The GIG Economy Podcast
Talks about our Gig Economy adventures and breaking down the Gig Economy News
The GIG Economy Podcast
Uber's $10 Billion Robotaxi Bet | Are Human Drivers Running Out Of Road? | Ep 302
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We trade real road stories from St Louis and Grand Rapids, then zoom out to the bigger shift as Uber pours $10 billion into robotaxis while Waymo keeps scaling on its own. Along the way, we dig into gig worker basics like bathroom access, easy side income disappearing, and how AI is already being used to scam riders with fake damage claims.
• Using Lyft promos and credits to cut ride costs
• Driving around major events when road closures break geofences and GPS
• What Uber’s autonomous vehicle fleet plan signals for rideshare drivers
• Why Waymo’s growth challenges Uber’s role in robotaxi rides
• DoorDash delivery robots getting stuck and what that says about last-mile reality
• Dovetail.ai shutting down and why gig workers will miss that easy money
• Drift subscription air fresheners and why a “natural” scent matters in rideshare
• Restaurants banning restroom use for Dashers and the ripple effect on pickups
• AI-generated cleaning fee photos and why bank alerts save riders
• Follow-up on a DoorDash driver shooting and the 17-year sentence
• Empty Waymos clogging a neighborhood cul-de-sac and why residents are furious
• Why so many drivers cancel IHOP orders and how restaurants can fix it.
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Welcome And What’s Ahead
SPEAKER_07Hello, hello, welcome to the Gig Economy Podcast, episode three hundred and two. Uh, I can't believe we're in the three hundreds. I had to actually look because I've been saying two blah blah blah for so long, and it's yeah, it's three oh two, I believe. So we're gonna talk about Uber's ten billion dollar robotaxi bet. Uh well, drivers deal with bathroom bands, and of course, an AI scam, uh, which we've dealt with before on uh on we haven't personally, but drivers that use like fake barf and stuff like that. So I have to do something like that. So uh checking in, Larry, how's it going? I we just talked on the pre-ramble, which you can get if you sign up for Patreon. Uh you had a busy weekend. Like I'm surprised he's here tonight.
SPEAKER_08A busy weekend. Yeah, I visited my son in St. Louis. We went to a uh St. Louis Beddhawks football game, a St. Louis Cardinals baseball game. We uh went bowling. Um have a good deal at night, like the last two hours, $15 all you can bowl. So yeah, we got after it. And uh and I was a tired puppy by the time I got back to Bowling Green.
SPEAKER_07I well, you forgot about all the drugs you did too. Well it's a given. That's all that's true. We don't even have to speak of it.
A Free Lyft Ride In St Louis
SPEAKER_07So um, okay, so stories from the road. Larry looks like you were a passenger as we just talked about. You had a busy weekend, so do you got a little and it yeah, it's so interesting, is it? Like kind of like picking things up.
SPEAKER_08It is, yeah. So we usually uh we always drive, and uh my son has a tag to park at the police department because he works for the St. Louis police. So we can park there, which is about um, which is much closer to the stadium than than his apartment. So uh we usually park there and just walk, it's about a 10-15 minute walk, but it was raining. So like, you know what, we'll just take a lift. And um like 10 minutes before we left, it popped up on my phone 50% off your next ride on lift, right? And then uh I also didn't realize I got that new sapphire reserve card, they give you a $10 lift credit every month.
SPEAKER_07Oh, really?
SPEAKER_08So we took an extra comfort and it cost me zero dollars. Oh, no kidding. Yeah, and the guy I was talking to him, and you know, telling him about the podcast, plugging the podcast, he had a little pad and pencil. He's like, Here, write it down, man. I'll forget it. So wrote it down from him. And his story was he was from Clearwater, Florida. He was an engineer, and he's like, They told me uh I'd saved too much time, I had to take six weeks off. He's like, I'm an engineer and I have ADD. If I sit around for six months, you're gonna read about me in the news. Some dude building a rocket down in Clearwater, or I'm gonna be flying under a lawn chair with a balloon, something's gonna happen. He's like, So I tell my wife, let's he's like, Let's let's have an adventure. He's like, So we'll we'll pick a city, we'll go there for a week. The first three days, I'll I'll do lift and make my make some money. In the last four days, we explore everything the city has. He's like, This week at St. Louis. Interesting. That's pretty cool. That's pretty cool, man.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, good for him to kind of just, you know, not to work, but like make a little adventure on it, you know.
SPEAKER_08Exactly. Yeah, real nice guy. His name was Christopher. Uh, if you're listening, uh, it was nice to meet you. We appreciate appreciate the ride. Um, so yeah, it was it's
City Safety And Wild Driving
SPEAKER_08pretty interesting. And I mean, I gotta give him credit. I don't know if he knows how dangerous St. Louis is. Because my son tell has told me repeatedly, he's like, Dad, do not do not ride share up here while you're here, you know, if I'm at work or something. Don't do it.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, I think it's pretty dangerous as like not a resident of St. Louis because like there's dangerous parts of your city, my city, you know, you just know the areas where like eh, I'm not gonna go over there.
SPEAKER_08Per capita this year again, they were the number one murder capital. Okay, per capita. Yeah, and like the the dome where we saw the football game. I just saw uh yesterday morning. Police shot a guy right in front of the dome there. Jesus don't know the whole story yet, but yeah, you never know what's gonna go down. And I tell you, they are they are some wild drivers in St. Louis. Really? I let my son drive because at first he just knows the way, so he didn't have to navigate while I'm trying. And he's like, Dad, I've been here a while. You have to drive a certain way, or else they will get they will they will get impatient. And and literally twice while we're we were sitting at a stoplight, we were like third car back, you know, just sitting there, and like it right as the light's turning green, this dude behind us goes down the left turn lane, just cuts in front of everybody. No way, yeah, and they'll do that when the light's red. You don't even be sitting there and all of a sudden some dude come out of nowhere and just fly through the light. They do not give a shit. Damn. They really don't. That's scary. That and that happens all the time. Wow. I mean, I've never gone there for the weekend and not seen you know, three or four people at least just blow through a light in the middle of it. Not not late, not running late. I mean, they're just like, we're going for it. Yeah, there's dads don't care. They're like, Yeah, they're not gonna stop me.
SPEAKER_07They gotta be on drugs when they do that, right? Because who's I don't know who's gonna put your own risk at or life at risk doing that? Like, I get if you run a red a little bit or whatever, but to just blow through a like a solid red light that's been red for like 20, 30 seconds. Yeah, crazy.
SPEAKER_08It is, it is. So, yeah, that was my story as as a uh passenger, and uh it was weird. We looked at Lyft and Uber, and man, Lyft was like man, it was it was so much cheaper. And then plus the 10 10 bucks off. Well, yeah, plus I mean, like I said, I ended up I I just did the extra comfort because it was free. I knew normally I just joined normal Lyft, and I was like, ah and and uh but being for free, we'll do the extra comfort. But it was gonna be like, I don't know, about $15 cheaper on than it was on Uber.
