

Getting the most out of Lyft's 50 free rides - dangoldin
http://dangoldin.com/2014/08/03/getting-the-most-out-of-lyfts-50-free-rides/

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FatalLogic
This is interesting. Who is being gamed here?

How likely is it that someone at Lyft not only realized that users would take
advantage of the $25 free rides, but was also smart enough to realize that
some of those users would share their interesting stories, and generate free
publicity for Lyft?

(99% likely, I guess)

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dangoldin
I think the problem is that with this much demand if a few people do this they
will make it very hard for others to get a car - which will end up just
annoying them about the Lyft experience. Lyft would prefer shorter rides that
would be distributed around more people.

Now it's basically investors subsidizing a few long trips and pissing off
other potential riders.

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FatalLogic
I wonder if they really thought through the consequences of this then? They
got another $250 million in funding recently, so money isn't a problem.
Probably the money prompted this program, in fact.

As you said, they could get things under control by forbidding back-to-back
free rides in the same car, assuming the terms are flexible. That would be
more in the spirit of the offer, and nobody could really complain about that.

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apptoss
When they launched here, two friends of mine basically rented a Lyft car for
the night, driving around nearly non-stop. They took the driver to dinner.

Can't imagine what Lyft's burn rate is.

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Scalar
The offer is already very generous, isn't really too fair to game it.

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dangoldin
Yea - I definitely felt guilty but the driver was okay with it and when you
get 50 free rides over 2 weeks you do have the incentive to use them all up.

If they gave fewer trips over a longer time frame I imagine people would be
more conservative.

