits must be qualified for; you generally have to have had a job that you lost (gig economy jobs complicate this severely and often disqualify people). You can't just "quit" and pick up benefits. And there is a time limit in all states after which the benefits terminate.

Very, very few people at any given time have a "choice" as to whether to get unemployment or work a gig job.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Them shutting down is a perfectly acceptable outcome.

California has essentially told them "You're doing an illegal thing". They're response is essentially "Oh yeah? Well then, we'll stop doing the illegal thing!"

Thank you? That's what you were asked to do in the first place?

If they aren't interested in operating legally, then pivot or disband the company.

<comment><USER21> Yes, a terrible solution for drivers and riders both. Back to the taxi monopolies.

<comment><USER22> Or an opportunity for a new ride-share company that doesn't claim their employees are contractors.

<comment><USER23> Even taxis claim their drivers as contractors.

<comment><USER24> An individual taxi driver owning a cab, a license if necessary, paying for his insurance and getting the money from his passengers is an individual contractor, yes.

It's just that he contracts with the individual riders, not any higher-up monopolistic business entity that sets arbitrary business-driven rules that all taxi drivers have to follow.

<comment><USER21> Very few drivers own their cars (or more importantly their monopoly medallion). Those are owned by investors like the presidents former lawyer, Michael Cohen.

[https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cnbc.com/amp/2018/08/23/tax...](https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cnbc.com/amp/2018/08/23/taxi- commission-warns-michael-cohen-they-may-revoke-his-medallions.html)

<comment><USER24> Isn't that only the case in certain metropolitan areas? It is a huge problem indeed, but the problem there is the medallion system having degraded to become a shady get-rich-quick investment scheme. This is unrelated to the way in which the drivers are operating.

They just lease their car and medallion from someone, paying that guy a fixed rate per day for that lease, but that does make them neither a contractor nor an employee of the guy who owns car and medallion.

If they also were to lease the clothes they wear while working from a tailor instead of buying them, that wouldn't make the drivers in any way into contractors or employees of that tailor.

<comment><USER23> Absolutely false. Most taxi drivers don't own the medallion, and in fact when they start their shift they owe the taxi cab company $80-100, so they need to work for a few hours just to get to break even.

Your mental gymnastics to try to justify why taxi drivers aren't employees but Uber drivers are is showing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Maybe I'm cynical but "temporarily shut down" sounds like a formula to:

\- Inconvenience a certain class of urbanites who have grown accustomed to being driven around in the hopes that they

\- Complain loudly to their representatives and other governmental officials in the hope that

\- The state will reverse this judgement

<comment><USER26> Uber isn't the only company who provides this commodity.

If Lyft continues to operate, that certain class of urbanites will switch to Lyft before they complain to their reps.

<comment><USER25> Lyft certainly has the option to comply with the law and jack up their prices to compensate. There are probably fewer "frivolous" reasons to use ride- sharing at the moment anyway and a decent percentage of that class of urbanites aren't all that price sensitive.

<comment><USER27> > Lyft certainly has the option to comply with the law and jack up their > prices to compensate

They also have the option, if they can find the financing, to comply with the law and burn money building an entrnched user base _before_ jacking up prices to compensate.

I mean, even on the old model, that's how Uber got itself entrenched and hard to displace.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> "If the appeal doesn't work out for Uber, it will be banking on voters to determine its fate. Khosrowshahi said if that's the case, the service would likely shut down in California until November, when voters in the state decide on Proposition 22, which would exempt drivers for app-based transportation and delivery companies from being considered employees."

It'll be REALLY interesting to watch this all unfold.

</comment><comment><USER29> Decoupling "benefits" like healthcare and retirement from employment is the real issue. Should be a government responsibility, given out equally, paid for by taxes.

<comment><USER30> We already have social security and medicare. The problem is that we refuse to expand these excellent social programs, opt to hobble them, and then point out how bad they are after we've bled them out. The American way.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> Uber has generally seemed like a net benefit and I've taken a lot of rides (hundreds to low thousand) and have generally conversed with most of the drivers I've had and the gig work has been beneficial to them, they make a decent standard of living for a HCOL area enough for a family and get to set their own hours. Hard pass on regulation like this and good to see Uber push back with the levers they have.

I will add that some regulation would probably be beneficial but not this one in particular.

<comment><USER32> You can set your own hours with W2 employment. There's nothing that says that Uber can't give their W2 employees that flexibility.

They could hire W2 employees right through the app, there is no technical barrier.

Uber just wants to avoid their fair share of payroll taxes and employee health regulations that their upper caste office employees enjoy. They want to provide benefits to some employees but not all, purely based on their job description.

I bet your ridesharing gig worker friends you know would love no longer covering the full payroll tax bill, and they'd love to be covered with workers compensation if they got into a car accident while driving for Uber.

If companies don't want to pay for healthcare and benefits anymore, maybe they should start putting their lobbying efforts toward making healthcare paid through tax revenue rather than through the inequality and inefficiency of employer subsidy and for-profit private insurance companies.

<comment><USER31> You're only partially correct I as a salaried employee could technically set my own hours but If my employer pinged me at 2am and asked me to do something and I said no I wouldn't have recourse if they fired me. If I'm a contractor I can set those hours in the agreement with the company with legal backing if I then refuse to work during hours I've said I do not wish to work.

But you're debating regulation in general and I'm specifically arguing AB5 is overly restrictive.

Edit: I can clarify as well, it may very well be the case they are employees but this isn't the regulation to do it because it is actively harming workers in multiple industries besides ride sharing.

<comment><USER32> I'm confused, what does Uber have to do with salaried employees?

This is the workflow.

1\. Gig worker applies for Uber in the app.

2\. Uber approves the employee as a W2 employee. Their schedule is...whatever they want. They never get scheduled for a shift. They never get "fired" unless they do something that would get them get kicked off the platform just as it works today.

3\. When the driver starts the driving mode, they start the clock on their shift. This counts the number of hours for the purposes of healthcare and other benefit requirements. Perhaps if they deny a ride request, the clock stops or considers the previous ride to be the end time.

There is no legal requirement for an employer to fire a W2 employee over being unwilling to work a shift. There's no legal requirement for a W2 employer to set a predetermined schedule.

What is the problem here, can you explain?

<comment><USER31> [https://www.integrated- payroll.com/difference-w2-employee-10...](https://www.integrated- payroll.com/difference-w2-employee-1099-employee/)

The setting your own working hours part. You're just a bit wrong there.

<comment><USER32> Okay, so Uber mixes both those scenarios.

I wonder if Uber has filed SS-8 to have the IRS evaluate the situation.

They have fixed performance guidelines (star ratings) and fire employees for not picking up jobs (rides). The employee also only works for Uber (not the individual customer, who is anonymous until the job is accepted), who determines the rate and is the ultimate decider if the completed work is accepted (they resolve all customer disputes and are the final say on whether you get paid, not the customer). Uber determines the method of completing work (e.g. how long you have to wait for customers before canceling).

