Eavesdropping Uber Driver Helps Rescue 16-Year-Old From Her Pimps (washingtonpost.com) 219
Slashdot reader sabri writes "In California, an Uber driver saved a 16 year old girl from human traffickers after he overheard them talk about delivering the girl to a customer." The Washington Post reports:
Uber driver Keith Avila picked up a passenger who looked like a 12-year-old girl in a short skirt Monday night. That was the first sign that something was off, he would say later. Two women got into his car with the girl outside a house in Sacramento. Halfway to their destination -- a Holiday Inn in Elk Grove, California -- they asked Avila to turn up the music, he said. Then the women turned to the girl. Avila listened in.
"They were describing what they were going to do when they get there: 'Check for guns. Get the money before you start touching up on the guy,'" Avila said on Facebook Live minutes after he dropped off the passengers, then called police to report the women whom he suspected of prostituting the child. The girl was 16, not 12, Elk Grove police told local news outlets. But Avila's suspicions were right, they said. The teen was being sold for sex at the Holiday Inn, and her eavesdropping Uber driver had saved her.
The teen girl was returned to her family, while the two women with her were charged with multiple felonies. The driver had only joined Uber a few weeks earlier, but his Facebook Live video from outside his fare's house has now been viewed more than 240,000 times.
"They were describing what they were going to do when they get there: 'Check for guns. Get the money before you start touching up on the guy,'" Avila said on Facebook Live minutes after he dropped off the passengers, then called police to report the women whom he suspected of prostituting the child. The girl was 16, not 12, Elk Grove police told local news outlets. But Avila's suspicions were right, they said. The teen was being sold for sex at the Holiday Inn, and her eavesdropping Uber driver had saved her.
The teen girl was returned to her family, while the two women with her were charged with multiple felonies. The driver had only joined Uber a few weeks earlier, but his Facebook Live video from outside his fare's house has now been viewed more than 240,000 times.
disruptive technology (Score:2, Insightful)
Prostitution is just Uber for sex.
Re: (Score:2)
Not until it gets an app (or at least a mobile page).
Tinder is basically just Uber for prostitutes.
Just make a profile, set your location to somewhere where it's known to be available and Robert is your mothers brother.
You talkin' to me? You talkin' to me? (Score:2)
I think I prefer the Taxi Driver to the Uber driver.
Someday a real rain will come and wash all this scum off the streets.
Re: (Score:2)
It was a movie reference [imdb.com]... and a rather apropos one.
Still strange values.... (Score:3)
I'm entirely happy he did the right thing,
I suppose it makes no difference since the girl was saved. Why turn it into a political commercial?
Certainly people who were not Trump supporters would have done the same thing.
what? (Score:5, Insightful)
Just because Uber is involved this is "news"? And almost a week late at that? This is not "news for nerds", sorry.
Re: (Score:2)
Oh. SFTU and spare me. Where is the "This isn't news!!!!ZOMG!!!" brigade when legit, nerd-worthy material is posted? I'll tell you where: NOWHERE to be found!
Real nerdy news in this joint tend to get a couple dozen posts at most.
Re: (Score:2)
Oh. SFTU and spare me. Where is the "This isn't news!!!!ZOMG!!!" brigade when legit, nerd-worthy material is posted? I'll tell you where: NOWHERE to be found!
Its people whoring for upvotes. Nothing more nothing less, simple attention seeking. Its also white noise posting that screws up the comment sections, and it demonstrates that the person commenting hasn't been around long enough to realise that slashdot has *always* had a diverse selection of stories.
Re: (Score:2)
It clearly falls under YRO, as this is just a government extension spy agency acting as a taxi service. Business getting involved with personal decisions has long been a staple in these hallowed halls.Given the age of consent, the girl was probably well within her rights, and this meddler got her age wrong by 25%. Doubt that was accidental.
So yeah, your rights are being trampled on and you don't want to know about it? Clearly you aren't a 16 year old involuntary full contact massage therapist, and you don't
Still no tip and only 2 stars rating (Score:2)
Despite heroics I bet they still didn't tip the driver and probably only gave him a 2-star rating.
And he probably made $3.75 for it.
Do everything right AND save the kid and Uber will give you:
"Your Uber rating is slipping. Don't worry, your account is still active! But here are some tips from Uber Pros on how to improve your driving rating!"
