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• 1 media/photo.png media/ubereality.jpg 2016-11-29T16:06:58-08:00 Actual vs Virtual and Transmission 77 plain 2016-12-08T16:12:18-08:00
   

      As a tech company, Uber is a sort of bridge between the worlds of the virtual and the actual. Companies in general are such things - moving the real world based on the thoughts in the minds of powerful members and the numbers in its accounting ledgers, but Uber is more so than that: It is a sort of taxi company, but it has no cars of its own, it has - albeit unsuccessfully - argued that its drivers are not its employees, it bears no liability for accidents its drivers cause while transporting customers, and - as a venture company - it has relied on massive private and public investment in order to turn a profit. Despite all of this, or perhaps because all of it, the company has been amazingly successful in our real world, even growing so large that no serious competitors exist to try and dislodge its near-monopoly status. Laws are being made to incorporate the effects of its presence; people have begun using the site to date; it has begun competing in the delivery business; it has drawn billions of dollars of real-world investment - so much so that it is harming other venture companies’ prospects; the way it builds its software is not simply a minor issue for a few computer nerds, but an increasingly massive, international corporate force that affects millions of users’ and drivers’ lives, especially in terms of monetary transactions and human interactions. Uber is thus a major locus of connection between the realms of the virtual and the actual, for everything going on in Uber’s software, that is churning in the minds of the executives who run the company, and in the massive deals it makes with investors, is part of the company’s virtual world, but which has effects - both massive and personal - sometimes beneficial, and often exploitative - on shaping our actual world; this is very similar to parts of the novel Transmission, which depicts similar connections between the virtual worlds created by tech businesses, startup/venture companies, and even viruses, to the actual world in which we work, live, and pursue happiness.

     Uber, despite suffering massive profit losses during every year of its existence, has continually made massive financial gains - and even huge strides towards becoming a global monopoly. (The company has grown so big that it is even being incorporated by law into serving as a source of public transit in Dublin, CA (link).) It has done this by garnering unbelievable amounts of international investment, just this year receiving $3.5 billion from the private investment wing of the Saudi government (link) (why?); 

  all of this enables the company’s growth and given it a huge edge in its dealings with competitors, both allowing Uber to subsidize its fares to benefit its drivers (and thus itself), as well as to prevent other, similar companies from receiving the funding for which such companies compete (link). This has enabled Uber to turn the weakness of its failure to turn a profit it into a competitive edge. In this way, it has turned the virtual loss of its actual lack of financial viability into an actual, ongoing string of victories against its competitors. This helps us to understand the the depiction of venture capital companies in Transmission, wherein the startup business “Tomorrow*” is far more dependent on securing funding from the virtual world of investors, than from becoming a profitable business in the actual world. The novel, then, illustrates how real world business can exist simply by forming and exploiting bridges between the worlds of the virtual and the actual. [GG]

            
  
   In Transmission, Guy Swift uses his business savvy to help establish PEBA, a European organization aiming to distinguish the genuine Europeans from fugitives, immigrants, criminals etc. Rather, Swift and company aim to use semantics as a means to make a “real” and a “fake.” Of course, it would be hard to identify how genuine a person’s European-ness is. Uber shares this certain muddling and ambiguity in its legal disclaimer, stating it is not an actual transportation service, but instead, Uber is a application that unites user and drivers on a virtual platform (Cecil). Therefore, Uber is an app service and not, as many argue, a new form of taxi. In these observances, both with Transmission and with Uber, we can see how virtual perception has an effect on the real life. In Transmission, it is directly seen in the miscommunication of Guy Swift’s mistaken identity as a criminal. For Uber drivers, it is found in issues such as insurance claims, where, because Uber isn’t an actual transportation service, Uber is not liable for accidents if a driver is not actually acting as a Uber service provider, making Uber drivers ask “what is my actual job, then?” There is a sort of abandonment by the Uber company to support drivers, and Arjun feels this abandonment, too, when he is laid off from his duties, shining a light on the idea of virtual position and the actual job security. (JH)
   