Critically, these "contractors" are integral to Uber's regular business operations. 100% of Uber's product relies on its drivers.

On the other hand, they don't provide equipment or set schedules. Clearly their mode of work blends aspects of W2 and 1099. But also, because these drivers are integral to Uber's business, it's possible they're in violation by _not_ compensating for/providing equipment. Again, the drivers are told who to pick up and where to go, and if they don't do it while they're on shift, they get "fired."

The only factor that comes close to making them a contractor is the lack of schedule, and maybe the fact that they can go work for Lyft too. But every other aspect of the job looks like W2 to me. More checkboxes are on the W2 side of the guidelines.

So, California's law fills in that logical gap by determining that, in this scenario, the workers are W2 employees.

If the IRS has a problem with the law in California, I assume they might have said something by now, or sued the state?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> There is zero barrier to entry for a rideshare service. (Just ask the city of Austin.) Absent COVID, competitors would be coming out of the woodwork to supply this market with fairly-paid drivers. That means the cost of a ride will double, but that simply means we'll be paying taxicab rates for much better service than taxis provided in the past. We've known all along that Uber's prices were too low to be sustainable anyway.

<comment><USER34> > Just ask the city of Austin.

[https://communityimpact.com/austin/central- austin/impacts/20...](https://communityimpact.com/austin/central- austin/impacts/2020/06/12/rideaustin-shuts-down-operations/)

"RideAustin shuts down operations"

"Other ride-hailing companies that entered the market in 2016 have also since suspended their operations in Austin. Fasten ceased its U.S. operations in 2018, and Fare closed in June 2017."

<comment><USER35> That's because the business model just doesn't work, it requires ridiculous scale and the ability to exploit workers to function - that is why Uber is so aggressive with this and even more reason to shut it down.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> I mean, consider the alternative, which is how taxis used to work. Investors like Gene Friedman would own fleets of medallions, and drivers would rent the medallioned cars. Or drivers would own their own medallion. Definitely, for sure, the drivers were not employees.

One big difference was that there were no big public companies to sue. In Chicago, clever class action lawyers tried suing the city, since they set all of the standards that are the basis of the employee/contractor distinction. It got up to the 7th Circuit, where Posner wrote an an opinion that went basically "uh, no."

</comment><comment><USER37> I don't know what kind of background checks and interviewing (if any) Uber drivers have to currently go through (beyond having a valid driver's license and good driving history?), but if I'm hiring someone as a full time employee, you better believe I'm going to be more rigorous and it will cost me more, and that will limit the number of available Uber drivers IMO, or the number Uber will allow to work for 40+ hours. In turn that lowers supply, driving up Uber prices even further. I don't know how this makes sense overall. If a driver chooses to Uber as their primary (or sole) source of income, that's their choice. Do drivers that hustle more for Uber get a larger cut? (I think that's fair).

This is not about Uber, but about how a government can force something on a business model. Something seems off about forcing a company that created massive opportunity for people in the first place. (I am in no way supporting Uber because I think their leadership and culture have very questionable ethics).

How much more are local, state, and federal governments going to reap from taxes once drivers are classified as full time employees?

<comment><USER38> > If a driver chooses to Uber as their primary (or sole) source of income, > that's their choice.

Government partially exists to protect people against themselves.

<comment><USER39> That's a rather contentious statement. Many would say it is solely to protect people from each other and outside forces.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> Civic safety nets should be the responsibility of duly elected governments. Pushing health care, sick leave, etc., onto businesses is so backwards.

Our body politic wants all these protections but can't muster the will to do it "properly". I see this as "pass a law, and make it someone else's problem".

<comment><USER35> > Our body politic wants all these protections but can't muster the will to do > it "properly".

This simply isn't true - one party runs on being against all of these policies.

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> Lyft announced that it would do the same: [https://www.cnbc.com/2020/08/12/lyft-president-says-it- may-h...](https://www.cnbc.com/2020/08/12/lyft-president-says-it-may-have-to- suspend-service-in-california.html)

</comment><comment><USER42> Could this be posturing to get the state to back down on the enforcement of its decision? And does anyone have a guess if Uber is making money in California right now? Given the state is still in lock down.

<comment><USER43> it is. Airbnb tried to pull the same trick in New York City. All Uber has to do is follow the law. Of course they can't since their business model is based on violating labour laws. If your business model relies on doing something illegal to make money then you are no better than the mafia, it's just organized crime.

As for people here who invoke "freedom of work". Most people doing these jobs don't have much choice at first place, in order to survive. But eventually Uber will backstab them, one way or another.

<comment><USER44> > Airbnb tried to pull the same trick in New York City

I think this is a good comparison, with the caveat that there is a major difference in the political calculus: the people who get the most benefit from AirBnB in NYC are people visiting NYC (i.e. people who can't vote in NYC). AirBnB is generally not popular among the people who live here because people don't like transients in their buildings and perceive it (probably rightfully) as driving up rents.

Uber/Lyft on the other hand are used by locals (i.e. voters) as well as tourists. They are perceived as bringing prices down by breaking the supply constraints of the medalian system.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> Can we talk about the upside of being a contractor? It takes more effort to keep tabs of what you do but there are many benefits to being a single person entity. I believe lack of education about being an LLC or incorporated entrepreneur or maybe the high bar of understanding its benefits contributed to the opinion that being W2 for Uber is much better.

</comment><comment><USER46> Great- I think this will bring forth the root cause of the problem which is employer tied benefits and employer tied taxes. Right now there are entire business models based on avoiding taxes and benefits.

You can have protections like min wage, sick leave, etc and still make it really simple os that evvery individual pays the entire tax (employer and employee payroll taxes) for every dollar they earn. It can be scaled based on annual amounts just like they are now. It'll be transparent and everyone will pay it.

<comment><USER47> The nominal burden of who "pays" employment-related taxes or benefits is completely separate from who the actual tax incidence falls on. Would you rather get paid $10k that you owe $1000 of taxes on, or get paid $9k with the $1k of taxes already withheld for you? Either way, the total cost of employing you remains the same for the company, and the take home pay after taxes remains the same.

<comment><USER48> Not quite, taxes are actually higher if you are self-employed. You have to pay SECA, which effectively includes the portion that your company would have paid otherwise (on top of the amount that they withhold and pay on your behalf).

<comment><USER47> That's not taxes being "actually higher", that's taxes being paid in a way that increases the total cost of hiring someone without showing up anywhere on the pay stub of full-time W2 employees. Like, it changes the numbers to something like "$9k with $1k withheld and $1k of employer taxes" vs "$11k with $1k of income taxes and $1k of 'employer' taxes that you now have to pay"

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> Golden opportunity for the taxicab industry to get its act together and compete on a semi-level playing field.

