> Because standing at the curb and hailing a nearby car on an app is much more like sticking out your hand and waiving down a cab than it is like calling up a limo company the day before and booking a ride.
The law has to define what is a cab and a what is a car service in a way that doesn't rely on feelings and impressions, but in a rigorous way, and Uber met that law even if using Uber leaves you with the impression of a cab like experience.
In fact, Uber met it in such an obvious and clear manner that no city (at least no major US city) tried to go after Uber by claiming it was a taxi company. They went after Uber for arguing that workers were misclassified as contractors rather than employees, but not for being an unlicensed taxi. Your insistence that Uber was blatantly breaking this law then creates a puzzle -- why didn't the cities see this "blatant illegality"? Perhaps they didn't know their own city codes as well as you do -- you should have written them a letter and explained how it was obvious that Uber was in violation of their codes.
Also, the link you provide doesn't actually say that Uber was aware it was really a taxi company. It is mostly a collection of documents intended to portray Uber as having an offensive culture. How many indictments came out of those leaks? None.
> no city (at least no major US city) tried to go after Uber by claiming it was a taxi company
Many major cities did, including NYC, LA and SF. Regulators in all cities considered Uber to be operating illegally.
Those cities later came to agreements with Uber to allow it to operate, because there was enough support for Uber in the public.
> It is mostly a collection of documents intended to portray Uber as having an offensive culture.
Uber executives repeatedly admit that they're operating illegally, and tell their people in new jurisdictions to just press ahead and expand operations, regardless of what local regulators say. Their business model was to get big first and then to pressure governments to legalize their operations. That worked in most places.
> They went after Uber for arguing that workers were misclassified as contractors rather than employees
The law has to define what is a cab and a what is a car service in a way that doesn't rely on feelings and impressions, but in a rigorous way, and Uber met that law even if using Uber leaves you with the impression of a cab like experience.
In fact, Uber met it in such an obvious and clear manner that no city (at least no major US city) tried to go after Uber by claiming it was a taxi company. They went after Uber for arguing that workers were misclassified as contractors rather than employees, but not for being an unlicensed taxi. Your insistence that Uber was blatantly breaking this law then creates a puzzle -- why didn't the cities see this "blatant illegality"? Perhaps they didn't know their own city codes as well as you do -- you should have written them a letter and explained how it was obvious that Uber was in violation of their codes.
Also, the link you provide doesn't actually say that Uber was aware it was really a taxi company. It is mostly a collection of documents intended to portray Uber as having an offensive culture. How many indictments came out of those leaks? None.