A few days ago , Thursday to be exact, New York City's Taxi and Limousine Commission abandoned its plan to make rule changes that would have made Hailo and Uber permanent fixtures in New York City. Were the incoming de Blasio administration disinclined towards these apps they would have had a fight on their hands to undo what would have been done.
David Yassky had made it clear that these apps were a " go" and that the TLC was going to jam through the Bloomberg taxi agenda leaving de Blasio with as many "facts on the ground" as could be done.
But one factor was not considered: An eccentric sextagenarian taxi driving pauper and his oddly named blog that gets around 140 page views on an average day. - That's me.
I have been ballistic over these killer apps since June when for four days I was a Hailo driver. I realized that Hailo was a threat to public safety. It was my good fortune that Heather Long at the Guardian online saw me and my presentation of the issue as being credible. Read this article
http://gu.com/p/3hytp
Hailo and Uber enable racist drivers to down rate passengrrs at will. Zab Kab does not.
I later interviewed some Uber passengers and drivers and concluded that Uber presents the very same public safety threat as does Hailo - overworked distracted multitasking drivers- people (or driver apps) that might kill you.
So Google stands to take a beating and so do venture capitalists like Union Square's Fred Wilson. They plunged into the fad, maybe without looking, investigating and asking little people questions. In stead of fighting for that which is evil and wrong they ought to loom at Zab Kab. That is not a taxi dispatch app, something that freaks out the livery industry. It is a taxi hail app that could make a lot of people who live on side streets as well as taxi drivers pretty well pleased without the distracted multi tasking of Hailo and Uber.
Zab Kab's Henry Ferlauto is well aware that his app, made here in New York, btw , needs fixes. The concept is sterling. Give Zab Kab a try powers that be!