<comment><USER50> The corruption here is incredible - the taxi cab industry had insurance of like $20K per accident (talk to the women who got brain damage), would never pickup in bad areas AND paid their workers as.... independent contractors!!

You think your taxi driver is a W2 employee - please think again.

The number of carve outs in this new "principled" rule is incredible, and more industries keep asking for them (freelance writers, gig musicians etc). Laws should ideally be broadly and equally applied, not this here is the rule except for a, then b, then c,d,e depending on who can lobby in their exceptions.

Pathetic.

<comment><USER51> What are the taxis doing with AB 5 then?

<comment><USER50> This is a law with numerous carvouts (ie, pretty garbage in first place) and HIGHLY selective enforcement.

The discussion is no longer logical. You can't say here is the law - here are facts - here is result. Now it's here is law (with lots of totally random elements and exceptions that are confusing for everyone involved if you actually try and comply with it - I've had folks says they promise they are independent businesses, and they look and act like it, but the law says things like if they don't have all the business licenses setup they are not, and some cities like SF require that if you do work for a company that has business in SF that work can be considered happening in SF and so you need to get licensed there etc etc).

I used to be a stickler for trying to get folks to comply with AB5 - but I'd guess we are at 70% noncomplaince still against letter of law - and it's not worth fighting employers AND contractors to get everyone to switch when they don't want to.

One workaround I've been recently is to hire out of state or look at offshoring - freelance writers are a good example where I don't think there is a way to really hire them legally in CA, but you can still hire them outside of state as I understand it. The mechanics of turning all authors into W2 employees is such a big leap, but most authors don't have all the right business licenses setup in every city they might have work appear.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> I've been bearish on Uber recently when they fleeced me with their credit card rewards recently. That barclaycard used to offer straight cash back, 4% at bars being the big one, which made it one of the best credit cards out there.

Then one day I checked my rewards balance and lo and behold, it was converted into useless uber bux that I can only spend on uber eats, which I avoid given the premium, or rides, which I am not going to ever do unless I've been inoculated for covid 19.

Very slimy anti consumer and anti driver practices, and I hope this statewide pull out means the writing is finally on the wall for Uber. I lust for the day ever since they ruined my favorite credit card.

</comment><comment><USER52> Seems like a fair outcome to me. If they can't operate within the law, they shouldn't operate.

<comment><USER53> Sounds like a great outcome for the people who are relying on that work for income right now.

<comment><USER54> If Uber hasn't been preparing internally for the possibility of losing this suit, they've been irresponsible in the hopes that California would go "oh shit, they're gonna shoot the hostage".

<comment><USER55> Well, I'm sure they have. They fundamentally disagree with the outcome, and so they will just not operate in California. Nobody will because the business model won't allow you to pay people enough money without charging too much. I also fundamentally agree with Uber and others here. They created a platform for someone to make a few bucks. If I sell something on Etsy they don't have to all of a sudden pay for my healthcare costs. The fact that people have turned to driving for Uber (and others) highlights problems with our government, economy, and priorities, not the companies. I really wish people would stop giving government a pass and wanting corporations to come save them. Go vote, educate yourself, and do something with your democracy. If people have to resort to driving for Uber to live, then that's something we need to fix at a state-wide or country-wide level.

Many people depend on rideshare like Uber to get to work like a public utility. Maybe if California (and this is true of other areas) actually built and invested in bike able neighborhoods and public transport, then they wouldn't need Uber.

California will lose this one eventually. You don't know what you have until it's gone.

<comment><USER56> comparing uber and etsy is dishonest at best.

The only freedom an uber contractor has is "when to work". All the pricing and trips are decided by uber, and they can't even reject properly. They are in fact an employees in everything but legal status.

In etsy, you choose your prices, what you sell, and even to whom you sell to, it's definitely a market place.

<comment><USER57> Drivers have been able to set their own prices in California for some time now [https://www.uber.com/blog/california/set-your- fares/](https://www.uber.com/blog/california/set-your-fares/)

<comment><USER58> What Uber did likely isn't sufficient. Uber restricts the maximum drivers can set, only allows increases in 10% increments, does not allow passengers to see the rates of more than one driver at a time, does not let a passenger set their own rates, does not allow drivers to go below auto-pricing, and still sets surge pricing themselves instead of letting passengers and drivers set pricing when demand is high.

 __ _Starting Tuesday morning, drivers at the three test airports can either accept Uber's original price for outgoing rides, or ask for up to five times more, in increments of 10%. After next week they will have the option to ask for less than Uber's original price.

Essentially those drivers now are bidding against one another for riders. Uber passengers will see only the lowest proposed fare range. If that driver rejects their ride request, they could see a new, higher fare range, as Uber would then show the request to the next-cheapest driver._

[https://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/Uber-tests- lett...](https://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/Uber-tests-letting- California-drivers-set-own-14992943.php)

Uber likely wouldn't be in this position if they stayed out of pricing/visibility and let passengers/drivers set whatever rates they wanted to. Just provide a platform for people to get rides and stay out of pricing entirely.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER59> Couldn't pick a less impactful time to shut down if they tried. I'm personally not using Uber right now because I have nowhere to go; I literally won't miss them.

</comment><comment><USER60> If a ridesharing platform can't classify drivers as contractors for legal reason, and if they can't classify drivers as employees for business reasons[1], can they classify drivers as owners? It's certainly legal for small businesses not to pay reasonable wages or benefits to their owners.

This ruling may give a substantial advantage to a ride-sharing service structured as a worker's co-operative. That'd be awesome, IMO.

1: this is a very big if

<comment><USER61> I don't know if there is a platform co-op specifically for ride-sharing yet, but it's not out of the question.

[https://www.yesmagazine.org/economy/2018/01/04/the- platform-...](https://www.yesmagazine.org/economy/2018/01/04/the-platform-co- op-is-coming-for-uber/)

The problem is that the co-operative model is not successfully funded in the initial phases. There is little infrastructure for worker-owned businesses in this country. There is little guidance for getting investment and start-up capital when the overall aim is to primarily put profits into owners' hands and not investors'.

We need a government that supports these efforts first. A good first step would be to pass first-right-of-refusal laws.

</comment></comment><comment><USER62> >"If the appeal doesn't work out for Uber, it will be banking on voters to determine its fate. Khosrowshahi said if that's the case, the service would likely shut down in California until November, when voters in the state decide on Proposition 22, ..."

I'm curious has the current situation with Covid-19 affected the likelihood of this passing? Would't the fact that CAREs Act allowed gig worker to collect unemployment assistance have swayed public opinion on upside of being designated a full time employee and the ability to collect unemployment when things go south?

