Uber loses licence to operate in London, will still operate while appealing

I'm not a fan of companies like Uber or AirBnB who attempt a violent takeover of a market. However, as a consumer who needs to get from A to B, or stay at some random city, I find those services invaluable. The black cabs in London are expensive, never around when you need them, and until recently might have refused card payments (now they just seem unhappy about it). At the very least I was hoping Uber would make that industry wake up and join the modern world, but instead they chose to protest and block roads. With Uber, I always have a car available within minutes and the prices are reasonable. I just hope that the competition will take their place (and driver mass) if they do end up leaving.

> who attempt a violent takeover of a market

What is a "violent" takeover? What would a nonviolent takeover be?

I'm all for new companies providing better services to consumers. If they take over a market, isn't that because the existing market wasn't meeting consumer needs? A new company taking over a market is generally a good thing, the creative force of capitalism itself.

(Provided it's not done by ignoring legitimate standards for safety, environment, externalities, etc.)

Agreed. Black cabbies have had it good for such a long time, cash in hand, monopolising the taxi business in London . I got in a cab booked using a taxi version app and the driver complained about paying % fee to the app and only getting paid once a month. Welcome to the rest of the world where people pay taxes and only get paid at the end of every month.

> Welcome to the rest of the world where people [...] only get paid at the end of every month.

Wait, what? You get paid once a month? Is this a UK thing? Every single job I've had over here (Canada) was either once every two weeks, or two times a month.

In Sweden, and I think in most of EU, once a month is the standard. I know of no-one with in Sweden with a full time job which is once a month.

Same in the UK. Traditionally here the lowest skilled jobs were paid weekly and higher skilled monthly but I think that's rapidly disappearing, if not completely gone, now.