goteed1

My 2 cents:

I never pipe in on talkboard matters either, but I would love to see a forum for ride share services. I don't really care where you put it. This type of forum would really helps me in my travel planning to know what's available and how good the particular service works. For instance there are alot of countries out there that have very specific taxi apps instead of Uber services and it would be nice to find a central forum to find all of that info. I don't see why it's such a big deal to try it out and if it flops it flops.

greg99

On that basis, though, doesn't that argue for having the discussion be in the specific geographic forums?

Then we wind up with three categories of places for discussions of ridesharing - a central ridesharing forum, the geographic forums and the loyalty program forums. To my mind, that makes critical mass of discussion even less likely.

SkiAdcock

Off-topic from actual forum discussion, but bit of history & clarification that seconding a motion means an automatic yes vote (it doesn't).

While bdschobel has said he'll vote for this because he seconded it, it should be noted that in the past there have been TB members who seconded a motion who didn't vote in favor of the motion. They thought the motion had enough merit to get a second & bring it up for a vote, but didn't mean that they supported it per se.

Cheers.

Mary2e

Oppose.

What in the world do ride services have to do with rental cars? Why mix them together?

obscure2k

Ride services have absolutely nothing to do with rental cars. Mary2e is right.

goteed1

I think the idea is that if I'm looking for information about a ride share service that may or may not exist in a certain country, it's like looking for a needle in haystack at this point. And even if I post a query, it would probably stand a better chance of getting answered in a specific forum dedicated to that subject.

bdschobel

Neither do I, and I appreciate the reinforcement of my position. People act like opening a forum that flops is some sort of terrible tragedy. It's not. But this one is very, very unlikely to flop, in my view. Uber and its kin are getting bigger and bigger every day. Having a central, consolidated place to learn about these services is going to be very useful. And that was the original request from users, too.
I think it's pretty strange to make or second a motion and then vote against it, UNLESS you changed your mind as a result of the discussion. I suppose that could happen here, but I doubt it.

Bruce

empedocles

What she said. I don't really see the synergies between car hire and taxis/black cars/ride sharing (perhaps a pros/cons discussion between renting a car vs. using public/private transportation in a specific situation, but that's about it).

If we want to move such discussions off the geographic forums or Travelbuzz, perhaps a new top-level that would incorporate fora for taxis, black cars and network transport companies?

Eastbay1K

I would suggest that to the extent that destination specific posts re: Uber, etc. are placed in the general discussion board, that the title and redirect stay in the new forum for an extended time period, i.e., months.

Otherwise, we'll probably end up with a forum with very few posts and have created a recipe for extinction.

kipper

Is hell freezing over again?

greg99

What will the moderation policy be around posts re: ridesharing companies?

Are the mods going to automatically move posts about partnerships from the loyalty forum of the relevant partner to the parent ridesharing forum?

That's the piece that I care about. If there's news about, e.g., a Hyatt/Lyft partnership, I should be able to read about it in the Hyatt forum and not have to monitor the ridesharing board.

I think (I might) speak for the unwashed masses who tend to only read the boards directly relevant to their travel patterns and don't browse much beyond that. For instance, I never read the destination forums. If I have to regularly cruise another forum to find out information that affects my participation in a loyalty program, I'm not going to do it.

Greg

scottpenderson

I understand that the plan for this new forum is to centralize the discussion of "Ride Services, including Uber and Lyft". However, I don't really understand, in a specific sense, what will be posted there. To quote Prospero from the pre-vote discussion forum:
It seems that all discussion of ride services have a home under the current system.


Is the plan for this new forum to be a place to discuss general Uber, Lyft and other ride service topics and news (e.g. "Concerns over Uber's safety grow with its popularity", "Lyft may expand to 100 cities globally in 2015", "Uber secures Series D funding")?

Will new topics currently covered in Destination forums be moved to "Ride Services, including Uber and Lyft"? And, will existing threads be moved and merged from Destinations to Ride Services in order to create mega-threads for each specific destination?

Will threads addressing cross-program promotions (e.g. SPG and Uber) remain in their respective threads or move to the "Ride Services, including Uber and Lyft" forum?

MSPeconomist

I'm inclined to be against this, but I'm willing to be convinced.

Canarsie

One of the reasons why I was first considering voting for this motion was based on the opinion offered by a moderator of the TravelBuzz forum, who inadvertently started this discussion......and now another moderator of the TravelBuzz forum has spoken...Both are respected colleagues who apparently have opposing views pertaining to this issue — and that is okay...

...but I am also reading what everyone else is posting as well on both sides of the debate over whether or not there should be a separate forum for “ride services”; and I favored starting off with general discussions posted in the rental car forum — but now I am not so sure about that, given the objections posted in this discussion.

Not to be a contrarian; but I currently do not favor the creation of an independent ride services forum at this time and will likely vote against it, as the need for such a forum on FlyerTalk just does not seem to be strong enough, in my opinion.

mia

I support the idea of a dedicated Ride Services forum, but not the placement of the forum in the Car Rental Programs area. I think the fundamental self-drive / chauffeur-driven distinction makes the placement unintuitive.

I think that FlyerTalk should be proactive in creating forums for which there is not yet established discussion, but it's not enough to create a forum, post a single announcement, sit back and wait for it to be discovered and used. FT seems deficient in internal promotion. We have a large established audience, and we need to systematically publicize and promote under utilized forums (old or new). Every Administrator, Moderator, TalkBoard member, and prolific poster can help attract traffic.

Here are some tools which could be used:

• FlyerTalk home page
• System-wide announcements
• Individual forum announcements
• Talk Mail
• FlyerTalk News
• FlyerTalk Facebook page
• FlyerTalk Twitter feed
• Frugal Travel Guy blog

In passing I note this article from the homepage of Flyertalk's sibling site FrequentFlyer.com

Free Uber Rides, Discounts for Cap One Cardholders