Fuck you Uber. With sand for lube. Fuck you.
Re: (Score:2)
He will be replaced by johnnycab soon then it won't be an issue.
Good (Score:2)
Re:Not news (Score:5, Insightful)
"Careless idiots overheard planning a criminal act. Person overhearing them called the police!"
If this is what counts as news today I guess we've got everything under control.
It's a fluff piece for Uber (Score:3)
I'm glad the girl got rescued, but whenever I hear these stories I always think, what now? It's not like the systemic problems that lead her down that path are just going to vanish...
Re: (Score:2)
But the hope is that each time such a story gets in the news it'll lead to something being done about it sooner. (but honestly, I doubt it looking at human nature)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm glad the girl got rescued
I am not sure if "rescued" is the right word. This girl chose this life because her home life was even worse. She was not being guarded 24/7, and TFA implies that she had a cellphone. She could have "self-rescued" at anytime by just dialing 911. But she didn't. So now she is being forced back into the situation she was trying to escape. All the authorities are congratulating themselves and saying "mission accomplished", while they forget about her and move on to the next damsel in distress.
Re:It's a fluff piece for Uber (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously?
Turning a 16 year old into a slave is all about control. You teach her that the cops wont help, you get her hooked on some kind of drug, you create a prison without bars by telling her shes done horrific things that the cops will send her to jail for years over.
In a physical sense your correct, she was free, but in a mental and emotional sense she was in just as much of a jail as someone behind bars.
Re: (Score:2)
You teach her that the cops wont help
In many cases, they won't. If she was slightly older they would have treated her as a criminal rather than a victim.
she was free, but in a mental and emotional sense she was in just as much of a jail as someone behind bars.
It is common to view women, especially young women, as mindless objects incapable of rational thought and certainly incapable of acting in their own best interest. Often the people holding this viewpoint are those most opposed to the legalization and regulation of sex work that is the best hope to improve their lives.
Raping You Several Times a Day (Score:2)
You teach her that the cops wont help
In many cases, they won't. If she was slightly older they would have treated her as a criminal rather than a victim.
Revictimization is a problem, especially as people get older, but by and large traffickers control trafficked women the same way that bullies control abused people (primarily abused women): threats and distortions of reality. Police will certainly not always be perfect, but mostly they will try to do a good job and even if they don't they will still be better than the person who is conspiring to rape you ten times a day.
she was free, but in a mental and emotional sense she was in just as much of a jail as someone behind bars.
It is common to view women, especially young women, as mindless objects incapable of rational thought and certainly incapable of acting in their own best interest. Often the people holding this viewpoint are those most opposed to the legalization and regulation of sex work that is the best hope to improve their lives.
It's certainly debatable whether legalization and regulation are the best hope and a lot
Re: (Score:3)
Seriously?
Turning a 16 year old into a slave is all about control. You teach her that the cops wont help, you get her hooked on some kind of drug, you create a prison without bars by telling her shes done horrific things that the cops will send her to jail for years over.
In a physical sense your correct, she was free, but in a mental and emotional sense she was in just as much of a jail as someone behind bars.
This, there are good reasons this kind of coercion is treated as a serious crime.
The problem the US has is that the puritans view being a prostitute as much of a crime as forcing a girl into prostitution. Out here in the ROW we don't have these hang ups.
Things like this are an argument for decriminalising prostitution, by not punishing women it makes it harder for pimps to operate. There are already several methods to directly introduce "ladies of the avenue" to "johns", the classic example is a red l
Re: (Score:2)
What's a ROW?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Every one of those machines has a camera and records every person who draws money from it in full HD colour. Anonymous money is quite hard to come by these days.
Re: (Score:2)
Unless it matches that to bill serial numbers, still anonymous. That may happen one day, but it's not true today.
Re: (Score:2)
You got a point there. I hadn't thought about that.
Re: (Score:2)
AFAIK, this is only true for the most expensive ATMs, and the cash dispensers that banks use for bank tellers. Plenty of ATMs are very cheaply built.
Re: (Score:2)
It's only anonymous if you pay in cash.
If you don't pay for a medallion can in cash, the driver will claim his credit card reader is broken. Therefore, you pay in cash.
Re: (Score:2)
Ah, but it was related to Uber. And for some unfathomable reason, people think that Uber is a tech company and thus worth reporting on.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Hey, that goes both ways.