For all the talk by the companies behind Prop 22 about a "third way", why wasn't the this third classification made a ballot initiative instead of simply saying they should be classified as a an independent contractor? Does it not seem odd to believe in a "third way" but have your legislation call for classification using one of the existing two?[1]

[1] [https://ballotpedia.org/California_Proposition_22,_App- Based...](https://ballotpedia.org/California_Proposition_22,_App- Based_Drivers_as_Contractors_and_Labor_Policies_Initiative_\(2020\))

</comment><comment><USER63> > Uber has argued its drivers prefer working as independent contractors, > though California AG Xavier Becerra rejected that claim as a "bogus > argument."

The link on the "California AG Xavier Becerra" is a google search link instead of CNBC's actual article. A mistake?

</comment><comment><USER64> This law sounds like it's putting the cart before the horse.

The real problem is the cost of healthcare and how everyone should be (but aren't) aligned with lowering the overall costs without compromising on individual care or the treatment of caregivers.

</comment><comment><USER65> AB5 is a colossal failure and it was done for taxes, not worker protection.

Full-time driving jobs already exist. Shuttles, buses, taxis, limos, etc. Uber Black is mostly private transport employees. It was a choice for drivers to willingly work for Uber instead. The lawsuit was backed by a handful of people who went against the 99.9% of drivers who wanted freedom and flexibility to work above all.

It's a tyranny of using a tiny minority to unlock massive tax potential. If protecting workers was really the goal then they should've created a 3rd option instead of shoving everyone into the W2 extreme, and it's affecting all kinds of freelance workers.

</comment><comment><USER66> I'm sure both Uber and Lyft have contingency plans to quickly hire drivers as employees. It is more they don't want to switch to the employee model and then back again if the Prop passes

</comment><comment><USER67> I used to use a service called car2go in previous cities I lived in. It was extremely convenient and approximately as expensive as Uber. Car2go dealt with all of vehicle asset, maintenance, gas, insurance, parking.

IMO paying someone to drive you around is just inefficient when you can easily do it yourself (though lack the vehicle). This is the wall that uber is running up against and is now trying to skirt regulation in order to cut costs.

<comment><USER67> Edit: looks like it's been shutdown and is now [https://www.share- now.com/](https://www.share-now.com/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER68> So basically, Lyft wins in CA? Ubers out and Lyft will comply and can finally raise the prices on rides however they want. Am I missing something?

<comment><USER69> Lyft is also a target of this injunction. It isn't clear yet that Lyft will begin complying with AB5.

<comment><USER70> Margins are already negative. How can they possibly afford to?

<comment><USER69> I don't know.

Financials aside, I don't even know what this is supposed to look like from an organizational perspective. IMHO the biggest problem Lyft and Uber are facing is not an increase in cost, it's a reduction in flexibility.

You can't afford to pay extra people to sit there on the clock if there's no demand. (plenty of drivers turn the app on in their house and go about their regular day, maybe only getting 1-2 rides in between eight hours of playing video games) Do you forcibly clock people out?

You now have to be really careful about the 40 hours. You definitely can't afford to pay people overtime, and for all intents and purposes you can't allow people to work enough hours to constitute "full time" either. So if someone hits 35 hours or whatever, you have to clock them out.

How do you handle drivers who turn down lots of rides? You have to fire them I suppose?

This is not a problem you can just throw money at. I'm glad I'm not a product manager at Lyft/Uber right now. I'm not convinced it's possible to operate in California anymore.

<comment><USER68> I guess another thing is that a lot of uber drivers could get fired b/c of just cost and the ones that stay on full-time are going to get thrashed around with little choice in what rides they want to pick.

Yeah, this is a huge mess, it kind of makes sense why they choose to fight in legal battles in the past, it's just easier than figuring this out from a product perspective.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER71> Uber's model would work fine in a country where the government provides medical insurance, disability insurance and the protective net you need.

In the US, unfortunately, those protective nets are liabilities of the companies to their staff, not a service provided by the government.

One could argue a third solution where the driver would unionize and the protective net should be offered by the union.

<comment><USER72> we have all that in germany but we also have minimum wage, which uber can't pay, that's why they're basically a "normal" taxi company here.

</comment></comment><comment><USER73> Regardless on where one stands in regards to the issue of whether or not gig workers should be employees, I don't see how anyone could see Uber's choice of action here as anything other than malicious obedience.

The court proceedings have been going on for a very long time, and now, only on practically the eve of the ruling becoming effective, do they start making plans for it?

</comment><comment><USER74> I may be a bit behind the loop as to what efforts has been done before, but has there been efforts at doing a "taxi platform" vs. a full ride hail-service app, i.e. just providing an app as a common platform for different taxi medallion holders to ride hail and maybe handle payments but without handling full fledged ride recruitment and rates?

</comment><comment><USER75> Why would they bank on voters? Do they really think people are going to vote against driver protections in california?

<comment><USER70> How about consumer protections?

"Driver protections" are the reason we have Uber and Lyft to begin with. Cab companies were very well regulated and paid. But the service sucked. I was hung out to dry in areas of San Francisco in 2009 - where cabs would simply not come because it was inconvenient for them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER76> California is bullying freelance. And honestly I don't see the realistic end goal. They can bring on all their drivers full time it would be a nightmare to pay and manage for a company that makes no money. Or uber treats driver worst and the quality of rides gets worse by lowering standard.

</comment><comment><USER77> This is fantastic news! Now there's a huge market available for a rideshare app that wants to prosper by actual good service rather than wage theft and outright hostility to the regulations of the market they operate in.

I hope some hungry founders-to-be are working on this now.

</comment><comment><USER78> if ridesharing leaves cali politicians will be skewered

<comment><USER79> This is what Uber wants them to think so that they get scared and drop it.

<comment><USER78> i agree, it is a tactic from uber's perspective, but it's also a reality regardless of uber's strategy

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER80> Why the burden of drivers being an employee fall on Uber and not the driver? One can argue that there is just a marketplace and a payment processor, the actual "management, directions, and compensation" are determined by the rider.

</comment><comment><USER81> If drivers are employees they can only work for one service, which for most of them will be Uber since they'll have the most demand. This law should be really good for Uber, terrible for its smaller competitors.

<comment><USER82> I was wondering about this too. Most Uber/Lyft drivers in my area drive for both services but it seems like they could prevent people from doing that as part of a formal employment contract (I'm guessing IANAL).

</comment></comment><comment><USER83> Big question for the room - are current taxi drivers W2 or 1099?

<comment><USER84> They are generally 1099 contractors, which have been reclassified as employees under AB5. In addition, they often have to rent their cars from the shop and pay the city for medallions to operate.

</comment></comment><comment><USER85> Seems like a good opportunity for a pure market exchange solution. Just have a service that lets drivers charge a flat fee or maybe use taxi rates... then take a cut.

</comment><comment><USER86> You know what'd make this whole employee/contractor thing moot? A robust driver's union that was willing to shut down Uber on their own.

</comment><comment><USER87> Isn't this a strategy from Uber to get the people of California to vote for the most Uber-supporting candidate in the next election?

