Protests by black cab drivers against a mobile phone application that allows users to book minicabs has resulted in a increase in the number of people using the service.
Protests by black cab drivers against a mobile phone application that allows users to book minicabs has resulted in a increase in the number of people using the service.
Lemmings piling over the cliff?
This is going to result in major savings for the consumer (and probably higher levels of service and politeness).
It is a sea change and unstoppable.
The real pain is the price paid for licences and the fact of counting on the resale to boost pensions. The rules are going to change. The question is if we want to dispense some special treatment to taxi drivers during the adaptation or let them fight (via apps of their own, licence buy-backs and disuse….). Maybe we will see further innovation and better service at even better prices.
We are watching a real-time market breaking innovation and we are going to see the gamut of consequences; from violence, protectionism, tax avoidance, tax evasion, tax innovationm, bankruptcies, new fortunes, faster better service……
popcorn time
There’s going to be some wails from the Licenced Cab vehicle supply industry. Wasn’t there a high profile politician involved with a cab manufacturer?
Oh yes!
Look:
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100195422/tim-yeo-no-headline-can-do-him-justice/
They Raised Awareness.
So this app provides what people want?
Surely a good thing for the customer.
As for the black cab drivers, if they are providing a service people want at a price they want then they have nothing to fear.
Oh wait. Maybe they want protecting at the expense of customers….?
There are more private hire vehicle drivers in the country today than there were miners in the 1980.
What will the protests against driverless cars look like?
I’m sure the cabbies will demand every sort of regulation possible and many as yet unthought of, all in the name of passenger safety. And when that fails they’ll just vandalise them in the street.
What the cabbies did wasn’t really a protest. It was, in fact, a very public funeral procession.
The Black Cab trade operated solely on the restriction of flagging down a ride on the street. The mobile phone and a mini-cab number partially avoided that restriction, the smart phone and the app removed it entirely.
They tried to ignore the technology, but when they embraced it they wanted it for themselves and soon showed their true colours.
in 2008 when all the cabbies were moaning about how poor their business was I tried on several occasions to make the point in sympathy that if only they were allowed to cut their fares so the market ‘could clear’ then we would all be better off. On every occasion I got a rant about how wonderful they were and how people didn’t understand what great value they offered. Like the government and the BBC (their main customers no doubt) they have been divorced from the free market for so long they can’t recognise it when they see it