France Detains Top Uber Execs After Cabbie Riots Against Peaceful Ride Service
Street violence goads French officials into physically grabbing organizers of helpful services
Ed Krayewski reported last week on some bull-goose loony fall-of-civilization style violent rioting on the part of French cabbies mad that someone dare try to outcompete them in the field of driving for hire, in this case a new Uber service called UberPOP.
Today the French government rewards the violent folk trying to prevent other people from doing peaceful business as they and their customers choose by physically detaining a couple of top Uber execs from Europe, as reported in the UK Independent:'
The heads of the American company's European and French operations were being held in custody last night by traffic police.
The timing of the arrests will be interpreted as an attempt to appease registered taxi drivers who overturned and burned Uber cars and blocked airports and railway stations during a strike on Thursday. The arrested men, both French, were named as Pierre-Dimitri Gore-Coty, director general of Uber in Europe, and Thibaud Simphal, director-general of Uber in France
I did a long feature for Reason last November on the so-far less violent and arrest-y fight for transportation freedom in the smartphone app age in these here United States.