
How prostitution and alcohol make Uber better - andrewljohnson
http://blog.uber.com/2011/09/13/uberdata-how-prostitution-and-alcohol-make-uber-better/
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nhashem
Am I missing something here?

The article basically uses crime as a proxy for "social population density."
I'm pretty sure you could also use "restaurant reservations" as a similar
proxy, but then I guess you wouldn't get to use words like 'prostitution' in
the title of your blog post.

Then, Uber cab riders go to these areas that are densely social. I'm guessing
they probably take other modes of transportation too.

Then, something about certain crimes being more prevalent on certain days of
the week, with some pretty huge leaps of faiths made in the reasoning and no
actual testable data to back it up.

I don't like to post too often on HN if I'm just going to stand there and
drink some haterade, but this just seemed like such a sad attempt to put
together something for pageviews that I couldn't help myself.

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joelhaasnoot
The whole article comes across very "nerdy and scientific" but indeed isn't at
all. Just the difference between correlation and dependence are already
something they should look at:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_and_dependence>

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seldo
To be fair, they were pretty clear that their data was a correlation, not a
causation. But the stuff about prostitution on second Wednesdays is pretty
crazily unsubstantiated, and controversial.

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pge
Fun data, but one question - there is an implicit assumption that prostitution
arrests are proportional to the committing of the crimes. I wonder if weekdays
show more prostitution because the cops are busy with other crimes on weekend
nights?

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shashashasha
A fun anecdote from the Oakland Crimespotting data was that every couple weeks
the cops would just do a "sweep" of San Pablo or other major streets for
prostitutes, just start at one end then go to the other. I think Wednesdays
are more a mark of police patterns than prostitute / john patterns.

~~~
windsurfer
Interesting theory! Do they have more crimes to deal with on the first
Wednesday of every month? Is that why they aren't "sweeping"?

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0x12
These guys have looked very hard at the okcupid postings. Interesting stuff,
but it doesn't really show how prostitution and alcohol ended up making uber
better in some tangible way. Only that there were some interesting
correlations.

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johnrob
Uber is able to decrease the average wait time by strategically placing cars
wherever alcohol and prostitution are prevalent, thus making the service
better.

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0x12
That would require a 'before' and 'after' with some numbers that prove that
they've managed to decrease the wait time in a statistically significant
manner.

~~~
johnrob
Agreed, there could be more direct evidence. They are assuming that this
correlation will hold true in most cities.

Perhaps a less contested statement would be: "How Uber makes prostitution and
alcohol better"...

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ataranto
tl;dr: people take uber to and from bars. that's it. not sure why that took so
many paragraphs and images.

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civilian
Here's a theory: They're only tracking the prostitution that is caught.
(That's how crime data works, right?) Wednesday is close enough to the weekend
for prostitutes to work, but there's not too many people around. On
thursday/friday/saturday there are hoards of partiers & other night life so
they can blend in and find johns easily. But on Wednesday they're more likely
to be caught.

~~~
qw
It's an interesting theory, but it doesn't explain why the second Wednesday
has more prostitution. And following your theory, I would think that those
Wednesdays have more people around because they have more money to spend.

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MBlume
"So before you go running off screaming about how the welfare state is
subsidizing sexy times for retirees, chill out and keep that in mind."

As subsidies go, this one seems pretty obviously positive...

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goo
This is such a great look into data-- I've long felt that consumer companies
like Uber (and Google and Apple and so on...) have the strongest ability to
explore the fabric of today's culture through their data, and it's sweet to
see that Uber has opened up some of that understanding to the public.

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nhangen
I was turned off by the style of the author's writing, and couldn't get past
the "shut up" line. This post didn't match my feelings of the product at all.
All in all, very strange.

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fomojola
Very interesting. I wish they'd factor in gender: are they guys ordering or
are the girls ordering?

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jbigelow76
Link title is too narrow in scope; prostitution and alcohol make everything
better.

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andrewcooke
interesting, but wasn't there an article posted here in the last 24 hours on
being too familiar? maybe they should read that. it was a pretty tiring read.

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networkjester
Fun read; thanks for posting!