SPEAKER_07It's always good to check both of them, even as a driver, uh, which kind of floats into
Navigating Big Event Ride Share
SPEAKER_07my story. I actually drove strictly a ride share. Well, I okay, I'm gonna back up. It got slow, and I'm like, well, I'm I haven't made the money I want, so I started picking up some deliveries. Sure. But yeah, as if you live in Grand Rapids, the uh amphitheater had opened for for the first time. Uh Lionel Richie. Yeah, Lionel Richie was there, it's not like you know, a big, a big headliner, but like it was, I mean, it sold out, so you can't say much. And then there was uh, or you can't say anything bad about him. And then um at the arena, there was a Christian concert there, like someone great, uh, that's really popular, I guess. So we had, you know, roughly 20 to 25,000 people downtown at the same time. So the city had 24 hours before that happened, they had resubmitted a plan to lift an Uber to change to add another area and shrink the geofense. And so that was a little hairy carry, and Ubers did not go through. Uh, Lyfts was good, but so Ubers didn't. So I didn't the geofense was not working at all for Uber. So I ended up knowing this the spot just because I read GR's transportation Facebook page and was following it a little bit. So I just dropped people off there, and most people were like, Yeah, that's fine, just you know, get us close. We understand that the roads are closed and those kind of things. And so it was it, it it went relatively well. I did see in a couple areas I ended up getting like it was I was just like locked in traffic, but I was like, you know what, I'm not the GPS is telling me to go this way, but I'm just like, nope, I'm just gonna do a UE and take the little bit a long way around because yeah, I just it was you know fucking around. Well, especially since the apps didn't know that the exit was closed, uh, and those kind of things. Like, and even regular GPS, I was like, okay, I'm gonna put the regular GPS just to see. Google wasn't even picking it up, and so I was like, Well, once I know where I'm going, once I get close, I'm just not gonna follow the GPS and just drop them off. So, yeah, I had some good riders, a lot almost all of them tipped. Um had this big bro get in the front seat. Like, my car is small, and and I guess I know why he did it because there were two girls in the back and then him, and I'm like, God, he's gonna have to cram it. I don't know if they were like not a couple or whatever, but he sits in my front seat and like he's spilling over onto my armrests and everything. And it's like I wasn't he was he was really nice. I wasn't uncomfortable with like him per se, but like it there was a lot of like my space got really small, and so I was just like, I'm not gonna say go back there now. If you're a single rider, we talked about this on the last show. I'm gonna tell you to go back there. I'm not, I don't want you sitting in the front. Like it's just I'm gonna say, Oh, nope, sorry, I got some stuff in here. Do you mind sitting in the back? But if obviously I I have to take four, yeah, this was three, but again, he was a big guy, so he sat up front. But other than that, it was good. Um, I did have one rider as a passenger, and they or and she was like, Oh my god, let me tell you about this story. I I went to a concert, and this lady was crazy, like in Grand Rapids. They was telling they weren't going to a country concert. Rips her up and down. I'm like, and then she I didn't even this was unprompted. She goes, Well, I still tipped and gave five stars. I was like, ma'am. I stopped. We were at a red light. I'm like, ma'am, please don't ever do that again.
SPEAKER_09Yeah.
SPEAKER_07I was like, you gotta report that because you know, no, they're not gonna get off the road. I know you feel bad doing it, but like it's unsafe. Yeah. And you gotta do the right thing. Like, and I had her daughter this time because it it was like uh they were going to the Christian concert.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_07And so there was a lot of kids. So I'm like, uh, I'm thinking to myself, what if your daughter, what if you got that crackpot tonight and your daughter was in the car? Like, would you be comfortable with that? Like, I wanted to say that to her, but you know, you're trying to grease the wheels and get a tip, you know, you're not gonna be confrontational. But yeah, it was good. I I kind of I didn't hate getting back into rides here. I mean, it's I think it's kind of different when you're bringing people down than back as far as like attitudes and for sure, you know. I'm pissed off at Johnny because you know, he looked at a girl at the concert, or you know, you know, just there's so many different things because everyone's excited to go down there. So most of the time. Exactly, yeah.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, everybody's looking forward to it. They've been anticipating this, you know, they bought their tickets, they've been thinking about it. You know, they even if they pregamed a little, they probably have, you know, they're probably not slobbering drunk or anything yet. Like you said, they haven't had any situations where I saw you flirting with that guy, flirting with that girl, and you know, what were you doing? What were you thinking? And yeah, none of that stuff's going on. It's usually a very different vibe going going to the show for sure.
SPEAKER_07So I did not stay to the close of the shows. I mean, I hit my number and I'm like, it's it's like 8 30. So it really did slow down. I went from like 4 30 to 7, and then all the which normal, right? Everyone's at the show. So it slows down. I'm like, God, do I really want to stay out? I had to get up in the morning. So I was like, you know what? I'm just gonna full throw food delivery on, hit my get my number, and then just go home. And so I that being said, I'm not putting ride share back on the shelf. I'm gonna try it again where it's like maybe a bigger name at the show, and and maybe see if I can stay out long enough. You know, I hate the dark. Um, and maybe, you know, I don't know. I didn't hear anyone say what their profits were for the ride home, but I didn't stay out for that.
SPEAKER_08So okay.
Nashville Gets The Super Bowl
SPEAKER_08Well, yeah. Uh speaking of you know, big big events. Um Super Bowl's coming to Nashville 2030.
SPEAKER_07Oh, really?
SPEAKER_08Yeah, they announced it yesterday for their new stadium. Their new stadium opens next year, but they and they pretty much built it hoping that they would be able to get the Super Bowl. They've already got WrestleMania's coming, and now now they announced the Super Bowl.
SPEAKER_07So they made it, so it's a dome then. It is. So yeah, okay. Is it still called Nissan Stadium?
SPEAKER_08Uh that I I don't know if it's still gonna be Nissan. I don't know when Nissan's you know endorsement.
SPEAKER_07Well, what's interesting still runs out, and we know the news uses bullshit photos and b roll from like you know, even we see some Uber ones, it's like the old logo back from 2016. But I saw they I read or I didn't read the article, I saw the headline and it used said Nissan Stadium on him. Like, really? It looks like they're really naming it the same. I mean, maybe I guess I don't know why.
SPEAKER_08I I mean they probably will. I you know, like I said, a lot of times those endorsements, those sponsorships will be for like 10 years or something. So yeah, I would think you know it would continue over, although they might renegotiate, you know. It's like, hey, we have this brand new stadium, we're gonna have to we're gonna have to cough up a little bit more cheddar there, you know. But it's gonna be a really nice stadium from everything I've read. I'm I definitely want to go see something there pretty soon after it opens.
SPEAKER_07Well, domes are nice. I mean, outdoor is like the the fall football vibe, like college football, I feel, but like when it's professional, can we just put a dome up?
SPEAKER_08Like I think it's like a uh like a roof you can see through, so you can be able to see outside, but you won't get rained.
SPEAKER_07Or just spend the money on a retractable.
SPEAKER_08Yeah.
SPEAKER_07You know, just so like you can like, okay, it's gonna be shitty weather this weekend. Let's close it up.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, best of both worlds. Yeah, best of both. Yeah, they'll have a you know, they'll have a ton of concerts there, you know, being in Nashville. They already do a Nissan, and sometimes it's in the middle of the rain. Yeah. Uh I know um I know T Swift, one of her concerts, it was pouring rain. Okay. Yeah.
SPEAKER_07And she still performed great and did the whole damn thing.
SPEAKER_08Yep. Yep. It was, you know, it was still sold out. I don't know how many nights in a row she sold it out, but it was several.
SPEAKER_07Uh both of them. She sold out every show on her new era tour. So all right, gig economy in the news, Larry.
Uber’s $10 Billion Robotaxi Push
SPEAKER_07You know, we talked about again uh Uber commits to some A V fleet. Well, the title I like is Uber commits to 10 billion to A V fleet while trashing Waymo.
