One of my favorite expressions of disgust is "The only time I wouldn't piss on him is if he was on fire."
Well, the world is on fire and the only time I wouldn't piss on Uber's Jump dockless ebikes is in a pandemic, when bicycle transport has never been more essential.
1/
Uber - and other dockless transport companies like Bird - unilaterally filled our cities' streets with ewaste litter - unsafe electric vehicles that endangered their riders and pedestrians in use, and blocked sidewalks for wheelchair users the rest of the time.
These companies compounded their misdeeds by refusing to help track down customers who had hit-and-run pedestrians, even when their customers' victims were critically injured.
2/
(and, of course, Bird threatened to sue me for explaining how you could buy their abandoned vehicles from city impounds and convert them to personal vehicles)
https://boingboing.net/2019/01/11/flipping-the-bird.html
But you know what? There's a pandemic on. People - especially vulnerable, low-waged, "essential" workers are going to great lengths to avoid public transit. Bike riding is resurgent.
3/
All is forgiven, Uber.
Oh, wait.
Uber has scrapped 20,000 of its Jump bicycles because of a fall in revenue, sending them to the landfill rather than continuing to service them or donating them to the cities they colonized with them.
https://bikesharemuseum.com/20000-jump-bikes-are-going-to-die/
4/
What's more, after they were caught, Uber lied about it - only to have their official narrative contradicted by internal whistleblowers who confirmed to Bikeshare Museum that the bikes are being scrapped "by the containerload." And they've got pics.
https://twitter.com/bikesharemuseum/status/1265082035380670465
Uber has also fired the entire engineering team for Jump - a team that scratch-designed an entirely new set of internals that they alone know how to maintain and fix. Ebay is filling up with salvaged parts.
5/
"We also can’t emphasize enough how disgusting it is for UBER to scrap 20,000 bikes in the midst of a pandemic where bicycles have literally become an object of survival.These could be transportation for the many who have been brought to financial ruin during COVID-19."
eof/