It's an up front cost that doesn't magically change during the journey, and you can pay on the app. That alone was an amazing selling point.

Did you never take a cab pre Uber? It was a poor experience. At best it went ok. But you have to be constantly paying attention, know the local roads (when on vacation/business that didn't work, or even when it did, you are having to straight call out old boy for being a scummy scammer and taking the wrong streets), deal with the 'sorry the mileage ticker is broken' 'sorry I can't take credit cards' after saying they did at the start. Uber fixed a TON of that experience.

No really, taxis were the first thieves of the world, on paar with politicians.

Look, I went to Russia, I took Yandex Taxi. I went to Indonesia and took Grub. Whether you pay double of half is i consequential compared to “Yes I take credit cards” then “Oh my credit card apparatus doesn’t work” then “Let me find an ATM for you, at your expense”.

The one brand than invested on marketing is for nothing in the death of the taxis; Everyone was wishing they’d disappear.

The price was the cherry on the cake, the bottle of water was the finger to every awful taxi driver that has existed in history.

As someone who grew up in NYC, lol. Taxis were horrible and tried to rip you off at least 20% of the time. Ubers have a transparent rating mechanism and transparent pricing.

From a country which suffered from a notorious taxi mafia which is now basically extinct, Uber isn't game changing because it is cheaper.

It is game changing because now the drivers have a reputation from their previous customers and you know you won't be treated like a stupid mark at best, or sexually assaulted etc.

THAT was the game changer and good riddance to bad rubbish. Even such "tiny" details as the cars being clean and not smelly are, in fact, a major improvement in quality.

Old-style taxi guys had zero incentive to keep their cars clean. Many smoked in them outright.