It ALSO underlines that Uber drivers are nosy little people who can't leave well enough alone. ;-)
Re: (Score:3)
Well, having worked a number of years in IT, one thing I noticed is that people tend to unconsciously treat IT-related workers as if they were mindless machines.
The irony of course is people ought to be more careful around machines these days. It boggles my mind that people literally pay for devices that eavesdrop on them at home. What's more it bothers me that smart phones don't have removable batteries anymore. It's only a matter of time before they start collecting information about us even when they a
Re: (Score:3)
What's more it bothers me that smart phones don't have removable batteries anymore. It's only a matter of time before they start collecting information about us even when they are supposedly "off". Snowden has already revealed that the NSA can fake you into thinking your phone is off.
I think that time has already passed. It freaks me out that we all have supercomputers symbiotically attached to our persons. Not only all of the data and information we pump though them which is subsequently analyzed and reverse-engineered, but also how that access fundamentally changes our social structures, the way we view the world, our own self importance; literally our whole lens of reality is distorted in proximity to these devices.
Unceasing surveillance, diabolical in depth, indiscriminate in brea
Re: (Score:2)
Sounds to me like he dropped off the passengers, called the police, then went on Facebook Live. Or went on Facebook Live while waiting for the police to pick up or something like that.
Re: (Score:2)
Driver Admirable (Score:3)
No one says that Uber drivers are not hardworking and conscientious. The issue is with the Uber system that passes the cost of the business model onto the lowest paid person in the chain.
Re: (Score:2)
Compared to taxi companies? Taxi companies have exploitation down to a science. The usual system encourages taxi drivers to work 48 hours continuously without sleep, then sleep for a day - a bad system for everyone on the road.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Most taxi companies have contractors, not employees. There are no shifts. You pay a daily fee for the use of a cab (and dispatch), and it might take 8 hours to earn back that fee. You're hardly going to stop there.
Truck drivers are a very different standard than taxi drivers - a chauffeur's license is not a CDL in most places.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: Not news (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
When are they going to start advertising the biggest perk of being an Uber driver: all the passed-out drunk pussy you can rape!
I know two women who have been raped by taxi drivers, who had already been reported to both police (no action, lack of evidence) and the taxi company (no action, lack of give a fuck.) They both love Uber, because there is at least some accountability.
Re: Not news (Score:2)
Re:Not news (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
It sounds to me like this wasn't "human trafficking". If they said they put her on a plane to say Thailand or Burma or maybe some poor Eastern European country that would be human trafficking. This was just prostitution. It appears that 'human trafficking' is a new phrase that is intended to make all forms of prostitution sound worse than they really are. The truth is that there are a lot prostitutes who want to be doing exactly and you can 'reunite them with their families' as many times as you want and th
Re: (Score:2)
It may not be, that much is true.... that is for the courts to determine. However, if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck...
And one can only act on what they can reasonably presume to be true from observation.... if they spent forever second guessing themselves on every little thing ("oh that might not be such-and-such, it may be something entirely innocent"), nothing would *ever* get done.
Re: (Score:2)
If she wants to earn a living selling her body then that's a decision she can make when she's legally old enough.
By then she'll also hopefully realise that she can control her own work and income, and only allow third parties to assist when she feels they're adding value.
What's so sick and twisted about the law? How is foster care so much worse than potentially coerced and illegal prostitution? What makes you think she's getting thrown into the foster system anyway, rather than returned to her family that r
Re:Not news (Score:4, Insightful)
It's bizarre enough that the age of consent in most states is years older than the majority of people become sexually active
Which is for a good reason. In my former home country, the age of consent used to be 12. Yes, I kid you not. Once a female human being turned 12 years old, she could legally be humped by a 70 year old grandpa. It was raised to 16 in the late 90s, with one exception: any form of paid services required both participants to be at least 18 years (prostitution is legal there).
And of course, which male would not want to hump that tight 16 year old's body? Who hasn't walked around in the summer, looking at a hot chick only to realize 3 seconds later that she's only 15? That's the problem: young girls are physically grown to completion, with a nice c-cup and bubble-butt, when they're mentally not ready to consent to a sexual relationship with an adult male. That's why you need a legal framework to protect them.
Also, don't forget that a lot of these laws were introduced at a time where contraception was not generally available, so the actual age of consent was derived from when a female was deemed fit to take care of a baby.