SPEAKER_08Exactly. So yeah, you know, Waymo and Uber have been uh kind of partnering up a little bit here in in the last year, but you know, I think Uber's kind of showing its true colors now. Yeah, they they really they really want to dominate, they really don't want to have to partner with anybody, give up any of those profits. So they've committed to more than $10 billion to build an on you know autonomous vehicle fleet. They they really are betting on the on the fact that uh people are gonna want you know a mix of human drivers along with robote taxis and not just the uh autonomous cars. Right. Um but you know, a lot of the analysts are talking about you know, Waymo has has been pretty quick in scaling up to doing I think over 400,000 rides a week now. Damn it proves that you know the autonomous vehicles might not need Uber at all. You know, Waymo has its own app, it has its own customers, it's going to new cities without Uber's help. You know, it's partnered with them in a few places, but it's going to a lot of cities just on its own. Uh, you know, in Nashville, it's partnering with Lyft. So yeah, it's gonna be interesting to see how this all shakes out and uh you know which one's gonna kind of if one of them ends up dominating the A V space.
SPEAKER_07So with the 10 billion, they're just like verbally committing to not a specific uh car manufacturer, right? Because we've heard them right.
SPEAKER_08They partnered with so many different car makers and manufacturers and A V companies that yeah, they did it. Everything I read, it didn't uh specify any one thing, it just says $10 billion to build up a fleet.
SPEAKER_07Well, I think what's happening is they're realizing, like you said, how successful Waymo is, and they're like, Okay, we're just gonna go fucking nuts and just invest in and and then we can always scale it back, right? Like if we blow this thing up and then people want a variety of like, okay, it looks like inner city stuff maybe is good for the the autonomous, but once we get out a little bit into the suburbs, you know, people and and but they don't want to get left behind, so they kind of gotta just throw everything they can at.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, they're kind of they're hedging their bets.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, they're hedging their bets, which they've been relatively successful with stuff.
SPEAKER_08They have, yeah. I can't say they're not gonna be money hand over fists. I remember the other day, I remember that for years we were like, are man they ever gonna make any money? Are they ever making any money? And now they're making so much money, so much money. Not even funny.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, I don't even know what their stock is. I know it's like decent though. I think I think maybe is it 50 bucks a share or is it a little bit lower than that? Uh let me see. I'd have to ask my or look at my stash account because I I actually sold all my lifts.
SPEAKER_08I just looked it up, it's 746.
SPEAKER_07Oh shit. I mean, it's no DoorDash, but you know, DoorDash, I think, is like 150 bucks a share, I think something like that.
SPEAKER_08Like I'll find out. Yeah, yeah, 160.
SPEAKER_07Okay, yeah. So I was I was pretty close on the on the DoorDash. I mean, honestly, if you do a little, so like we should use that as a referral too, but stash is really fun if you want to like just have fun with the things you use. And you know, it's like I like monsters, so I'm gonna invest in monster, and I drive for Uber and Doordash. I'm gonna invest in that, but it's really fun to to do like I do I literally do five dollars a week. Like that's yeah.
SPEAKER_08Oh, go ahead. I'm sorry.
SPEAKER_07Well, I'll say I five dollars a week and I have thirty eight hundred dollars in there, so it's like yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_08It's right. I don't I'm I'm not even sure uh what I've got in mind, but yeah, it's fun because you you know it's not like you're you're like, oh man, if I do this, I'm not gonna be able to pay my mortgage. Well, yeah, of course. You're putting in you're playing around, it's kind of just play around money, yeah. And and if you you know it ends up tanking, you know, you haven't lost a lot. Yeah, but it is fun to watch, you know, you're like, oh, okay, I feel like I've got a little skin in the game here.
SPEAKER_07Well, for sure, for sure. And you I shit, I invest in my own energy company, like Consumers Energy. They're their stock isn't just for them, it's like a couple companies, but like, why not? Why not you know get some dividends back? You know, like I do Costco, I do McDonald's, all the stuff I use. Uh Bubba Sue says buy lift stock. I'm like, I why? Why would we no no no lift?
SPEAKER_08They're recommending buying lift stock. Really? Yeah, yeah. The analysts have been pushing lift the last year. Why? Well, what is their what is their thought of their their ridership has increased a quite a bit over the last year? Really? Yeah, interesting. They're they're heading in the right direction right now.
SPEAKER_07For the longest time, I oh yeah, had lift and it just stash in stash, it tells you like what they've lost, and it was always like negative 60% or something like that. It was something horrible.
SPEAKER_08It's coming back around, though.
SPEAKER_07All right, well, maybe I'll throw five bucks at it. You know, you never know. That's what that's the thing. You throw five, ten, twenty bucks. Now, there's some I got like three, four hundred dollars in because over time, with it being good and my five dollars, it's just kind of sky.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, do it in reinvestments and all that kind of stuff. Yeah, it can. Sometimes you look at it if you especially if you don't watch it all the time, you look at it, oh man, that's that's you know, that's that's grown. And I, you know, don't you don't feel you don't feel the pain to put money.
SPEAKER_07You know what I do just for shits and grins, I uh especially with the market being so volatile in the last six months. When I get my five bucks, I go in there and I typically go what's just kind of lost that week, like it's an it's in the negative, but not like 60%. It's like two percent. I'm like, okay, you're down, I'm gonna buy. You know, it's down. Yeah, yeah, exactly. You know, it's like and it's like uh Comcast or Xfinity. Oh, they're down a little bit, or UPS. I'm like, well, you're not you're coming back, you know what I mean? So you're not going anywhere. But I will say for uh I have a lot of other retirement that's sizable amounts of money that go in there that I don't fuck with. I have a professional for that.
SPEAKER_08So oh, nice, man. That's all I got is my stash account.
SPEAKER_07That's oh, you're you're good luck, godspeed. Did you did you uh send your pension to some Nigerian prints or something?
SPEAKER_08Uh twice, man. They got me twice on that. I think I would have learned the first time.
SPEAKER_07I know. I don't even know how you were able to sign on to this show.
SPEAKER_08All this computer stuff's over my head. I don't really understand technology.
SPEAKER_07So uh all right, moving
DoorDash Delivery Robots In The Real World
SPEAKER_07forward. Uh, this is a guy that says he did a good deed. It's a video, and it's one of the DoorDash robots. And when the the video doesn't do it justice, he this this thing is like driving in the slums of LA. Like, it's bad. You see like tents on the sidewalk. I'm like, why is DoorDash send like what is going on here? Like, I don't know why they would do that, but we'll watch that uh a minute and then uh chat about it.
SPEAKER_05Don't come outside. Oh, he's having some trouble. Uh I uh the problem is he can't even go under he can't even oh man, we got we can't, we can't. I just can't. I gotta do my good deed. I don't even know if this is a good deed. I'm helping someone else lose a job right now. Come here, buddy. Stop. Stop. I'm gonna help you. Welcome here. No, he's not gonna make it. We gotta help him again. Come on. Oh my god, bro. I gotta do it for the week.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, so like I said, I'm like, why are you? I mean, I get it, maybe that's the quickest way, but they hopefully they take some of that data. On the guy helping him. Like, and for the for the listeners, he gets him unstuck. He finally gets it going. Then he realized there's like a piece of metal around its tire. So then he's got to lift that out.