</comment><comment><USER88> Dara: we need to take better care of gig workers

Also Dara: if you force us to pay our gig workers more we'll pull out of your market.

</comment><comment><USER89> A couple points here: Uber/Lyft are 100% better than taxi services in every way. You might get a bad driver, but I've never had a bottle of piss hit me in the feet in a ride share. Also, try not paying cash in a Philadelphia taxi. I've had a wheel fall off a cab while I was in it, zero recourse. Rear ended accident, same. Told to pound sand with the PPA. Anecdata, sure, but about ten years of it.

Taxis still exist, with no benefits, still pulling 60+ hours, as an entrenched monopoly via medallion systems. This is sort of a from of driver share cropping, and is equally if not more exploitative.

If CA wanted to regulate it, they could use the data from ride shares and create limits etc. Instead, they're going to put them to pasture.

As for them operating illegally, it is a better system and more efficient than cab services. Sharing rides alone is a multiplier for gas, and app routing is a better system that taxis refused to implement for the longest time, "getting lost" to pump up fares.

If taxis disappeared tomorrow, I would shed zero tears.

Is uber a good company? No, they are a giant capital fueled destroyer. They went toe to toe with entrenched cabs and made some changes. Maybe that's what it takes in a hypercapitalist society, I don't know.

I used cabs for a decade coming home from an interstate train commute and would never use one again. I'd rather take the bus, and in Philly that's saying something.

Hope we see more innovation in this space, if not Uber or Lyft, something.

</comment><comment><USER90> And once again, Uber is trying to socialize the losses and privatize the profits. We should all be shocked by this company losing billions a quarter but still paying its execs and (initial) shareholders way above what they produce.

The difference here is that by having drivers as contractor, Uber is making us ALL pay social security, medicare etc for the drivers [1] .

Uber should fail as it has proven numerous time that its business model simply doesn't work at scale. I will say it once more but there was a good reason why taxis were expensive...

I find it embarrassing that so many urbanites, socialites, and other coastal elites got tricked into rooting for Uber's success by getting artificially cheap rides.

Also, Uber is losing billions each quarter with no clear view on ever being profitable. Why is that stock still so high?

[1]: [https://www.forbes.com/sites/ebauer/2019/12/16/is-uber- cheat...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/ebauer/2019/12/16/is-uber-cheating-on- social-securityfica-taxes/)

</comment><comment><USER91> i had this question on the other thread,

If uber drivers are employees can they still 'decline' a ride?

Employees aren't free to decline work that their boss assigns them.

</comment><comment><USER92> there are a lot of drivers in California with extra space and free time.

there are a lot of people that need rides.

There was a company that facilitated these two meeting and took a cut of payments.

It does not need to be a company. It can be an autonomous entity, eg a smart contract. Think ethereum + ipfs. just by way of example.

in other words, cut out the middle-man. Remove the target for governments to pressure and tax.

At that point, the free market decides.

<comment><USER93> Not sure ridesharing is the best fit for decentralized solutions. A big role of these companies is performing background checks and dispute resolution, and those seem hard to do in a trustless decentralized system without exposing loopholes that can be exploited.

</comment></comment><comment><USER94> shutting down your business is a great way to drive operating costs down to zero...

</comment><comment> horizontech-dev wondering does the same law applicable to Instacart, Postmates etc..?

</comment><comment><USER95> And here I was thinking that they were shutting down due to covid19 to protect people's health.

Silly me.

</comment><comment><USER96> "I Am the C.E.O. of Uber. Gig Workers Deserve Better."

what an absolute coward.

</comment><comment><USER97> Translation: We're pouting until we get what we want

</comment><comment><USER98> the same thing has happened in Turkey.

</comment><comment><USER99> Good riddance

</comment><comment><USER63> > "What worker doesn't want to have access to paid sick leave?" Becerra said. > "What worker doesn't want to have unemployment insurance at a time of > Covid-19 crisis? What worker doesn't want to know that they'll get paid for > overtime if they work 60 hours in a week or 12 hours in a day?"

Since when are we reasoning about workers starting from what they want? If we go by that reasoning, "What worker does not want to be paid 3 trillion dollars per year?". Work only exists in a narrow space between a consumer and a service. Increase the costs of running the service, and you don't have work anymore. That's not very hard to understand.

<comment><USER100> > Increase the costs of running the service, and you don't have work anymore.

This hasn't been found to be the case when increasing the minimum wage, though.

<comment><USER101> It absolutely has. Minimum wage prevents some possible jobs. There are studies showing this [0].

The fair debate is only about whether more jobs is better than less jobs with higher pay.

[0] [https://www.vox.com/the- highlight/2019/7/13/20690266/seattle...](https://www.vox.com/the- highlight/2019/7/13/20690266/seattle-minimum-wage-15-dollars)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER102> Want to be free to have a random part-time gig you can pick up whenever you want? Nope, do-gooders are going to do-good you into a wage slave job like everyone else.

<comment><USER103> Tragically, the state has also taken away my right to sell my kidneys for money, just trying to "protect" me. I'm an adult, if I want the money isn't it strictly better than I have the freedom to cash in on my human resources?

<comment><USER104> > I'm an adult, if I want the money isn't it strictly better than I have the > freedom to cash in on my human resources?

Yes.

<comment><USER105> To add onto this —- living with only one kidney rather than two only barely increases your risk of dying, and many people each year die due to lack of kidneys. So, creating a market here (regulated of course) would save a lot of lives.

<comment><USER106> It would likely coerce poor Americans into selling their kidneys to the wealthy so that they could pay off their student debt. Is coercing the poor to sell their organs to the rich a net benefit for society?

For anyone who thinks this is hyperbole, ProPublica has done excellent work investigating how lenders use the court system to imprison Americans who can't pay back their debts: [https://www.google.com/search?q=propublica+debtors+prisons](https://www.google.com/search?q=propublica+debtors+prisons)

<comment><USER107> "Coerce" in the sense that poor people would notice a way to make money and go after it?

<comment><USER106> Coerce in that someone will now have the "choice" of selling an organ or going to jail.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER108> Taxi drivers are almost always 1099 as well... So have they basically killed on call transportation for CA?

</comment><comment><USER70> I recommend reading the book Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. California will attack and attack and attack because those in government believes they are morally superior. The only way they will learn is when Capitalists fight back by "turning off the engine of the world".

Who is John Galt?

<comment><USER109> In case someone actually wants to read Atlas Shrugged, I did actually read it. It's a fictional world where the strawmen business people are happen to always be good and moral, and are oppressed by the strawman government people who are bad and greedy. Also the author occasionally has her characters go on multi- page speeches, for instance about how we ought to be using gold for currency.

In case it's not clear, Atlas Shrugged is a piece of fiction and using it to draw parallels to reality is like saying "I recommend watching Disney's The Lion King. Zoos keep hogs apart from lions because they think they can't get along".