      To what extent should companies like Uber and Databodies be held accountable for their employee’s well being/conduct? This article (Cnet) explores the aftermath of a situation where the virtual and actual come together in an unpleasant way; an Uber driver brutally assaults a passenger with a hammer after a verbal altercation. Apparently Uber’s terms and conditions include “You understand, therefore, that by using the application and service, you may be exposed to transportation that is potentially dangerous, offensive, harmful to minors, unsafe or otherwise objectionable...You use the application and the service at your own risk.” What about the safety of the driver if the situation were reversed? It seems unfair that Uber can pocket a significant percentage of every ride payment (virtual) yet completely absolve itself of responsibility when it comes to the (actual) safety of its drivers and passengers. This is similar to the way the company Databodies takes advantage of Arjun in Transmission. They were profiting by paying him a lower wage than many of his coworkers and then they unceremoniously let him go when they were done with him.(CC) ​
  
   

  In Transmission, Arjun is able to get a job with ease. He is promised a job in America as soon as his paperwork is sent to the employer via online. Transmission and Uber relate because they both contain human labor to benefit the virtual/technological world.  Uber now accepts all documents via the internet: All official documents can now be scanned and submitted directly on their website. That allows Uber to expand their company at an extremely fast rate. Uber is slowly becoming a virtual monopoly; its becoming an actual one is soon to follow. Uber is located in over 60 countries worldwide. Uber is using its employes to build profit because they soon have plans of having a self driving fleet, using something similar to the Tesla car's autopilot feature. Travis Kalanick already released the first fleet in Pittsburg, California to see how well his product will perform. Uber is attracting people virtually which is creating them actual profit and and now Uber is going back to the virtual by creating the new fleet of cars that use high tech technology. (TR)

  In Transmission, Guy Swift is a successful businessman whose company is extremely affected by the Leela virus.  Guy’s reliance on the technology causes him and his business to lose money as he relies on power points, graphs, and visuals. Currently, Uber is experimenting with the use of self-driving commercial trucks (LA Times). While they don’t provide vehicles for drivers for their ride sharing practice, they have been working on establishing a line of self driving commercial trucks. They have already completed one commercial delivery and set out to have a full fleet in the coming years.  The tie-in between Uber and Transmission in regards to Virtual/Actual is the reliance on technology.   While in theory, the thought of self-driving vehicles is an admirable idea, it would take away many jobs and ultimately affect the economy. As the article explains, the use of self driving commercial trucks could mean fewer jobs for the 1.7 million truck driver currently in the United States. Presumably, these self-driving vehicles would be controlled by computer software so that raises the question of the truck possibly being overridden by a virus? The loss of vehicles, products and in extreme cause the causalities it could cause accidents or possible terror attacks.  In the virtual world of Uber this is the next step for business, but in reality, the loss of jobs and the uncertainty the self driving trucks would cause would be catastrophic.   (NP)

  When you think of safety, Uber might fit that description at least to most people. Their app displays driver information so you can in a way discriminate discretely whether or not to take the ride. Taxis in general are perceived as safe in most industrialized countries but not so in the developing world. This article where a driver was arrested for stalking comes from LA but imagine what else is going on outside the country. In the Philippines or Thailand for example there are numerous cases of taxi drivers robbing their passengers, so Uber works to provide the illusion of safety. In reality, well established taxi companies are safer because the drivers are actual employees of the company. And whatever happens to the passenger of a taxi company can be in a way able to help them because it involves their company. However there are also independent operators of taxi cabs on these countries where a single person owns a unit or two. People generally do not feel safe with these taxi operators because their business names are hard to remember compared to an established company. This problem is amplified with Uber because the drivers are not treated as employees and are therefore more able to do a one-time heist.

