It's basically nearby anyone, with the connection being a location instead of a phone number, email, username, etc... They have done a good job at keeping the content focused on useful information, rather than dick pics.
The downside is it really only has a strong user-base in Chicago.
Great app! And really nice job with useful information instead of simple chat.
After remember that Twitter have already an "location flag" when you tweet from mobile, I did a search for something that use it, and found it: http://nearbytweets.com/
It seems that this is the same idea with Twitter users...that is also interesting
I think improve it with twitter integration will be great. And, maybe, let an optional "public chat" (without images and with flood control) maybe let it more 'popular'
if you want to discuss more feedback feel free to found me on me at dougcorrea.com
As of May 2013, Y Combinator had funded over 500 startups.[20][21] The number of startups funded in each cycle has been gradually increasing. The first cycle, in summer 2005, had eight startups. In the summer 2012 cycle, there were more than 80. Y Combinator has since reduced their class size down to less than 50 with their winter 2013 batch, but they expect to grow it again.[22]
Some of the better-known funded companies include Scribd, reddit, Airbnb, Dropbox, Disqus and Heroku.[20]
We’re proud to announce our partnership with the
Bike Messenger Emergency Fund (BMEF). The BMEF
is a non profit public charity organization that provides
emergency compensation to bicycle messengers who
are hurt on the job. With the launch of UberRUSH, we
will donate $1 from each delivery to the BMEF.
Bike messengers are almost universally contractors (there are some wonderful companies who basically exist to treat their messengers well, but they're a small part of the market). That obviously means they don't provide insurance and don't have to carry workman's comp for those employees. Most messengers I know make dirt pay and could never afford insurance except through their spouses (or parents if they're young). They live and die on being careful and help from the community and the BMEF (which is an awesome organization), and they do it because they can barely imagine life off a bike even in the face of the risks. So Uber isn't unique in this sense at all. That said, they're obviously swinging to cut margins out of an industry that already can barely support its workers. I'm more curious about the rates they pay than anything -- I actually suspect few in the industry would object to outcompeting large dispatchers if they pass some of that on to messengers in the form of better/stable pay. But BMEF donations "with the launch" (they do not say long-term) are no substitute for responsible employment.
On the whole I'm a bit surprised -- the messenger industry has been shrinking a lot as people need fewer actual signatures on documents. I suspect they're doing it more to understand the delivery market and pilot a delivery service than for the traditional document carrying market.
of course it is dangerous. but if you are employed by uber and get hurt "on the job" while carrying out their agenda, they should be responsible for your recovery.
You can look at it as a service connecting bike messengers to people that need deliveries.
A comparable example is Google Play or the Apple store. They take a cut of your pay by connecting you to customers but they don't call you an employee. Where is the uproar there?
When I sell something on eBay I don't have any expectations that I'm an eBay employee. The Google Play and Apple app store are both apt analogies as well. Selling goods or services on a marketplace often comes at a cost per transaction, but it almost never comes with an expectation of employment.
Well, in my country if you work without a contract and the companies fires you without cause, you can sue them in Labor court and the judges will do a test to see if you were de-facto employed: whether you had fixed working hours, a manager that told you specific tasks and evaluated you on them, were paid a fixed salary or a per-task or per-hour rate, and a few others.
In Uber's case, and AFAIK, the drivers don't have any of that. They just have to take a course, and then they can just take any job they want, when they want, without fixed hours or even fixed days per week.
To me, they sound more like freelancers than employees.
This happens all of the time. Large US companies sometimes only hire contractors that have employee status with some other firm to protect themselves.
In the standard test to determine whether an person is an employee, they look at things like who supplies the equipment, who sets the hours, whether it possible for the contractor to have a loss -- most critically in the Uber case, you are more likely to be classified an employee if you do the work that is the purpose of the company.
What that means is that if I clean the offices, I can be a contractor because the purpose of the company might be to make and sell widgets. If I am on the factory floor making the widgets, then the labor dept. frowns on a contractor classification.
These are all just guidelines -- the labor dept or a judge will make the call, but US tax laws incent them to prefer employee status.
(IANAL, but I have served on an employment board, overseeing a US Labor dept regional office)
false equivalency. what is the risk of being injured selling items on ebay, compared to flying through the streets of manhattan during rush hour on your bike? however, they due insure purchases in the case you get ripped off, which is much more likely to happen.
when did social responsibility go out the window? to me, this isn't a profitable business if they have to claim responsibility for the people they are putting in risk to make a buck. yet, they do it anyone and pass the cost on to the tax payer and no on seems to mind.
A huge barrier for many people is they have no understanding of what programming will enable, what it entails, and its varying difficulty levels.
I think there are so many "pre-med" college freshmen because everyone understands the role of a doctor. If programming were more tangible and widely understood, there would be far more people doing it (and luckily this is rapidly happening).
The mobile team is actually run by @orta of CocoaPods fame. We're definitely excited to have Ash join. We also have two beginner iOS devs (@1aurabrown and I) and we need some experienced guidance!