As a sidenote to balance my scathing review, I rather liked one of her earlier novels, Fountainhead. If you want to read an Ayn Rand novel I'd go for that one, as it's more about a type of "rugged individualism" than an economic system. It directly grapples at the question of the nature of invention/innovation: whether as a product of individual genius or standing on the shoulder of giants. Obviously the novel has an answer but it's not exactly a solved question in real life, and at least some of Ellsworth Toohey's quotes aren't half bad.

<comment><USER70> Francisco D'Anconia's Money Speech - Atlas Shrugged (poor quality): [https://youtu.be/u-T0ey0IKDA](https://youtu.be/u-T0ey0IKDA)

<comment><USER109> I recall reading that. It's all very true, but it also glosses over the fact that some people acquire money through regulatory capture, violent crime, inheritance, etc, etc.

I think capitalism is the best system we have, but Atlas Shrugged espouses a rosy picture of anarcho-capitalism like Marx espouses a rosy picture of anarcho-communism that doesn't work when real humans come into play.

I've come to believe that having market forces bring out the best in society is a state of constant work to cultivate those forces in a human direction.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER110> Just an update from an old guy.

From my favorite capitalist, an oil futures trader on WS:

Between 9:30-4:00 I'd kill my own mother to make a dime a trade. Kill my own fucking mother.

Do we seriously think Uber would not slash wages to shit, deny healthcare, work drivers till they dropped, and then killed someone's mother if they could make a dime and get away with it?

People seriously believe they would not do that unless someone (AKA The State) does not stop them?

I've worked in corporate America, they would kill you for a nickel if it could lift their stock price.

Welcome to the "system." Now back to work!

Your boss has their eye on a new house. And YOU are going make sure they have that downpayment. :-)

<comment><USER111> That's a very cynical view. What about You and I who also have a down payment and a mortgage? You can argue that Uber was exploiting workers, but at the same time, none of them were forced to work. All made a free choice. And now "The State" has essentially legislated them out of their jobs. The State has literally said, "you're too stupid to realize you're being taken advantage of, so you can't work this job". I'd say that "The State" is far more of a problem here than Uber.

<comment><USER109> I definitely agree with you on this issue, but want to point out that "free choice" can lead to suboptimal outcomes. Here's an excerpt by Singer:

> Suppose I live in the suburbs and work in the city. I could drive my car to > work, or take the bus. I prefer not to wait around for the bus, and so I > take my car. Fifty thousand other people living in my suburb face the same > choice and make the same decision. The road to town is choked with cars. It > takes each of us an hour to travel ten miles. In this situation, according > to the liberal conception of freedom, we have all chosen freely. Yet the > outcome is something none of us want. If we all went by bus, the roads would > be empty and we could cover the distance in twenty minutes. Even with the > inconvenience of waiting at the bus stop, we would all prefer that. We are, > of course, free to alter our choice of transportation, but what can we do? > While so many cars slow the bus down, why should any individual choose > differently? The liberal conception of freedom has led to a paradox: we have > each chosen in our own interests, but the result is in no one's interest. > Individual rationality, collective irrationality…

Taken from [https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/09/13/book-review-singer- on-...](https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/09/13/book-review-singer-on-marx/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER112> They're protesting. Shocker. Not surprising, given their business model is built on taking advantage of their drivers working themselves and their vehicles into the bone. They did not design their company to equitably distribute the share of profit and productivity gains, they are an extractive company.

</comment><comment><USER113> Bullsh*t. You know they have a team somewhere that was preparing for the situation where they lost this case. They have a Plan B. They're just playing chicken with us right now.

This statement is part of Dara's week-long media blitz to scare everyone into letting Uber be its own regulator. Check out the NYTimes op-ed he wrote.

They will not shut down. They will blink.

</comment><comment><USER114> COVID-19 situation has clearly showcased the vulnerability of the drivers regardless of the platforms, there's no merit for the drivers to be treated as contractors as they are algorithmically made to work beyond office hours to be eligible for the incentives.

I hope other states and countries follow the suit if California forces Uber to treat the drivers as employees.

<comment><USER115> What do you mean by "algorithmically made to work beyond office hours"? You know the drivers set their own hours right? There are some who prefer to drive exclusively at night.

<comment><USER114> Yes, that's why I said- >made to work beyond office hours to be eligible for the incentives

I said that based on complaints I received from Indian drivers, • Need to work X hours to be eligible for incentives, incentives are used to meet fuel costs. • Algo punishes when rides are not taken during peak hours. • Majority don't own the vehicles, they are working office anyways for someone who owns it.

Anyways, main issue is many of the drivers are out of their work due to COVID-19 and if they were employees; at least some protections would ensue.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER116> The Uber situation seems to be echoing the deregulation of the CA energy market [0]. First, hopes of new efficiencies through unleashed market forces, then bad-faith actors (Enron), then clusterfuck, then taxpayers left worse off.

[0] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_electricity_crisis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_electricity_crisis)

</comment><comment><USER117> Just make the whole service distributed. Cut out Uber. Connect me directly to a driver through open source software.

Person A exists who is willing to drive from point a to point b for x price. I am willing to pay x price. An open source software exists to connect us both in real time.

Who will the government regulate in this scenario?

<comment><USER118> I think that you're underestimating just how much infrastructure goes into running something like Uber. A friend of mine does ML work at Grab (South East asia ride hailing company) and the amount of data processing that goes into getting a good fast and cheap ride is incredible.

It might be possible to somehow distribute it and pay people at home for spare compute time, but it would still run into latency and spike problems.

</comment></comment><comment><USER119> Uber, lyft, and related services have single handedly saved lives by reducing the drunk driving rate in California. Moreover, they have kept many cars off the road. Previously, it was impossible to have a night out responsibly, or for people without cars to get around. Now, with uber and lyft, California finally became somewhat more liveable.

Good to see the state deciding to make things worse.</comment>


The FCC weighs breaking with Obama over the future of the Internet - <AUTHOR> http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2014/11/11/the-fcc-weighs-breaking-with-obama-over-the-future-of-the-internet/ <comment><USER2> Pro: despite the "woe is us" rhetoric too often found in online communities, getting a bunch of people to complain actually made a political entity wake up and take notice.

Con: They only noticed for political reasons rather than that whole "representing the people" thing.

Con: Wheeler got the position after arranging several hundred thousands in donations to the campaign of the "no more lobbyists" candidate. He's unlikely to listen to the president he's already paid off.

Con: It doesn't seem like Obama is willing to actually fight for what he said he wants by leaning on those three of five. His record certainly indicates that he won't.

Con: Wheeler says "I am an independent agency" when there are several other people involved in the decision making. Implies total power, or at least distended ego.

It was great that Obama made a statement - it brought the issue to the attention of people who otherwise dismissed it as nerd rage. I don't think it will change anything.

<comment><USER3> I believe both major parties reach the same conclusion, it's just that the Democrats do some dramatic act of high-minded rhetoric, then cry uncle and are forced to give in, shaking their fist at the sky. It's all for show.

