Uber is not taking things lying down and New York's Mayor Bill de Blasio and regulators looking to push the proposal of reining car services just got trolled by the cab service.
For the unfamiliar, de Blasio is aggressively driving a bill that would limit the driver licenses companies such as Uber will be entitled to. The bill if approved by the City Council will undoubtedly hit Uber and restrict the service's growth.
No surprise then that Uber is lashing out at de Blasio but in its own covert way. How? Uber has included a fake feature in its app dubbed "de Blasio" and the same will only be visible for users of Uber in New York City. While accessing the UberPOOL and UberX mode will throw up plenty of car options from the service, when one clicks the de Blasio mode the map will only show "No cars available." Further clicking on this message greets you with the pop-up: "This is what Uber will look like in NYC if Mayor de Blasio's Uber cap bill passes."
Ouch! Not only did Uber troll the Mayor bad but also puts forth the plea to "Take Action" by emailing de Blasio and the City Council asking them to rebut the proposed bill.
Moreover, when one selects the fake de Blasio option in the app, users see a waiting time of 25 minutes.
"Mayor de Blasio's plan to stop Uber will cost 10,000 jobs, hurt underserved areas and make wait times for Uber cars skyrocket. With this view, New York City riders can see for themselves how much time this political payback to big taxi owners will cost them," said David Plouffe, Uber's director.
Next week, the City Council is slated to vote on the proposed legislation, which de Blasio's administration believes will aid in reducing the traffic snarls in New York. If the bill is approved, on-demand ride-sharing service Uber could be under fire as the number of new vehicles for hire it can have will reduce drastically.