Re: (Score:2)
Would save on the 'I didn't know she was only 17!' when you have to card _everyone_ no matter what the age before having sex.
Re: (Score:2)
It is news when taxi drivers do this too. You think underage prostitution being caught wont make the news? Do you even think of the children bro?
Re: (Score:3)
You think underage prostitution being caught wont make the news? Do you even think of the children bro?
The child sex trafficking in Rotherham went on for at least six years, precisely because the authorities and news suppressed any mention of it. You see, the perpetrators were immigrants, and better to kill the story than be a racist (since anyone who calls immigrants rapists is just a racist). Yes, that really happened. Yes, 1400 children were abused. Yes, that was really the reason it went on so long.
Re: (Score:2)
My point is that it is newsworthy. I think you agree that it is newsworthy, just that sometimes it has not gone reported. The problem is not with this story though.
Re: Not news (Score:3)
Really you need a citation! This is well know fact and the wikipedia page is a good jumping off point if you are not aware of what was going on. Oh and for the record it was not confined to just this city, but also manu other British cities where men of mainly a Muslim background abused young girls of an almost exclusively white ethnic background.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotherham_child_sexual_exploitation_scandal
Re: (Score:2)
You need to cite stuff like this. Not everyone is from England. Someone from half-around the world is unlikely to even know where Rotherham even is, and if they do, they may think you are talking about the nearest Rotherham. There is more than one possibility:
- Rotherham in England (correct)
- Rotherham in New Zealand (nearest to me)
- a misspelling of Rotterdam, Netherlends (my first guess)
This sounds like a major local story, but it wasn't a big international story. Britain has had a number of sex-a
Re: (Score:2)
I have heard of it for what its worth. Likely from the news. How did you hear about it anyways, if it did not make the news? Inside sources?
Re: (Score:2)
Must be a slow news day. I should probably submit this story I read about: A guy with an HDTV on a cart tries to make a run for the doors without paying when security forced him back into the store, where he was promptly arrested because of a "Shop With A Cop" promotion going on inside the store.
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/crime--law/police-florida-man-tries-steal-from-store-shop-with-cop-day/wy2LvzXDoMg8a5cyFPGq6I/ [palmbeachpost.com]
Because a HDTV was involved and it happened in Florida, it's tech news.
Re: (Score:2)
Taxi drivers also do the reverse all the time.
I don't know about USA, granted, but here in my country, the best place to ask for prostitutes is a taxi driver.
Re: (Score:2)
Taxi drivers also do the reverse all the time.
I don't know about USA, granted, but here in my country, the best place to ask for prostitutes is a taxi driver.
Do you speak from experience? ;-P
Anyway, let's not forget that prostitution is a crime between adults, whereas prostituting a minor is on a whole different level. I wouldn't necessarily applaud a taxi driver who thinks that one is okay and the other isn't, but there is a difference.
Re: (Score:2)
You might say there's some experience to it. I take cabs a lot (working late shift and whatnot) and many drivers ask me directly "how about a chick for tonight". I'm married, have kids and love my wife, so never took the "opportunity" - but I am aware that the phenomenon exists.
Re: (Score:2)
Correct.
Re: (Score:2)
Of course it doesn't matter, legally speaking. 16 is under the age of consent, and prostitution is illegal most places anyway.
Isn't 16 the most common age of consent in the world?
The article also quotes the guy referring to her client as a "pervert." While it is appropriate and correct that sexual engagement with a 16 year old child should be illegal, it is also biologically normal for men to be sexually attracted to girls at that age
She looked 12, though, per TFS, which is why the driver acted. That's a different story.
Re: (Score:2)
12 used to be the age at which girls got married.
It was that way for a LOOONG time. Only very recently in human history has that changed.
Still illegal. Still wrong. Still biologically normal.
BS. Oh, sure, maybe a few aristocrats married off to cement alliances, but not the norm. Rates of death in childbirth would put an end to any group that did that regularly (and there would be no point at all in a girl getting married before she was fertile). Somewhere around 15-16 maximizes population growth rates for a tribe, and almost all recorded sexual morays from early times were all about maximizing population growth rates - because that's what the primitive environment selects for.
Re: (Score:2)
Somewhere around 15-16 maximizes population growth rates for a tribe
Then the tribe would want the mean to be 15-16, not the minimum.