SPEAKER_08Yeah. So it's this little, you know, what do they call them? Dots, door dash dots. It's trying to go down the sidewalk. And it looks like there's a maybe an unhoused person with a tent there and some, you know, some debris and wood and trash kind of stuff on the sidewalk, kind of blocking this this thing's way. And he's the the dot had had like one or two wheels were off the sidewalk. So he's like ready to tip over anyway. So yeah, this guy helped him out a little bit, which is completely different from the other video. We showed that one night where the guy's like, F you, you're taking somebody's job. Quit taking people's job.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, I just I mean, I guess I don't know. I would probably help it too. I mean, I'm glad he got it on video. It's kind of a fun little thing, but I'm just so shocked that that was the and maybe that was the quickest way, but uh like fuck what are you doing? And and and maybe that's very common where they're delivering. They have people, you know, I mean a trash is fine, but like they literally there were tents on the sidewalk.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, and I, you know, I mean, if you go roll, I can't I'm I can see those things trying to rolling through uh a little encampment there, and somebody just grabbing that thing and prying, you know, getting a crowbar, prying it up and getting whatever foods in there.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, you imagine though, like if there's a god, I hope if there's a shake in there, I hope they sealed it well because that thing was bebopping falling on the curb and he was oh yeah, he was lifting it up, and I'm like, Well, I hope it's sealed well.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, shake might be all over the bottom of the container.
SPEAKER_07Damn. All right, uh Larry, dovetail, not good news.
Dovetail Earnings Screenshots Ends
SPEAKER_07Uh, if if anyone's used it before.
SPEAKER_08So uh for people who don't know, dovetail is dovetail.ai, uh it was a website, and and we've been using it for as long as we knew about it because it was such easy money. And basically, all you would do is at the end of your week, uh, if you take screenshots of your earnings from Lyft, uh, Uber, and DoorDash, and Dovetail would send you ten dollars each for those.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, for each app that they were for each app.
SPEAKER_08You could make um they were very specific. You had to make sure all everything was expanded or they would reject your pictures. It was pretty easy to get rejected. Yeah, but uh it was easy 30 bucks. And then uh uh for a little bit a few weeks ago they stopped taking submissions and then they started back up, I think. And but now that I got an email just the other day said we're reaching out to share an important update about Dovetail after careful consideration. We'll be closing the Dovetail platform at the end of May. Um I'm grateful for your participation and support. It meant a lot to us. And then they give the times for the last submission and everything. Um but it was it was like I said, we uh talked about it quite a bit for anybody who did the you know ride share or DoorDash because it was just such easy money. Yeah, I mean take you uh you know what 30 seconds a minute to take some screenshots and submit them and you know 10, 20, 30 bucks. And a lot of times we would do like, oh, I gotta do my one lift ride this week or my DoorDash to suck, and they it didn't matter. You didn't know they never said anything.
SPEAKER_07That's what I did this week. I took one lift, not like on purpose, but that's just how it worked out. And I was like, oh, sweet, because when I went to go log in in the morning, it was only accepting lift at that point.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, and that was the thing in the last probably three, four months. Like anytime, like I would get up in the morning and and uh like right before work is a lot of times when I would submit nine, and every time pretty much Uber was already filled up. I don't know how fast they filled up, but I guess after midnight you can start submitting right your stuff. So Uber got filled up pretty quick. So normally it was just DoorDash and uh Lyft that was available. Still, you know, it's an easy 20 bucks, you know. I mean that's 80 bucks a month. Yeah. Uh just just easy money. And hopefully they'll come back around. And you know, people were worried about privacy stuff. It none of your information showed on there, didn't show your screen name, all it showed were your earnings. That's all they wanted a screenshot of. So they were obviously, you know, doing uh putting putting all this info together to sell it to somebody or you know, uh something, you know, they had to be making money somewhere, uh, you know, to be able to pay all this out to all these gig workers. But yeah, I'm gonna miss dovetail. And hopefully, you know, fingers crossed, maybe somebody will invest some more money and uh it'll crank back up.
SPEAKER_07For sure. Uh Larry's gonna talk about lift, uh lift drift.
Drift Air Fresheners For Your Car
SPEAKER_07Uh we actually had somebody sign up. Thank you. Uh from last show. It looks like I got a refer or uh credit, and next one goes to Larry. But uh yeah, tell us why they should sign up for Drift.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, so I've been using Drift for probably about four years now, and it's a subscription air freshener service, and they have a couple different options you could do. Mine is a little piece of wood that they soak in essential oil. Uh, they also have a slate one that they soak in essential oil, and they've come out with a new one that uh is metal. Um, it's a new scent every 30 days, um, and they will last 30 days. Um, sometimes you might not think about it because you get used to the smell. Like about the month, sometimes I'm like, I can't smell that, but I'll have writers get in, or my wife will get in, they're like, oh my gosh, that smells so good. And the scent is always really natural smelling. It's not, it's not artificial smell, it's not over sweet like a lot of the air fresheners are. And I've I've maybe in in four years, I've maybe had one or two that that weren't you know my favorites, but um but besides that, they they've all been fantastic.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, yeah. So check out. I recommended it. Yeah, link is in the description if you want that.
SPEAKER_08Um the wood ones cost about I pay about uh twelve dollars a month.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, the wood one, the referral or the is the refill is yeah, a little bit cheaper than the slate, and probably the slate's probably cheaper than the metal.
SPEAKER_08It's probably just and they have stuff for your house too. Yeah, I noticed that they do have stuff for your house uh that you can get as well.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, for sure. Cool. Uh all right, moving
Bathroom Access And Dasher Bans
SPEAKER_07on. This was a picture of let me get that up there. So uh driver, it's kind of hard to see, but they pulled up to it and and said that uh dashers can now be banned for authorized restroom use. So clearly they must have had a sign up that said no bathrooms and you can't use them, but people were going to use them. They must have not had a lock on the door or whatever for that. But that this whole bathroom thing, and we've we've talked about this before. Like it really, it really frustrates me that you're gonna deny your dasher a bathroom. And I mean, it's kind of like a human right. Like, I mean, they're going there to pee, or maybe they have to poo. I don't know. It's like whatever. But I mean, what would be their reason? Unless they unless they've having trouble with it, right? Like if dashers are going in there peeing on the wall. Like, I mean, I go to the bathroom, I go to the bathroom. I'm not doing anything else.
SPEAKER_08So yeah, yeah, I mean, that's the only thing I can think of too is that they've had trouble with people coming in there and trashing you know the bathrooms, or uh, you know, who knows? Maybe they've had trouble with people going in there, you know, doing drugs. I don't know. But yeah, just if it's just uh I'm gonna deny you going to the bathroom because you're not a paying customer, you know, that doesn't make any sense because they are helping your restaurant, they're delivering your food.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, and and no, I get it if you're like got a homeless population, but like clearly I'm a dasher. I'm not homeless. I have a car. Exactly. Let me go to the bathroom because I'm just gonna decline any trips I get from there. I mean, you're the people that are dashing for you live in the the community and they're gonna be like, oh fuck that place, you know.
SPEAKER_08I'm just never going to eat there.
SPEAKER_07And and and while you think one person saying that, it trickles down like, well, if you're not gonna pick up the order, then you know John's not picking up the order, and then all of a sudden you got an order sitting there longer. Why is no one picking up this order? Yeah, you know, it's because you know, you're kind of uh being a dick.
SPEAKER_09Yeah.
