"Roland Perry" wrote in message
...
In message , at 12:48:53 on Sat, 3 Oct
2015, D A Stocks remarked:

Satnavs aren't always very good at trips to *places* rather than
*addresses*. I remember many years ago getting into a cab in central
London with a visitor from the USA and telling the driver the name of a
small restaurant in Kensington. Where he whisked us with no additional
prompting. The visitor was amazed!

With Uber you confirm the pickup and drop off points on a map, and the
search function is probably linked to Google so it will already know most
places.

That's no help if all I know is the name of a place, and can't locate it
on a map. If in a strange City it can be very difficult to correlate
random destinations with "points on a map".

A bit of digging on the web suggests Uber may tend to use Apple rather than
Google for their mapping.

As a user of licensed taxis and Uber in a number of places it's fairly clear
to me that a lot of the arguments against Uber in London on this thread are
a bit like candle and oil lamp makers complaining about electric light. I
think that in London (and maybe the UK in general) the regulations for the
industry as a whole need to be brought up to date, rather than trying to put
in specific rules in an attempt to restrict a newcomer to the market,
especially one that is using a new business model with new technology.

I have just done a little bit of research on Uber in Dublin, where I am
working during the week at the moment and travel everywhere by taxi. It
would appear Uber may be finding it harder to get established in the market
there simply becasue their standard service doesn't offer much, if anything,
that isn't already available from any other licensed taxi. AIUI the rules
for the whole industry were re-written a few years ago and the result is
that Uber is just another way to order and pay for a licensed taxi.

--
DAS