  In Transmission, the chemistry seen between fringe character Chris and geeky Arjun is exemplary of the split between the virtual and actual. For Chris, the attraction for her towards Arjun wasn’t necessarily a physical one, or a real one, but an invented and abstract idea conjured within a community where satisfaction is in the novelty, whereas Arjun was ready for anything. Similarly, the ride service Uber has devised a place for people to connect via the virtual randomization of the Uber app called UberPool, in which two strangers share a ride and get to know one another. The phenomenon isn’t just a novelty; it’s a bridge from abstract to physical, virtual to actual, as shown in articles such as Vogue’s “Breathless: Is UberPool the New Tinder?”(Sciortino) where writer Karley Sciortino comments on her first session, in which her date proclaims, “Oh, my God, I fucked someone from UberPool last week!”.  The cyber connectivity is reminiscent of the initial email between Arjun and Chris where, coincidentally, it is used as a means to establish a meeting ground for the two to acquaint one another. Thus, with concepts such as UberPool, we see how people bend to the convenience and commonality in virtual connection and communication, or rather, there is a validation in the connectivity we feel from others who use similar applications of virtual reality and take these as actual grounds for attraction. If he/she uses UberPool, he/she must have similar tastes and likes as me, and therefore UberPool is a viable starting ground for individuals to establish these commonalities.By using the apps, decision making is facilitated and because of this facilitation, it gains credibility and merit, pushing it ever more from virtual unto something more tangible and actual. (JH)

  These issues and connections highlight the growing meshing-together of the virtual and actual worlds in our 21st century reality. Hari Kunzru saw this coming when he wrote Transmission: His characters effect changes in both worlds, regardless of which they directly interact with; that is, by altering the virtual world, they likewise alter the actual world - and vice versa; indeed, the fates of the two are increasingly bound together, with the virtual no longer being a mere shadow of reality as it was in the 90’s, or the mildly-influential-of-society, budding world of the internet of the aughts. Internet businesses were a joke until Amazon transitioned from being an alternative means of getting books into one of the biggest retailers in the world. Internet chat rooms were similarly derided, but now over 1.5 billion people use Facebook at least monthly. The internet is now the core of global business and human communication. Uber’s executives and Transmission’s Guy Swift understand/understood how to manipulate the virtual world to make themselves wealthy in the actual world (albeit for how long is a pertinent question). Corporations in the novel, including Tomorrow* and Databodies, are shown as exploiting their workers, investors, and governmental systems to amass wealth, just as Uber does. The main protagonist of the novel, Arjun, is able to find less prominent success via the virtual world, but is able to grow as a person - in terms of his career and in regards to sex and love; this is much like the reality we live in, wherein most jobs in the developed parts of our planet  require some sort of online application process, and countless people are using apps - everything from plethora dating sites to even the likes of Uber - to find romantic partners. Indeed, humanity - individually and collectively - are increasingly dependent on the virtual world in order to exist, or especially to flourish, in the actual world. No longer can Alexander the Great or Mahatma Gandhi forge and shatter empires in the actual world alone; anyone who wants to noticeably affect the actual must do so at least in part by affecting the virtual world; as Uber’s success with its software and virtual profits, and Arjun’s impacting the lives of so many other facets of reality with the Leela virus have shown, changing the actual world is done best by changing the virtual.
• 1 2016-11-29T16:00:14-08:00 Disruption 33 plain 2016-11-29T16:50:02-08:00

  QN    Hari Kunzru’s novel Transmission follows an Indian programmer and the CEO of a marketing company as they navigate their changing personal and professional networks. To counteract his demise, set forth by a series of layoffs, Arjun attempts to get his job at an anti-virus company back by releasing a virus of his own: the Leela virus. But the virus fails to fulfill any such intention. Instead, telecommunication is disrupted and reliability forfeited as the the virus wreaks global devastation inadvertently. What is more worrisome, that we rely on such systems so defenselessly, or that such havoc is so easy that one could do so without even meaning to do it?

  As our world becomes more and more globalized, we have technological advancements to thank—and blame. Emerging technologies continue to promise the masses that they will change our lives for the better, and any resistance to this revolution has proved unavailing. As newer models are being implemented previous ones are naturally rendered obsolete. This result is unavoidable. Technologies, undoubtedly, increase efficiency. They promote connectivity. Their conceptions aim to fill any gaps in performance or overall capacity and their implementation ultimately serve to attack the present system at hand.

  Today, ride-seekers’ needs are met in a new model. Here, Uber passengers are picked up on location and taken to their destinations, both drivers and riders using their respective Uber apps to hail and navigate vehicles that—under Uber’s business model—are owned by drivers and are, therefore, under the driver’s scope of liability. Uber’s technologies have, undoubtedly, made the process of getting a ride easier, and in its proliferation, taxis have become antiquated.