SPEAKER_08And and travelers said people can be slobs, and I agree with that 100%. 100% one thing that uh it really yanks my chain, and it happened when I was driving to St. Louis, you know, stop, stop to a gas station to you know, get a get some gas, get a drink, go in, use the bathroom real quick, go in, you know, and and and the stall. Somebody's taking that crap and they haven't flushed it. And I'm like, what kind of animal do you have to be to get some kind of pleasure out of that? I do not understand at all.
SPEAKER_07Same the the amount I mean, working outside the home, especially when I used to do lawn care. I mean, I'm constantly in public bathrooms, and I would see some of the crazy shit too. Like he says there's a lot of like there'd be shit in the wall. Like, or or you made a mess on the seat. Like, if I if I make a mess, I'm gonna wipe it up. Like exactly. I I'm gonna clean it up. I'm not gonna scrub it, but I'm like, I don't want someone to come in here and like sit on poo. You know what I mean? Like, that's gross, and not that I get poo on the seat, but you know, I mean, sometimes you know, whatever, even if you get a little pee on there, but yeah, I I'm just why it's wild walking in some of those bathrooms.
SPEAKER_08It is, man. Now it man, it like I said, I'm usually pretty easy going. Yes, you are. That's one that one that's one thing that will get me fired up. And and uh, like if I was seeing somebody coming out and I would I think I would confront them in this door. Oh, I would too. What are you you know what are you? I don't understand. I just don't understand what kind of pleasure you get out of that.
SPEAKER_07I I don't think it's pleasure, I think they're just a POS and they don't care about any Wells. I'm like, do you do that at home? Yeah, yeah, I bet they don't. No, of course not, because it smells. Yeah, it's caca.
SPEAKER_08Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Animals disturbing, anyways. I I fully hope that you don't use a bathroom for door to like if just don't pick up orders there, screw them.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, exactly.
AI Cleaning Fee Scam On Lyft
SPEAKER_07All right, Larry, what do we oh driver uses AI claim a cleaning fee?
SPEAKER_08Yeah, so we're gonna watch this video and then we'll talk about it. But yeah, this is you know, uh I'm surprised we don't hear about it more because yeah, people out there that are they're always trying to scam, they'd rather try to scam their way into money than actually earning it.
SPEAKER_07So I watched a little bit of this, but it's 254. I can't believe we have to talk for 254, but we'll we'll see when we cut it off. All right.
SPEAKER_10In other news, a Boca Rateman is sharing his story after he says his daughters were falsely accused of damaging a lift driver's car. And he says it was all engineered through the use of AI. Our Jade Jarvis joining us now in the studio with what he wants the community to know. Jade.
SPEAKER_01Well, Felicia, Burt Gore just wants to make people aware that this happened to him and it can happen to anyone. So always be alert and check your bank statements. Saturday afternoon, Bert Gore says he had just returned home in Boca Ratone after taking his son to the ER when he got this fraud alert from his bank, a $75 damage fee from Lyft. Gore declined the charge.
SPEAKER_06So then I'm thinking to myself, what could possibly have gone going on here? So I I reach out to you know my girls. I have a 14 and 15-year-old that had been to the beach earlier. And so I'm like, hey, did you guys take Lyft today? And they're they're like, Yeah.
SPEAKER_01But Gore's daughter said they didn't leave a mess in the lift, contrary to what a lift customer service rep told Gore via chat.
SPEAKER_06They didn't have food or drinks in the car. These girls were coming back from, you know, the beach. They were in their towels coming back from the beach, and they said, Well, you know, we we verify everything with uh the drivers, and the driver, you know, sent us pictures. And I said, Well, I asked them, I said, to send me the pictures.
SPEAKER_01These are the pictures Liv told Gore, the driver, provided them with, showing evidence of the damage. But he says his daughter pointed out a glaring issue.
SPEAKER_06She goes, Dad, that's AI. Um, you could see the Gemini logo on the bottom right hand side of one of the photos. And I'm like, Oh my god, you're right. So I tell them, I said, Hey, I said, you know, matter of fact, I said, you know, these photos are AI generated.
SPEAKER_01Gemini AI is Google's artificial intelligence assistant and can generate images and videos. Gore says the Lyft Rep agreed that the images were created using AI, apologized, and blocked the driver from their app.
SPEAKER_06Blocking the driver, you know, that that's I I don't know how you can have a driver that's doing this to your customers even driving for you. It just doesn't make any sense.
SPEAKER_01Gore said he posted his story on a Boca community Facebook page, getting several responses from other people who have had similar experiences. Now he just wants to raise awareness so it doesn't happen to someone else.
SPEAKER_06You know, if you're not paying attention to this and you know, you're getting charged uh $75. I mean, you know, it can really add up. So you really got to pay attention.
SPEAKER_01And Lyft released a statement on this saying, quote, Lyft takes damage disputes seriously and reviews each matter based on the available information. We have reviewed the rider's concerns, offered reimbursement, unpaired the rider and driver, and addressed the matter directly with the driver. In studio, J. Jarvis, WPVF 25 News.
SPEAKER_07Oh man, what a fucking idiot. So that so that's how he got caught because he left the frickin' watermark in the pin.
SPEAKER_08But you know, kudos to this guy for or this guy's kids for spotting it. Because a lot of people wouldn't spot it, a lot of people wouldn't know what it was if they did spot it. Uh but uh go pick up your daughters. Don't send them, don't send your 14, 15 year old in a lift.
SPEAKER_07Oh, you're victim blaming. You're victiming. I was thinking it. I'm not gonna lie. I mean, I know there's lifting, but then I in my head I'm like, yeah, I don't know if I'd want to send my daughter. Maybe my my son, uh that maybe one of my sons that's more with not with it, I don't know, just more worldly. Yeah, I might do that, but yeah. Um I wouldn't notice the logo either because I don't use Gemini AI, so I may have missed that. But like if you're gonna scam, like at least crop the photo.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, I think I would be checking it pretty closely if I if I was using AI to do that. But I'm I'm surprised we don't see this more. Uh yeah. Just because uh especially, you know, if you're doing late night crowd, these people are drinking, yeah. They don't remember. Half of them aren't gonna remember whether they got sick and they're just gonna pay it. Yeah, but to do it to do it to two young, you know, young girls like that, you know, that's that's that's rolling the dice, I think.
SPEAKER_07Someone brought up in the comments, well, this is why they need to to submit receipts. And I'm like, well, I can create my own. They're not checking on that. I may or may not have done that in the past. I mean, I wasn't gonna say anything, but uh, but yeah, it's it's just like the receipts. I mean, I can I can probably create a better AI receipt than a well, maybe pictures are hard to do AI. I mean, depending on the AI, but yeah, I mean it's just it's just kind of stupid. Um, you're now you're off the platform for what 75 bucks. And honestly, they probably just well, didn't they say they were supposed to human review those pictures? It wasn't supposed to be like automated.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, but but yeah, I mean, human probably did review it. He probably didn't catch that either. Yeah, he probably didn't. Yeah, you'd think they'd train him on that, but yeah, I hope they kicked the driver off because the the guy, the victim, or the dad said that they kicked him off, but then at the end, the the statement from Lyft said they reviewed the situation with the driver. They didn't say anything that they about kicking him off.
SPEAKER_07Well, what's funny is like that guy's like, there should there's no room for these people. Yeah, dude, have you been to stop that? Well, not only that, like have you seen the rift? Like, how many times have you taken a lift? Like, there is a lot of riffraft driving Lyft and Uber. I mean, and and I drive it too, so I'm kind of calling myself that. But I'm my point is is like he was shocked that someone would do that.