Dont let thinking get in the way of a good moral outrage though.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, the minimum, in principle, ends up as the mean, in practice. Just like everyone knew a peasant girl could do in 7 months what took a duchess or cow 9.
Re: (Score:2)
I'm not sure I'd call a 16 year old a "little girl". Young person, sure.
Re: (Score:2)
Not only that, but if you watch his livestream of the event where the cops are still on the scene, he goes on a tirade about how Hillary voters would never have reported it to the police, but Trump supporters -- they don't mess around.
Instead of being a hero, he's shown himself to be just another deplorable.
Yup. I just watched the video. It happens about 1/3 of the way through.
Too bad. I thought he was a class act up to that point. Good for him for calling the cops, but it's uncool to use the situation as a platform to express political views.
Re: (Score:3)
whatever. nit pick if you want.
bottom line uber guy did the right thing, namely he didn't look the other way.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
But school education is just sad in general.
Yeah, it is. Fixing it is not easy, though.
Re: (Score:3)
Eesh man. I think I understand what you're suggesting, but give the guy a break for doing the right thing.
Perhaps FB Live was the handiest option to document what was going down? Once he had his proof, he was able to do something about it. You seem to think this was a case of "ready fire aim" but it worked.
Re: The problem with society (Score:5, Informative)
Go and see the Facebook live video. The cops were already there on the video and he only made the video because the cops told him to stay because they would like a second statement from him
Re: (Score:2)
To clarify from the summary: Avila said on Facebook Live minutes after he dropped off the passengers, then called police to report the women whom he suspected of prostituting the child.
So after he dropped them off and called the police, he started streaming on Facebook Live.
Re:Uber driver (Score:5, Informative)
You are assuming that she is indeed "prostituting herself" rather than being sold . The story and outcome makes it sound like the second possibility is the reality here...
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Nobody is "being sold" for sex these days except in exceptionally rare circumstances. It does not work economically. The Mafia gave up forced-prostitution a long time ago for that reason. In the rare circumstances where it still happens, the first customer is usually the one to call the police. (Well, not in the US obviously, but in decent countries where prostitution is legal, that is how it goes.)
This thing basically shows the deranged fantasies of the "rescuers". More likely than not, this young lady was
Re: (Score:2)
Nobody is "being sold" for sex these days except in exceptionally rare circumstances. It does not work economically.
False [thinkprogress.org]. Want to tell us anything else trivially proven untrue? This is fun!
Re: (Score:3)
As I said, "deranged fantasies". You are guilty of those.
The number should already give anybody with two braincells to rub together a clue: There is no way for 100'000 children with an average age of 12-14 in the US to be forced into prostitution. There are only about 3.5 million children of that age-range (it does not get any better with an understanding of what "average" means, the author of that propaganda-piece has none), hence that would mean one in 35 is forced into prostitution. Now that would be a b
Re: (Score:3)
Now, assume these on average 13 year olds stay in prostitution until they are 18
No. I will not make idiotic assumptions with you. If they're only prostituted once, they've been "forced into prostitution". Hope this helps you understand where you went full retard.
Re: (Score:2)
So you think somebody forces a child into prostitution, risking 20 year or so in prison and only does it once? That does not make any sense at all! If this is for economic gain, it will be done regularly over the full time that child has a reasonable market value. But since this is mostly your perverted fantasy, economic realities (or any reality, really) does not come into play.
Re: (Score:2)
The 100'000 "children forced into prostitution" was per year as in "new in", so the same applies to the missing persons. This was only a demonstration how far wrong the "100'000" children number must be. For example, many of these missing persons show up again in a short while, which just makes my argument stronger.
Re: (Score:2)
Nobody is "being sold" for sex these days except in exceptionally rare circumstances. It does not work economically.
That argument doesn't make sense. I'd guess it works great, from an economical point of view. Force the girl to prostitute herself, take most or even all of the pay, great profit potential for those with low morals.
It does seem to happen a lot, all over the world, and not just to children. Europe with its refugee crisis may also see refugees end up in forced prostitution - e.g. to "pay off debts" to people smugglers. Even before the refugee crisis there were ample examples of women ending up in forced prost
Re: (Score:2)
And then there's the parents selling their daughters to men to eventually be married to them when they are old enough. If they're below the legal age of consent even with parental consent, and there is compensation involved [cnn.com], it's child prostitution. This stuff might be legal and/or traditional where some of these people came from, but it's not legal here. (And it wasn't necessarily legal back home, either.) And it goes on plenty. Also, where do people think all those missing kids go? [slate.com] A lot of them are never
Re: (Score:2)
I see you have nothing to back up your claims, and hence you are trying to change the subject. Figures.
