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Comment by somsak2 | Hacker News Reader

with those resources, you can give me the Uber app from 2010.

consumer expectations are much higher than 13 years ago and that's not going to cut it.

What's an example of something for consumers that Uber 2023 does a lot better than Uber 2010, if the drivers behave entirely cooperatively? (since we're talking autonomous vehicles here)

airport terminal maps and regulations for every major airport in the united states

That's a good one. I remember lots of shenanigans about putting pins next to airports & then contacting the driver to get picked up at the airport on early Uber.

Not sure this particular one would affect Waymo if they were going it alone, since their rollout to each service area would involve designation of pickup & drop off points at airports and collaboration with airports, which they'll have to do either way, but it's definitely a significant difference between Uber 2010 & 2023.

route planning / fleet management i think is a huge optimization problem. perhaps you can cut it for MVP but it would require having a big multiple of drivers to provide the same service

another big deal is gps accuracy in cities, which is a pretty non trivial problem but at this point a consumer expectation https://www.uber.com/blog/rethinking-gps/

Ahhh yep. I remember Uber 2010 unopinionatedly just setting the pin directly on whatever the reading was from GPS. Stale or inaccurate GPS readings led to so much confused communication between drivers & passengers.

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