SPEAKER_08I'm like, bro, well, he also lives in Boku Ratan.
SPEAKER_07Is that like rich area?
SPEAKER_08That's that's like a pretty wealthy area. Okay.
SPEAKER_07Well, it doesn't mean then it doesn't mean that like he doesn't know like well, I I see what you're saying because he doesn't probably interact with a lot of riffraff like us. Probably not.
SPEAKER_08Probably not, be my guess.
SPEAKER_07That that's fair, but yeah, I he was just appalled that these companies would hire somebody like that. I'm like, God, have you fucking seen?
SPEAKER_08His driver's probably like, oh man, this you know, he he knew where he was delivered. He probably dropped them off at a pretty nice house. He's like, Oh, they can afford it, you know, they're not never gonna even think miss, yeah, you know, just gonna think their kids were being messy. Yeah.
SPEAKER_07I love that, Chase. And I've had that a couple of times with Chase too. I love that they throw that alert out because it's odd when it's out of your normal like patterns. I think it, I mean, I'm sure, I'm sure that's AI too, just picking up like, ooh, let's send them a text to make sure. Yeah. And I've had times where it's done it, it's been legit, and I just say it's it's me, and they're like, okay.
unknownYep.
SPEAKER_07So I mean, I think that's great. I think probably you could set stuff up where a certain money tier, you know what I mean? Like anything over a hundred bucks, let me know before it goes through.
SPEAKER_08I I yeah, I mean, I get an alert every time my credit card is charged. I get it, I get a text.
SPEAKER_07Well, I get a yeah, a notif, but it doesn't like, hey, this we want to make sure it's you. It's just like, right, yeah, I get that too for sure.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, you probably could set uh set some kind of alert if it's over a certain amount to yeah, please contact me or something like that.
SPEAKER_07Because I also bought stuff that was a couple hundred dollars at a site I never bought before and it didn't do a damn thing either. So yeah, no, and it wasn't sextels.com either.
SPEAKER_08So the don't don't you said where you usually didn't buy things.
SPEAKER_07Oh, gotcha. 10-4. Yeah, you're right. You're right. Okay. Well, I kind of walked into that one, didn't I? A little bit. Damn.
DoorDash Driver Shooting Sentencing
SPEAKER_07Um, all right. So we always talk about uh news that we talk about, and we never hear the follow-up, but we have a follow-up. If you remember, there was a uh DoorDash driver that got shot at from some guy from his porch. Uh and this dude, okay, so he got charged, he got sentenced, sorry, charged, I'm using terms, for 17 years in prison for this. 17 years. And I I read through the entire article and it didn't say that he had priors. And he was like a former, what was he like a county commissioner?
SPEAKER_08Yeah, city, city, uh uh, what did it say? Chester, yeah. Some kind of a some kind of a city official. I mean, does it highway superintendent?
SPEAKER_07Okay, so I'm not saying, I mean, city officials aren't like they're dirty all the time, but it just it just seems odd. But yeah, he got 17 years in prison, follow-up of five years post-release supervision. Uh, the charge carried a maximum of 25 years. He was convicted in uh March on two counts of first and second degree assault, second degree criminal possession of weapon, and eight counts of criminal possession of firearm. The jury did not consider the attempted murder charge. The judge said considering the evidence of the shooting, he did not see the shots were fired at someone who was afraid. Brown said that the first shot into the lawn appeared to be a warning, but he found the second and third shots fired in the direction of vehicle with Barry inside did satisfy this depraved indifference. I don't even know what those mean words mean, but basically, like I think he was cool with the one in the ground. Like, I don't think he would even be here. But then firing at the car um and hitting the guy. Yeah, so I yeah, I read this whole thing. So at 9 p.m., uh, he approached the door with a bag of food and to deliver it, had a dead cell phone battery. Two versions in court uh of what happened at the door varied as Barry, who testified through a friend's translator, do his limited English, said they only had asked to charge his phone but not to come in. While Riley said Barry would not answer his questions and would not leave after Riley asked him to go. Riley testified that he was afraid for his family and feared a home invasion. Bitch, you got a gun and he's walking away. Uh video shown during the trial. Riley with a 45 caliber clock pistol and a sling holster, which grabbed after he went inside, firing shots at Barry's Torrey to Corolla as he was attempting to drive away. One part projectile traveled through the trunk of the car and struck Barry in the lower back. And then he's had some medical issues. Um can't eat many things now because he had to remove two feet of his small intestine. Like he's fucked. He should sue this guy too.
SPEAKER_08Had to live with a colostomy bag for six months.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, like he he should he should uh he should sue but civil lawsuit, yeah. Yeah, because like now I'm gonna I'm gonna I don't know. 17 years, do you think that's an appropriate or do you think it's too long for that? Hey, it said that the they were um they were going for 24 years. Well the max is 25 for that for those charges. So yeah, I don't know. I mean, I I'm glad he got some time, but man, 17 years.
SPEAKER_0817 is I mean, that's no joke. That is no joke.
SPEAKER_07Uh yeah, I mean he's he's probably 50 years old.
SPEAKER_08It's so weird though, because you see people who kill people and get less time.
SPEAKER_07I know that's what I'm saying. Like you drunk drive and kill somebody, you might do a dime, but that's it, not that that's not a lot, but like I mean, although it is I mean, drunk driving is actually now that I think about it, like you get to use the defense of alcohol so it's you don't get penalized. As much, but this guy clearly was attempting to I don't know. When you point a gun at somebody, you're kind of attempting to and fire it. Like, what did you think was gonna happen? That the the bullet was gonna magically, you know, just veer away from it at the last second?
SPEAKER_08Exactly. Like I said, if he would have you know, if he would have shot in the ground or shot in the air or something like that, where it's obvious that he's not shooting at the guy. But you pointed it in that general direction, man. That's it. You know, they're gonna get you for murder or attempted murder.
SPEAKER_07Well, this wasn't even attempted murder. I don't know.
SPEAKER_08Whatever. Yeah, it's gonna be something serious because yeah, if it that that bullet hits somebody, yeah, yeah, they they can they can throw you away for a long time.
SPEAKER_07God, this is I mean, fuck this guy, but in my head, I'm like, man, why would you like why would you do that? You 17 years, like you're your life's done. Like you're he was probably drunk. You think so? Yeah, yeah, he probably was. Yeah. Anyways, well, I'm glad we saw a follow-up because again, it's sometimes I'm sure they do post them, but we just miss it because we're not looking in the right spots or not, or whatever.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, I was pretty happy when I saw this one because like we talk about it all the time about following up on stuff, and then you know, it just like you said, we're we're searching for specific stuff, and and that's usually not up in the in the upper, you know, upper echelon of of of what we're searching for, uh the follow-up stuff.
SPEAKER_07As excited as I could be, someone was going to jail and got shot.
SPEAKER_03I was like, oh, there's a follow-up. This guy's cooked.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, yeah, he got cooked. That's for sure. Certainly did. All right, moving on.
Waymo Cars Swarm A Neighborhood
SPEAKER_07Waymo in the news. It's Waymo, right? Or am I out of order? Nope, you're good.
SPEAKER_08You're exactly right.
SPEAKER_07All right, uh, Waymo uh is having some issues, and they're in, I think this is in Lanta Atlanta. Hotlanta. Hotlanta, and it's deciding to drive through this neighborhood when they're not busy, and this is kind of fucked up.