The game is rigged. US politics is the dramatic art of competing narratives to get there.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This is what happens when you're hiring a former lobbyist for the industry [1]

Also, I think Net Neutrality was a bad name. I think many average Americans wouldn't care about "Net Neutrality". I think something like "Internet Freedom" would have been a much stronger.

[1] [http://business.time.com/2013/04/16/tom-wheeler-former- lobby...](http://business.time.com/2013/04/16/tom-wheeler-former-lobbyist-and- obama-loyalist-seen-as-fcc-frontrunner/)

<comment><USER5> > I think something like "Internet Freedom" would have been a much stronger.

I agree that the naming leaves something to be desired, but think it should have been the other way around. Rather than the status quo being "net neutrality," I wish the proposed changes had been labeled something like "Increased Internet Provider Penalties and Fees."

Then it would be more clear that people want to change from what we have now to something that allows providers to penalize and charge people.

<comment><USER6> I disagree that this is a better label. For a consumer, some violations of Net Neutrality might actually _reduce_ monthly charges and increase their available bandwidth.

For example, let's say T-Mobile's Music Freedom program (which uses packet inspection to whitelist Spotify, Pandora, and a few others so they don't count in data metering) expands to also encompass popular video streaming services: Netflix, YouTube, Vimeo, Hulu, etc.

Now a consumer could pay T-Mobile for an inexpensive plan, say $20 for 1 GB of data on a mobile device. They stream high-definition video and music every night, maybe using 40 GB of data this month. But they only pay for 1 GB, which is still available to them for email and general internet browsing.

No extra penalties, no extra fees.

That's a great deal for the consumer, since the majority of their bandwidth use is probably streaming media from these services. The free streaming is a value-add which encourages users to pay for streaming services, but it doesn't count against the advertised data they pay for.

This clearly discriminates different kinds of traffic and provides preferential treatment to certain services. But it doesn't cause general internet services to be slower. Storing the media in hard drives near cell towers may cause the preferred media to be faster.

<comment><USER7> > That's a great deal for the consumer...

Remember Hulu Plus? The deal there used to be that you paid the major "Content Providers" a monthly fee and in exchange, you got advertisement-free access to a small slice of their catalog. Shortly after people started paying for the service the advertisements crept in, but the monthly fee stayed the same.

The truth of the matter is that today's great deal can be eliminated at a CRO's whim tomorrow. Moreover, "great deals" such as these throw substantial roadblocks in the way of non-favored players who which to participate in the marketplace. This substantially reduces competition, and substantially reduced competition has lead to the sorry state of the US's consumer telecommunications and Internet service "market".

<comment><USER8> I see your point, but I believe Hulu Plus has always had advertisements [0].

[0] [http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/29/hulu- unveil...](http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/29/hulu-unveils- subscription-service-for-9-99-a-month/)

<comment><USER7> I stand corrected (and walk a little funny, too). I should trust my memory less and re-verify my recollections more frequently.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Good for Wheeler. Obama waited until the Democrats lost control of the Senate to drop this bomb. He knew it would be DOA on arrival in a Reid controlled Senate and I really doubt he would have made this move with Reid still there.

Now the onus is on the incoming Republicans, who may be at odds with their own base if they don't do something to prevent companies from charging for access by Netflix and similar.

Regulation of such, turning these providers into utilities isn't going to come up all roses. There exists a distinct possibility many will see less options going forward, roll outs of new tech may slow and even never reach many users, all because nothing moves slower than a utility, especially heavily regulated and protected ones.

So unless the government is in turn going require the deployment of specific speeds to all regions and set dates all I see is higher costs and less new services. Call me a pessimist, but after waiting years for Bellsouth to provide reasonably priced high speed internet I was more than happy when the cable company came to town

<comment><USER10> You overestimate the incentive of Comcast et al to improve what they have in place now. They have essentially a monopoly in most of their markets over what is a utility service.

The priority at this moment has to be prserving the de facto status quo of net neutrality. Allowing Comcast to use their monopoly position to extract rents from _their competitors_ like Netflix is not a precedent we can let stand. If we go down that road, the Internet will quickly become a very different place.

<comment><USER11> Exactly. Cable co's are in a great position. They have a lot of upstream bandwidth available to upgrade their services, they have DOCSIS 3 or better modems in the field; barring other shortcomings in their networks they can roll out upgrades if competition ever arrives, probably killing it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Goes to show who has the real power: the President, or Comcast?

<rant> This is what bugs me so much about Democrats. They refuse to fight for their principles. In the old days (think Civil Rights Act, SS, etc.) they showed some backbone. But now? Obama makes some noise, the FCC barely looks up to see what's the noise, and then the FCC goes back to doing the industry's bidding. Shame on Obama.</rant>

<comment><USER11> Shame on all of our elected representatives, and shame on the rest of us too for largely ignoring and refusing to involve ourselves in politics.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> "Wheeler, a former lobbyist for the cable and telecommunications industry,"

There's your problem right there, how did that fool get appointed in the first place?

Wolf and sheep etc.

<comment><USER14> You think this is unusual? This is par for the course in dc. There's practically a revolving door between industry and government these days.

<comment><USER15> I'd say it's a little more like they're conjoined twins at this point.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> > "I am an independent agency," Wheeler told them repeatedly, according to > several officials.

Under the Executive Branch. This guy needs to be slapped down.

<comment><USER17> wondering about this very thing recently; does Obama have the capacity to fire him? I've never really gotten what 'independent' means in this sort of situation

<comment><USER18> He can't fire any of the FCC commissioners, but he could promote one of the other ones as chairman over Wheeler, in theory.

It would probably turn into a pretty big political shitshow if he did though considering how the Republicans have deluded themselves into thinking they have a "clear mandate" (which seems to primarily involve wanting the opposite of whatever Obama wants, regardless of what that is).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Is there anywhere to read up on this topic? I don't understand why the FCC would want to please the large telcos here? What would happen if the FCC simply took an extreme stance on neutrality here? Are telcos threatening with anything?

<comment><USER10> Most likely Wheeler's retirement as a highly paid consultant with no responsibilities at one or many of these ISPs.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> I'm confused about the consistent reference to the fact that Tom Wheeler used to be a lobbyist. It seems that having that sort of experience in the past would mean that he knows how to deal with lobbyists better than those who never have worked in the industry.

Why is it assumed that because he used to lobby for the cable and telecommunications industry that he is now definitely corrupt? I don't know anyone, anywhere, who still goes to bat for their former position in priority over their current position.

edit: It's not my intention to defend Wheeler. I don't agree with his position, which has barely been stated. I just don't think it's quite so obvious that he's explicitly doing the bidding of the cable industry purely for his own benefit, or theirs.

