Now Uber's own drivers are steamrolled by tech giant

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Hey, Uber driver. Your overlord hasn’t just spent years breaking laws, leaving you unprotected and endangering your passengers. They’ve now made good on their early promise once they reached their always-declared real goal: to ditch you altogether.

The company is now rolling out a pilot program where specially crafted Volvo SUVs and Ford Fusions will arrive, randomly, to deliver people to their destinations in fully automated mode. Pittsburgh is the test site; there will be a person behind the wheel, but the car will be making full use of all the sensor-wrapped technology available to navigate a streetscape that has been studied and defined down to potholes. The city is home to Carnegie Mellon University and its famed robotics department, the equivalent of having CAA right there if you need it. 

Don’t think of me as that party pooper, the oldster who refuses to wrap her head around autonomous cars, for failing to grasp the future is here and that resistance is futile. I am none of those things. I am just still clinging, uselessly it feels, to the notion that somehow people – you, me, everyone – have more value and worth than the future we are hurtling towards allows.

I’ve battled Uber policy relentlessly, because they treat their drivers like crap. They’ve barged into cities around the world with zero regard for local laws or consumer protection. They’ve recruited drivers who blindly sign waivers forfeiting their insurance coverage and who end up working for far less than they thought, in most cases; they’ve put passengers in danger from unvetted drivers; and they’ve acted like outlaws in the cities they’ve invaded. “Giving the people what they want,” is their battle cry. Far be it from me to argue, I guess, except I do. Just because everybody wants something does not make it right, or good.

This sharing economy is a blasted, reeking bog of bulls**t. Everybody rushing to run their worlds from an app, to save money booking cars or rides or accommodations, everybody loving it until they realize the consumer protection – the checks and balances – behind most of these entities is as flaky and useless as the propped up storefronts in a spaghetti western.

Do I care that Ford – with its drumroll announcement of fully automated cars ready for the masses by 2021 – will push us faster in a direction that was inevitable? Not really. Somebody has to be first, and I still say the legal wrangling, insurance issues and the basic fact of human behaviour will all play a far larger role outside the lab than those inside seem to be considering. We were all supposed to be in electric cars by now, so forgive my lack of faith in the industry’s understanding of the tarot of the Average Consumer. 

Nope, I get that the sooner we remove the driver from the driving equation, the safer we’ll be. But I also get that when I was in a McDonald’s recently, I was given the choice of ordering off a tablet. Well, isn’t that handy, I thought, for a microsecond. Then I glanced at the people behind the counter also ready to take orders and thought, you won’t be there for much longer.

And where will they go? It’s not like they can now go drive for Uber, that last bastion of employment security, if their ads are to be believed. I wonder, actually, if Uber will pull those recruitment ads now that they’ve launched their pilot program in Pittsburgh. The technology on the cars is spectacular and it’s hard not to get all science fiction-y, if not romantic, about the implications. But what about the people? Does nobody give a damn until they come for your job?

I’m reading stories of Uber drivers in that city, and others, in shock that the end came so soon. Why are you surprised, Uber Driver? They promised this all along. The goal was never to line your pockets, it was to turn them inside out while they lined their own. Grow up, wise up, and kiss your job goodbye. This launch is a simultaneously bold yet cautious one: Oh my God, automated cars right out there in public! Yet each car will still have a driver. They’re in the ultimate information-gathering phase of the operation, and in case of disaster, there will still be “light” hands on the wheel. Perhaps, Uber Driver, you think this will be the gentle phase-out, you will be able to get in some hours as an autopilot while you look for other work. Think again: That autopilot is actually a highly trained engineer. You really have been cast aside, and in a hurry. If you’re not sure how to cope, call up a taxi driver in your city.

There used to be a rule of thumb that to keep a certain congeniality in polite conversation, you never discussed religion, politics, money or sex. I won’t discuss Uber, if I’m being entrusted to keep some decorum. The line in the sand is broad, and impenetrable. Those who use the service are more entrenched than a Trump supporter at a pro-life rally.

Uber teamed up last year with Otto, a company that has itself developed an automated highway truck system. The world of robotics engineering is a clandestine, high stakes one, with highly coveted thoroughbreds being lured from high-profile company to high-profile company in the rush to capitalize on the coming gold rush of throwing away the drivers. Getting tired truckers off the road is a good thing, right? Sure. Until we get to the final phase where there is no driver at all. Who’s gonna be able to buy all that junk being hauled around in all those trailers? Uber has enthusiastically announced that when it gets the final flourishes on its Pittsburgh experiment, when it’s worked out the glitches (its sensors struggle with bridges, so if there’s a bridge between you and your destination, be careful) they anticipate they’ll be able to make using one of their cars cheaper than driving yourself. And we all know money is the only currency that matters, right?

Uber Driver, we hardly knew ye.