SPEAKER_04Wayward Waymo's. This video here captured several of the self-driving cars just clogging up a neighborhood cul-de-sac. The people living in the Northwest Atlanta neighborhood say dozens end up circling their community. Channel 2 Steve Gelbach is on one street where they want the Waymo's to stop.
SPEAKER_02It's almost every little cul-de-sac around our area. So I think it's a real problem.
SPEAKER_03Waymo after Waymo after Waymo enter this dead-end street, usually early in the morning.
SPEAKER_02I think yesterday morning we had 50 cars that came in between six and seven.
SPEAKER_03Neighbors on Battleview Drive started seeing the autonomous driverless cars two months ago, but the groupings and large number of Waymo's just started circling in and out in the last couple weeks. They even shared video with us when neighbors used this little guy to put him right out here in the street to block the Waymo's from getting into the cul-de-sac. And you can imagine what happened next.
SPEAKER_02We had at 1.8 Waymo's that were stuck trying to figure out how to turn around.
SPEAKER_03The Waymos are empty and not picking anyone up. Parents are worried, not only calling it excessive, but dangerous. Neighbors reached out to Waymo and have not got a response. They've also contacted their council member representatives, and GDOT don't know what to do.
SPEAKER_02We would just like to see them stay on main traffic roads. I don't think there's any reason to be on small residential cul-de-sac if they're not picking up somebody.
SPEAKER_03Steve Gelbach, Channel 2 Action News.
SPEAKER_00Meanwhile, Waymo is recalling thousands of its cars because of a software issue. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says the self-driving cars detect flooded roads, but um, yeah, it uh oh, you're still muted, Larry.
SPEAKER_07It's because I can't it usually cooks one of us when I end it early because I didn't want to talk about the the recalls. But that's wild that they're doing that. I mean, I would put a barrier, like a complete line, and but then then it buy then it might be the same thing, you know. They put that thing and they might get backed up, but like don't even allow them down a certain point and then because you know a human will just get out and move the barrier. Sure.
SPEAKER_08But I this one I don't understand. Why are why are these Waymo's just out driving around? I thought they're so out driving around. Why are the if they're not if they're not going to pick somebody up or they don't have a passenger, why are they not parking somewhere?
SPEAKER_07Yeah, I don't understand they neither, because don't they have like unless this this launch in Atlanta doesn't have like a base, they gotta have a base station, right? Because they got a charge.
SPEAKER_08They have to, but and even if they don't have a base station, park it have it go into a parking lot in a parking spot and park somewhere, yeah, in a shopping center or something. You're just wasting gas or if I mean wasting you know electricity, wasting your electricity, your charge, and yeah, 50 of those in an hour in your cul-de-sac, I'd be pissed.
SPEAKER_07I'd be super pissed. Like a lot of times when we watch these news, you feel like the person complaining is like a Karen or a little like okay. Not here. No, not here. She's 100% right. I'd be fucking hot.
SPEAKER_08Yes, yeah. I would there's no reason for them to be back there in a cul-de-sac in a neighborhood at all.
SPEAKER_07I would be on, I would be calling Waymo every five minutes. I got a lot of time. I will dial you.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, I'd be at the town hall meeting, whatever it is, commission meeting, and raising hell.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, like you've allowed this these cars to do this, we're okay with it, but like you can't be in a nut this fucking doing loop-de-loops like it's a racetrack.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, and that that's what I yeah, that just doesn't make any sense to me. Why are you having them drive around? Have them park. There's it's Atlanta, there's a lot of places to park.
SPEAKER_07Right.
SPEAKER_08Go into a uh Walmart parking lot and park somewhere.
SPEAKER_07Travel. Spike strips. Yeah, yeah. I mean, it'll fuck it up for a while, but they'll get that they'll get the message real quick after the first one goes, and the rest of them like leave or whatever, and then they come pick it up and they're like, Oh, somebody popped the tires. They're like, Yeah, we don't want to do that again. Like that's true. That the squeaky wheel gets the like squeaky wheel gets the grease, I always say that's gonna get the grease with the spike strips.
SPEAKER_08Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Instantly. Okay, you're gonna you're gonna charge me. Okay, I'll pay for the tires. Fuck you. Like, whatever. At least it gets the cars out of there.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, that's that, you know. I you know, when I first saw this story, I thought it was, you know, oh, maybe you know, three or four cars coming in through the cul-de-sac or something, but four forty or fifty in an hour at that time of the morning, that that is just asinine.
SPEAKER_07Me, I'd be excited because we talk about on the show. I would go out and fuck with them so bad. I'd be running in front of them, just like testing it out, watch me get hit or something. I'm like, jackpot, I'm retiring.
SPEAKER_08Exactly. I'm collecting my payday.
SPEAKER_07Oh, that poor family. Well, I I hope we get a follow-up of this one because I want to see what fucking Waymo's statement is of like why they were doing that.
SPEAKER_08We'll have to search deep for it, I imagine, because you're just gonna probably be buried.
SPEAKER_07You know you're gonna search for it when you hit end recording and you're like, all right, see you next week. And you'll not search for it, but I'm the same way, so don't feel bad.
SPEAKER_08Put it in my notes. You know, that's right.
Why Dashers Avoid IHOP Pickups
SPEAKER_07Larry Doordash employees can't stand a certain restaurant. And uh I I might I'm kind of surprised about this. I I don't have a problem with this one.
SPEAKER_08Okay, yeah. So um they were talking about on Reddit. Uh they said just a countless amount of DoorDash drivers have shared their frustrating experiences uh picking up from IHOP. Uh one of them says they've waited 25 minutes for an order on a very slow day. Uh iHop's always a nightmare for us, they literally don't give a you know flip about us. Yeah, um it says it's become so obvious that even customers are starting to notice it and how much time it's taken. Uh customers said I made an order from IHOP over an hour ago. I've had three different dashers canceled because they've been waiting too long. You know, this is this is insane for this to take this long. You know, some people think that you know maybe the long waiting times vary by day as you know, diner tends to get busier on weekends and holidays. But a lot of the delivery drivers say that's not the case. It it seems that they think the problem is more about just the staff just seem to have a flippant attitude toward them and uh ignoring them or just being rude to them. And it seems like they just don't care about the online orders. Uh you know, they're taking care of the people in the restaurant. Um so you know, because of all this, a lot of dashers have said they're gonna not gonna pick up you know from iHop. They if they get IHOP order, they're gonna cancel it. And uh you know, that's not good for anybody. It's not good for IHOP because they're gonna end up losing business. Because if I order from IHOP and I want some, you know, pancakes because I'm gonna have a craving, I don't want pancakes that have been sitting there for an hour and a half. Right, you know, and so that's gonna cause problems for them in the end. Um it's weird how you know I guess different places uh seem to have different restaurants. What's uh what's one of the restaurants that like you would not pick up from in Grant in GR?
SPEAKER_07Well, like, you know, McDonald's is a big one, but specific McDonald's. Like, in fact, the one in my city, well, I mean, we got a few of them, but one of them the closest to me, because like if I order McDonald's, it always wants to pick that one. It's terrible. They're slow, they get the order wrong, so I always go out of it. So, like, for me, as far as that, it's probably McDonald's. So, I want to clarify about our IHOP. During COVID, it was not good. They they did not handle the volume of like food orders and delivery on top of like on the weekend. I mean, honestly, IHOP's still packed on the weekend by us.
SPEAKER_09Sure.