<comment><USER21> Because he says things like this:

> "What you want is what everyone wants: an open Internet that doesn't affect > your business," a visibly frustrated Wheeler said at the meeting, according > to four people who attended. "What I've got to figure out is how to split > the baby."

No, no he doesn't need to "split the baby". He's refusing to listen to everyone else and is giving preferential ear to the cable companies. If he gives them anything, they will take it all and destroy the Internet as we know it.

<comment><USER22> I'm not a fan of this reference either, though for different reasons. We're to believe he needs to "split the baby" between the 320 million Americans who should be able to use the internet, and the handful of companies that provide it?

<comment><USER21> Yeah, I know what you mean. I was appalled that he would use the phrase at all, much less in this context.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Can Obama just fire the guy since he's appointed? If he won't, it shows who are really running the show.

</comment><comment><USER24> Wheeler went into that job with a clear mandate not only from the executive branch, but from the US electorate.

He's ignoring his mandate and charting "his own course". He's corrupt.

<comment><USER25> That's a huge leap to make. Is everyone that doesn't agree with you corrupt. Am I corrupt?

<comment><USER26> >That's a huge leap to make. _Is everyone that doesn 't agree with you corrupt._

Pot, meet kettle.

<comment><USER26> ITT, when someone says that the sky is blue, someone else asks if everything above everyone's head is blue, then asks if they are blue. This is considered a logical progression.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> > _Wheeler is well aware of concerns that ill-considered regulations could > stifle innovation and slow the growth of the country's broadband > infrastructure_

Is anybody really scared that we might slow that growth, considering there hardly _is_ any growth in the first place? We've already spent billions trying to prod these companies to pretend like they're in some kind of competitive market, but instead they've just taken that money without so much as a 'thanks'.

I think the only way the FCC can make things worse with regard to building out America's broadband capability is to deliberately go out of their way to do it - otherwise, I don't see much merit to the argument that they need to avoid unintended consequences.

</comment><comment><USER28> Can Obama force him to resign or outright fire him? I'd like to see a "I brought you into this world, I'll take you out" approach from Obama at this point.

</comment><comment><USER29> rule # 1 of propoganda: things are never as they seem

<comment><AUTHOR> It's interesting the FCC chairman is pretty much straight out saying he's not going to do what Obama wanted.

<comment><USER30> The FCC chairman was appointed by the President, so who really knows what either of them truly want</comment></comment></comment>


Hillary Clinton emails declared 'top secret' by State Dept - <AUTHOR> http://www.politico.com/story/2016/01/22-hillary-clinton-emails-declared-top-secret-218420 <comment><USER2> It is very disappointing that Clinton's head isn't on a pike for such an egregious display of malfeasance. If it weren't for her name and relations, she would almost certainly be subject to more severe action.

Though the US federal government is often far too heavy handed with their response to information-related crimes, this is a pretty clear-cut example of where a heavy-handed response would be completely appropriate.

<comment><USER3> Hardly, if her married name wasn't Clinton, it would have made no more than a Friday afternoon page 18 story and then disappeared.

Of the terrible things perpetrated by US government officials, this doesn't even register in the top 20000.

<comment><USER4> It is certainly most interesting that she is both a former Secretary of State and a current Presidential candidate that makes it interesting. To your point, both of those may be the result of her lastname.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I could care less about what the State Department, which was involved in this and has all the reasons to protect itself, decides about the emails. I want to see what the FBI has to say about them.

</comment><comment><USER6> No high ranking USG official should be using insecure communication channels, as it will inevitably lead to leaks that could damage the state (secret information).

What Clinton did was dumb, but no one should have sent her classified emails in the first place. If the people sending the 'classified' documents were doing it through the right channels, it wouldn't be getting to her email server.

<comment><USER7> From a human rights, civil rights, universal rights, and transparency perspective all USG communications, and communications of all government officials everywhere should be public knowledge available to anyone on the planet at any time. At the end of the day what we find is how much all of these people conspire behind each other's backs to screw each other over and get the upper hand.

If citizens are not allowed to do this for fear of damaging society and government, politicians should be held to the same standards. For fear of damaging human rights of non-citizens, their livelihoods, economies of other countries, etc.

It's funny how government does not trust anyone below them, and yet expects everyone below to trust them when we know that they do not do the right thing most of the time (tm).

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'm more concerned about Bernie's margins on merch. He's using shopify for chrissake!? Even on mugs... that's not going to cover your outlay. How are you gonna scale that to every field office in every state with different inventory?

 _shudder_</comment>


Slack Drops on Forecast Miss, but CEO Sees Coronavirus Boost - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-12/slack-sales-forecasts-misses-estimates-sending-shares-plunging <comment><USER2> Can someone ELI5 where all the costs are to flip from black to red like this? Are they not including things like salaries to calculate gross margin? It seems those are the COGS of an IP based business, not raw materials

\----

GAAP gross profit was $157.5 million, or 86.6% gross margin, compared to $105.7 million, or 86.6% gross margin, in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2019. Non-GAAP gross profit was $160.6 million, or 88.3% gross margin, compared to $106.3 million, or 87.1% gross margin, in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2019.

GAAP operating loss was $91.2 million, or 50.1% of total revenue, compared to a $43.4 million loss in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2019, or 35.6% of total revenue. Non-GAAP operating loss was $23.1 million, or 12.7% of total revenue</comment>


Why I don't Walk Crosstown: The Influence of Shorter Steps - <AUTHOR> http://jason.deroner.com/blog/productivity/why-i-dont-walk-crosstown-the-influence-of-shorter-steps

<comment><USER2> Jane Jacobs had some interesting observations on the influence of short blocks on the vitality of neighborhoods (hint: lots of short blocks make for many possible routes, and many more interactions than long blocks). See her [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Death_and_Life_of_Great_Ame...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Death_and_Life_of_Great_American_Cities)</comment>


YC voting arrows - <AUTHOR>

Are they really needed? Why not just count clicks on links and ditch the arrows completely? <comment><USER2> Because sometimes stories are made to sound a lot more interesting than they are. Vallewag specializes in this. Ranking by clicks would encourage every submitter to do it.

<comment><USER3> It would be cool if he system looked at what links I clicked on and then didn't vote up. That could be used to get an idea of what I didn't get excited about; perhaps that would could as a fractional vote down.

John.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> A lot of clicks (at least most of mine) come from the RSS feed. I only come to the site when I really want to vote something up, or if I want to comment (or read comments). I'm a fairly passive user of YC, so a lot of my votes I didn't even 'click' from the site, so you'd also have to check those from the RSS feed for this to even remotely be effective.

</comment><comment><USER5> we only get to see the titles here if the system was designed to give a teaser of the article or maybe a separate voting of the quality of the article then we would know more clearly how good the contents are .. I guess voting up and down will help to some extend to solve the problem .. i would agree its not the most useful feature

</comment><comment><USER6> Another reason: Because you 'need' to advertise broccoli, not pizza.</comment>