> They will drive to your location, pick you up, and take you anywhere you want to go.
The corrected version of this is "they will drive to your location some time within the next 24 hours, pick you up if you want to go to the places they want to go, and maybe accept payment in credit card".
Go on. Ask a brown person who lives by Lake Merced what it's like to try to get a taxi there from downtown.
Also, to be clear, I don't have a problem with this. I think you should have a right to transport whomsoever you desire if you can reach a consensual agreement.
But I don't think it's consensual if you ban the alternative.
Rideshares have their own cost and reliability problems for riders.
No one is saying taxi services are fine as-is, in addition to rideshare ride being artificially cheap thanks to VC money subsidizing costs, they did offer real user experience improvements. But the rideshare services have also shirked a lot of duties and created new externalized costs for others to bear.
I've only been to Boston a few times pre-Uber, but I agree. I've had great cab experiences in Boston and Chicago, and Manhattan (although in Manhattan they often pulled the "I can't take cards right now" crap).
The corrected version of this is "they will drive to your location some time within the next 24 hours, pick you up if you want to go to the places they want to go, and maybe accept payment in credit card".
Go on. Ask a brown person who lives by Lake Merced what it's like to try to get a taxi there from downtown.
Also, to be clear, I don't have a problem with this. I think you should have a right to transport whomsoever you desire if you can reach a consensual agreement.
But I don't think it's consensual if you ban the alternative.