SPEAKER_07I mean, so when you're you're picking up Saturday morning at 10 a.m. and there's five other deliveries plus all the people in there, it's it's tough. And I I do think it depends on if it's like franchise owned or if it's corporate owned. Um, because if it's franchise owned, you know, you're your your employees are only as good as you are, right? Like how you set your standards at your restaurant, and I'm sure some of the IHOPs are absolutely amazing because the the f you know the franchisee kicks ass, you know. But yeah, I would say probably that McDonald's. I can't really think anything offhand. Um I got nothing. I I I have pretty good success when I deliver. I don't really have to wait long for most places.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, I'm trying to think. Uh there's a place in town called uh what is it, Lisa's Fifth Street Diner. And it's a it's one of those little kind of uh looks kind of like a little hole in a wall diner and but and breakfast, man, they are they are packed on at breakfast time. And you it's one so you can get you can get a lot of good, really good food for uh not much money. And so it's very popular. Uh you know, it looks like a greasy spoon kind of place, you know. Um it kind of has that throwback feel. Uh, but really good food, but they're they I think they're just so busy that uh that that was one place that when I was delivering food a lot more, I would tend to like I think I'm gonna pass on it because it's I know it's gonna it's not gonna be ready. It's like we're ready for a while.
SPEAKER_07I mean, honestly, if you have a busy restaurant that's great, and you you take on delivery, you gotta kind of like hire a like a crew to prioritize that. Like coordinate it. Yeah, and I get it. If you have a small grill and like you know, this is all we got. So like I'm gonna take them as they come. Because they probably take them as they come, right? They just I think so, yeah. You know, if if I got six in sitting down and then a delivery, it gets to it when I get to it, which I mean that's the fairest way to do, but yeah, I think I think you're more likely to get bad reviews from delivery, like not drivers, but like customers that didn't get it. They're they're probably not gonna, I mean, they're gonna be mad at Doordash, but maybe they'll go to that restaurant's site and and shit on them. You know what I mean? So maybe balance it a little bit. I don't know. I don't know what the what the answer is. I know some of these restaurants I go to, they do have a dedicated like takeout, like maybe not just for delivery, but like this is our takeout. Um, I know when I go to Anna's house, great. They I walk in a separate door. Now it's still in the restaurant, but it literally says for drivers only, I walk up to right up to the bar. I have so-and-so, and it's hidden, like unrelated, and they pull it up and they hand it to me. I rarely have to wait.
SPEAKER_08That's the place me, you and Ben went to eat when I was there that first year, right?
SPEAKER_07Yeah, you know, honestly, the last couple times the quality has gone down. I don't know, it could be unique to my situation. I'm not gonna throw it, you know, it out yet because I really kind of enjoy their their variety menu and and it's it's it's hard to stay great for a lot of years.
SPEAKER_08But I think some of these restaurants, like an IHOP, before COVID, they probably didn't have a ton of of uh to go orders.
SPEAKER_07Yes, you know, oh a hundred percent.
SPEAKER_08So I'm sure that was a train a big transition and a lot of other places just didn't have that, you know, didn't have the takeout order. You know, it was a place where you came and you sat down and ate. Uh you maybe occasionally get a takeout order. Same thing with like a waffle house. You know, and uh places like that probably just you know it took him a little bit to transition and kind of figure things out.
SPEAKER_07And that's fair. I I get it. It's uh it's crazy that 2020 exploded the the food delivery. Are we ever gonna go back to not doing it? You know what I mean? Like, why you know things happen in the world that you know change the trajectory of things that you didn't think of, you know, like and it's just crazy that that was one of them that it decided like, oh, this is a huge business now. Like, and then it's it's it's not slowing down, it's only getting bigger.
SPEAKER_08Oh yeah, yeah. I mean, yeah uh we wouldn't have AddoorDash.
SPEAKER_07Uh yeah.
SPEAKER_08Our companies, you know, Grubhub, things like that. Uh we greets.
SPEAKER_07It's still wild to me that Lyft never got on the on the food.
SPEAKER_08The food delivery or any kind of delivery.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, yeah, exactly. I mean, there was bits and pieces. We talked about it. They were doing some package stuff. I think they were partnering with they dabbled in it. Yeah, who were they partnering with? It was like was it Amazon? Like it was like you were gonna do a ride and then pick up a like a delivery, but it was like it was like affiliated with another company that you were gonna do a mix of like rides and deliveries. I can't quite remember, but whatever it was. Because it never went anywhere, yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_08And we never did it, so we don't remember it because we never did it.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, and the crazy part is you could still get in on like you still have the opportunity. You have the platform, you have the drivers, they all they all double dip. They they all do that. Traveler says advanced auto. It could have been, it might have been that one. I don't know. It was it was something where it was they were partnering with somebody, but you could still like you could start food tomorrow. Like, yeah, you might struggle. It would take time for you to get into the restaurants, and they're all gonna take you, they're not gonna be like, oh, well, we are expressing.
SPEAKER_08We're gonna do Uber Eats or we don't want to do Lyft yet, right?
SPEAKER_07And it you might have to be a little bit more fancy than Uber, like the software might be up to a little bit better because like you got to convince these people you want me to put a third or a fourth fucking tablet in my row of like Grubhub, Uber Eats, DoorDash. But yeah, they they literally could still do it and and could be successful with it. Yeah, and I mean don't think they will do, but it's almost like it's uh oh god, we're way over already. It's all we've been running our
Patreon Shoutouts And Sign Off
SPEAKER_07yappers. We didn't we were complaining about we didn't have enough articles, we didn't even get through them all. Um, it uh what was I gonna say? Oh, it's almost like they're like, We're left, we're tune gun for this. You know what I mean? Like, I'm like, I get that vibe, and I'm like, bro, like just do it. Quit being a bitch. Yeah, make that money, yeah. Go make that money. We want another app. If it's if if it's something that it's already integrated in your ride share app and I can get eats or rides, like fucking let's go or deliveries, yeah. Yeah, yeah. As long as they you know, and again, the pay, it's all about the bay. If it pays good, I'm taking it. I don't care if it's eats, I don't care if it's rides, I don't care, whatever. If the pay is good, I'm taking it.
SPEAKER_08So yep, exactly.
SPEAKER_07All right, well, yeah, I got a lot in there. We got through seven articles. Um, and uh appreciate you guys tuning in. Uh, the Patreon is in eight minutes. You can go to patreon.com slash the gig con podcast. Uh quick shout out to Samson, Bud, Omar, Frank, Tom, Jim, Miguel, Linda, Jerry, Faith, Metal, uh, Kickass, and Anna. Oh, God, I have to talk. Shit. Uh, or I'm gonna go longer. So Anna sent us a couple emails. Okay, she listened to the Patreon and she talked about Baby Quip and says she's used it. She has kids, like, she doesn't even do gig work. And maybe she did, I can't remember her story, but she's in New York. But or uh she's from Ann Arbor, but she's actually used Baby Quip as a customer with her kids when she traveled. Pretty cool, and then she talked about, and I don't know, maybe I talked about this on the pre-show uh a while back, but I was worried about my profile picture. She's like, I wouldn't worry about it because I had decided to put my wife in the picture with me. Right. So I don't look like a serial killer.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, pretty things up a little bit, right?
SPEAKER_07Right. Uh a lot of it. Yeah. So yeah, Anna, thank you so much for the feedback on Patreon. It was really nice to get a message and uh chat with you briefly. That's awesome. Yeah, yeah. So as always, don't put up with anyone's bullshit. And we'll see you on the road. All right, peace out. Hey, good night, everybody. Thanks for listening.