  Uberization, as it has come to be called, has replaced the previous monopoly taxis had with another monopoly. As full time drivers are rebranded as independent contractors, they have to forfeit much of their livelihoods and commit to the company as part-time workers. The outrage lies in the loophole Uber exploits, employing drivers without paying to train or insure them, without purchasing a single vehicle under the company’s sole ownership. Taxi drivers are not aggravated by their loss of business to a competitor, but rather to that of a usurper.
  TT    Uber is not content to rest on its laurels, however - frequently exhibiting a cutthroat competitive spirit, especially towards a company very similar to itself: Lyft. At least as far back as August 2014, Uber has been embroiled in legal trouble for allegedly hiring “Brand Ambassadors” as contractors, giving them burner (disposable) phones and credit cards, and directing them to systematically order and cancel Lyft rides to bog down their profits and, in general, waste their critical customer-seeking time. Apparently, there’s even a name for this coordinated program; “SLOG”.  Individually, these incidents only account for a few lost minutes, but on the scale that Uber’s campaign has been operating on -- thousands of cancelled rides -- there’s potential for a serious loss of profit and productive time. CNN reported on this, and upon tracing the phone numbers, Lyft estimated that 5,560 rides were cancelled. There are also reports of Uber employees taking rides in Lyft, and during the ride, attempting to recruit the Lyft drivers into the fold, giving them a virtual survey to fill out with their information. It seems as though Uber is anything but happy about its current size, and wants to assimilate both its competitors and their riders as soon as humanly possible.

  KL    At the end of the novel, an event called Grayday takes place. Grayday is “an informational disaster” where the Leela viruses disrupted major networks and numerous of data was lost (Kunzru 254). Businesses and people’s daily lives were disrupted by havoc that the Leela viruses wrought. This disruption can also be seen in the Uberization that has taken place. As Uber drivers and taxis compete against each other for business, the change in the industry that Uber has brought about has lend to violent and disruptive protests. In Jakarta taxi drivers violently protested against Uber drivers—blocking off streets, attacking vehicles, and causing massive traffic jams (BBC). This disruption in the daily lives of people and the violence that has occurred are reflective of the events that occur as a result of the Leela virus.

  TT    Uber also creates new ways for society to be disrupted - on New Year’s Eve of this year, many customers were understandably upset about their “Surge Pricing” - part of Uber is their policy for determining what the cost of a ride should be based on demand in that area. With such an influx of users, all concentrated around the same areas, the system either couldn’t keep up, or kept up too well: riders were charged as much as 10 times the normal amount for a ride, with one man being charged $1,100 at 1:32 AM in Edmonton, Alberta (Canada). He claimed he did not get an estimate before agreeing to the ride. Uber did respond to the incident, and comically insisted that 60% of rides that night were not affected by Surge Pricing - though surely the 40% of riders who did have to foot the bill did not feel any better about the hand they’d been dealt. While you can choose to not take the Uber, Uber is designed for convenience when other methods would prove more of a hassle - so, what kind of choice is a rider left with, when their ultimate fate is designated by an algorithm that can’t recognize when there’s a problem? As Kunzru put it, facing computer issues with no tech support is tantamount to standing naked before the mercy of God.

  SH    Uber is seen as a safe form of transportation for most, but there are  incidents where Uber isn’t as safe as it seems. There was a reported incident two years ago, where an uber driver and three of his riders got into an altercation. The uber driver, out of frustration according to the Cnet article, hit one of the riders with a hammer in the face causing the rider, Roberto Chicas, to possibly lose sight in his left eye. This is a form of disruption, as his life is being altered and not going as planned. As with the disruption caused by the Leela virus, in Transmission, there is a guild called the ElderQuest who find their game stalled as the servers shut down. The guild makes it their mission to find out who created the virus, due to the fact that they not only lost a prestigious position in the game, but real money from betting on the game, in order to harm that individual. This disruption, them wanting to harm Arjun, messes with the flow of their everyday life as well as others. It also allows for realization that the separate entities of a virtual person and the actual person can combine, and when they do; it mostly causes havoc.