As most of you know, I left Uber in December and joined Stripe in January. I've gotten a lot of questions over the past couple of months about why I left and what my time at Uber was like. It's a strange, fascinating, and slightly horrifying story that deserves to be told while it is still fresh in
A Driver’s Suicide Reveals the Dark Side of the Gig Economy (Published 2018)
A livery driver facing financial ruin killed himself in front of City Hall to protest the financial devastation wrought by ride hailing services like Uber.
Super pumped: the battle for Uber
"A New York Times technology correspondent presents the dramatic rise and fall of Uber, set against the rapid upheaval in Silicon Valley during the mobile era. In June 2017, Travis Kalanick, the hard-charging CEO of Uber, was ousted in a boardroom coup that capped a brutal year for the transportation giant. Uber had catapulted to the top of the tech world yet for many came to symbolize everything wrong with Silicon Valley. In the tradition of Brad Stone's Everything Store and John Carreyrou's Bad Blood, award-winning investigative reporter Mike Isaac's Super Pumped delivers a gripping account of Uber's rapid rise, its pitched battles with taxi unions and drivers, the company's toxic internal culture and the bare-knuckle tactics it devised to overcome obstacles in its quest for dominance. Based on hundreds of interviews with current and former Uber employees, along with previously unpublished documents, Super Pumped is a page-turning story of ambition and deception, obscene wealth and bad behavior, that explores how blistering technological and financial innovation culminated in one of the most catastrophic twelve-month periods in American corporate history"--
Uber caps employee AI spending after blowing through budget in 4 months | TechCrunch
Uber's cutback has occurred after the company had reportedly encouraged staff to use AI as much as possible.
ale, today › One year of cargo biking
Some random notes from my first year with an electric cargo bike, and why you should (maybe) get one
ale, today › One year of cargo biking
Some random notes from my first year with an electric cargo bike, and why you should (maybe) get one
Google Takes on Uber With New Ride-Share Service
Google is moving onto Uber’s turf with its own ride-sharing service in San Francisco that would help commuters carpool at far cheaper rates, according to a person familiar with the matter, jumping into a booming but fiercely competitive market.
Questions · Patrick Collison
Some questions that I find interesting. I've omitted some that are related to Stripe. (Pointers to interesting readings on these topics are always welcome, as are pointers to responses.)
Stripe unveils AI foundation model for payments, reveals ‘deeper partnership’ with Nvidia | TechCrunch
Fintech giant Stripe announced Wednesday a slew of new product launches at its annual Stripe Sessions user event. The highlights include a new AI
Uber’s CEO is out because of pressure, not some ethical epiphany from the board
It’s hard to predict exactly how much pressure is needed to affect change, but it’s clear to see when there is enough. And there was finally enough to flush out Uber’s CEO. But let’s not kid oursel…
Read This Before You Build Uber for X | Y Combinator
Sam is a cofounder of PocketSuite (YC W16). -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- We still hear it all the time: “I’m building the Uber for X.” That idea – an app that lets consumers get a specific service when they need it, while giving service professionals (“pros”) immediate work – makes complete sense. It worked great for local transportation [https://www.uber.com/] services, so why could it not be applicable across all types of industries? Any
Uber Caps Usage of AI Tools Like Claude Code to Manage Costs
I wrote the other day about Uber blowing its 2026 AI budget in four months, and how that wasn't particularly surprising given they would have set that budget in 2025, …
Google Cabs And Uber Bots Will Challenge Jobs 'Below The API'
Working "below the API" is a dead end. Uber drivers, Amazon Mechanical Turk workers, 99design contestants, TaskRabbit taskers and HomeJoy cleaners are all targets for further automation.
How Uber uses AI for development: inside look
How Uber built Minion, Shepherd, uReview, and other internal agentic AI tools. Also, new challenges in rolling out AI tools, like more platform investment and growing concern about token costs
Stripe’s Acquisition of Bridge is a Stroke of Genius
controlled by banks, b2b payments account for $120 trillion yearly — compared to stripe’s $1 trillion
i quit coffee for 30 days (and it ruined my life)