Re: (Score:2)
I see you have nothing to back up your claims, and hence you are trying to change the subject. Figures.
I already provided something, and you cried about it. Apparently, pointing out your fallacious logic is also a waste of time. I dub thee waste of time.
Re: (Score:2)
Most over Europe, prostitution is legal. This makes it easy to find out whether women working in that field a coerced or not. They pay taxes, you can talk to them and ask them for their motivations, etc. Turns out, they are only very rarely coerced and those few that are usually are not coerced for very long. Also, no brothel owner will be willing to prevent the ones working there from leaving the building, as that would make for a large pool of victims that could a) escape b) tell customers what is going o
Re: (Score:3)
Incidentally, here are a few a few harder numbers
https://www.washingtonpost.com... [washingtonpost.com]
They are form a study done by the DoJ. Unfortunately the link to the DoJ is broken and I cannot be bothered to find the document, but there is no reason the Washington Post would make numbers like these up.
They have 4'500-21'000 underage persons working in the sex trade in the US, with an average age of entry at 15.8. Only 15% have a "pimp", i.e. if you assume each pimp forces his girls into prostitution (extrem
Re: (Score:2)
That, and the part where the driver thought she looked just 12 years old. I don't think there are many if any place in the world where the age of consent is that low, and in places where prostitution is legal the age of consent for that is often even higher. Certainly not even 16, her actual age.
Re:Uber driver (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm astounded that you'd blame the victim here ("turn around and do the same thing next week.") She was apparently a vulnerable person who was actively exploited by these two women. She had been reported missing by her family. Whether she ran away or was kidnapped doesn't really change the fact she was exploited, which is wrong and illegal.
Posting to facebook live astounds me, but come on, the guy did the right thing. Most people would just walk away. Kudos to him for acting, regardless of which taxi company he was working for. Sure if it wasn't uber or didn't involve facebook life, it wouldn't be on slashdot. I agree with you that this story doesn't really belong on Slashdot.
Re: (Score:2)
Wow that's such bizarre logic. Of course it helped the girl! You know nothing about her situation other than that she was being exploited and had been reported missing by her family. I don't understand your fixation on what she may or may not have done to land herself in that situation. Regardless, it not only is a feel-good story, it also is a lesson to all of us to watch out for folks and do what we can to help them out of potentially harmful circumstances. If you agree with me there, then I don't un
Re: (Score:2)
but you could say that of many crimes, "Oh , that thief was fined and put on probation, but he'll probably just go back to stealing...".
Re:Uber driver (Score:4, Informative)
Did the Uber driver also investigate what it was about this girl's life that led her to prostitute herself in the first place and remove those conditions so that she won't just turn around and do the same thing next week?
Yeah, the two pimps went to jail. The harder it becomes to sell your daughter into this kind of situation, the less likely it will be to happen.
Re: (Score:2)
Is this what this site as come to? Someone is victim blaming (someone with "fluffer" in this nickname may I add), and gets modded up as a result?
What the fuck is wrong with this site?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
So what your point? The guy should have done what apparently you would have, and just walked away, leaving her to her fate? Seems to me you're assuming facts that aren't in evidence.
Furthermore, are you arguing that if an action could only have a short-term positive affect on a person then it's not worth doing? What a sad outlook on humanity.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
That's the job of the police. The driver did his part.
And yes, this is not groundbreaking, it is just a story the name "Uber" in it.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Not making them any money but who needs that when everyone knows your name.
Exactly!
They are losing money, but they will make it up in volume.
Apparently, they have lost 1.27 billion [bloomberg.com] in 6 months in 2016. That's impressive.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Yet another nail in the coffin for autonomous vehicles. Should we really keep going?
Autonomous vehicles can do it better, with hidden microphones throughout the cabin, plus one visible one with a little sign that says "All conversations are recorded." Since autonomous vehicles are already stuffed full of expensive sensors, adding a few more won't affect the price of the vehicle to any great extent. Taxis today are much much cheaper vehicles, so adding the microphones would be a big burden.