[kalvin]

I'm happy Lyft is demonstrating that it actually cares about its core/founding values of decreasing car usage.

They could have viewed this as a distraction to expanding its existing dedicated-driver model, in order to better compete against Uber. (Lyft Line is just multiple passengers; Sidecar already does "driver destination" aka real carpooling, but they're also playing a different game focusing on drivers in general, and don't have the scale Lyft does)

If they can get traction, they'll have cracked a problem that many people have tried to solve and failed at: how do you get Americans to carpool?

Context: Lyft's founders pivoted into Lyft from Zimride after five years of building white-labeled carpool sites for colleges/companies + a public long-distance carpool/rideshare board, and discovering that a) that's not a VC-scale business, and b) 90% of Americans don't "do" traditional carpooling and they're not about to start

Anyway, I use Lyft over Uber when possible for many reasons, but this is one-- they started out trying to improve society in a particular way, and still are, even as they've changed their approach. And I think they should be commended for setting an example for how to achieve an activist-y goal through a startup/company. Or since it's not achieved yet, at least trying.

(I have no affiliation with Lyft, see my profile.)

[onion2k]

b) 90% of Americans don't "do" traditional carpooling and they're not about to start

90% of Americans didn't pay non-professional strangers for a ride before Uber came along. 90% of Americans didn't share what they were having for lunch before Instagram. 90% of Americans didn't share the hilarious list of "cats who forgot how to cat" before Buzzfeed.

The point being it's pretty much impossible to predict what product will be a success based on past market behaviour. Saying something won't work is very often right, but it's a sucky reason not to try.

[enraged_camel]

Your overall point is correct but I don't think it applies here.

There are deep cultural reasons for why carpooling hasn't become popular in America. From what I have observed as a foreigner, people in this country love their big personal spaces, and their cars are a part of that. It's related to why public transportation isn't popular: most people don't want to sit within such close proximity to strangers.

[username223]

> that's not a VC-scale business

It's depressing that "VC-scale" (i.e. convincing some rich dude he can flip his investment soon for a 1000% return, possibly by unloading shares on unsuspecting rubes) is what matters. What ever happened to making something people want, then selling it at a profit?

[johnny99]

Nothing, but you get a bank loan for that, or bootstrap. VC money comes with strings, including the expectation of high growth.

I agree very much with your sentiment, but I think the solution isn't changing VC, it's finding other kinds of capital.