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Reasons not to use Uber

We should not accept the promotional term "sharing economy" for companies like Uber. That is spin. A more accurate term is "piecework subcontractor economy".

Uber is selling low and losing money to destroy its competitors.
If you are a short-term thinker, you will be delighted to take advantage of this — until it controls the market and squeezes you forever.
Guber appears to have stopped displaying phantom cars, without admitting they existed.
Guber reportedly shows "phantom" cars on the map, giving would-be passengers the impression that a car is available close by.
Guber denies doing this, but I don't trust Guber.
Uber plans to snoop on users' locations and contacts all the time.
Uber has the technical possibility to do this because its app is nonfree: it is controlled by Uber, not by the user. In addition, snooping depends on a nonfree operating system. With a free system, the user could tell the system to lie to the Uber app.
Uber requires passengers to identify themselves, both to order a ride and to pay.
It also records where you get the ride and where you go with it.
The US government can get those records, and any lawsuit (such as a divorce lawsuit) can subpoena them.
Uber requires passengers to run a nonfree program (an app). As always, a nonfree program tramples its users' freedom.
I'm not talking about the software that Uber runs in its servers; if that is nonfree, it tramples Uber's freedom, which is a grievance for Uber but not one for us. The injustice here is that Uber requires its users to use software and digital services that attack their freedom in various ways.
That app requires running other nonfree software (in the case of Android, Google Play).
Uber's clever policy of not being directly responsible for anything that goes wrong extends to harassment by drivers, and its practice of identifying passengers enables drivers to find out who the passenger is. This makes some women scared to use Uber.
This problem comes directly out of the practices listed above that mistreat all users of Uber.
Uber pays drivers peanuts; we should call it "Goober."
Uber is an unregulated near-monopoly, so it can cut rates for drivers arbitrarily.
Drivers are starting to complain that they're left with little money for their work.
Uber can arbitrarily cut drivers' pay, and they need to work 15 hours a day. Some are trying to unionize, but it won't be easy.
Uber plans to do away with human cab drivers.
It would be easy for a non-plutocratic government to prohibit this, and that's what every country ought to do, unless/until every person gets an adequate basic income so people don't need to be employed.
Uber executives and staff have stalked passengers in various ways.
If you take an ordinary taxi and pay cash, it will generate no records associated with you — except in New York City where the government might apply face recognition to identify your photo in real time.
Uber in China tracks drivers and actively pressures them to stay away from protests.
The company could not prevent Chinese repression, but upholding it in this way is complicity.
Uber can track who has a one-night stand. In fact, it did so.
Journalist Sarah Lacy writes about how an Uber executive said he would punish her critical journalism by using lies to smear her family life. It was the culmination of Uber's years of contempt for the company's drivers and passengers.

By the way, I don't see anything wrong in offering taxi rides driven by attractive models of either sex. However, this need not and should not be accompanied by Uber-style contempt towards women (and men).

With real taxis, you can flag one on the street or phone in any fashion; you can pay cash; you can be anonymous.

Beware of thinking of Uber as one more option in addition to real taxis. At the moment, that's true, but if Uber is a big success, real taxis could disappear.

Then what will you do, if you don't want to tell Big Brother where you are going?

To recover our privacy and make democracy safe, we need to redesign digital systems so that they do not collect information about people in general. First step, don't help any new ones gain a foothold.

Because I reject technology that mistreats me, I will never order or pay for an Uber car. I hope there will always be taxis I can use. But what about you?