Uber to let loose loads of ride data

Uber is known as a secretive company that isn't keen on divulging its data. It's had public spats with lawmakers in New York and Seattle to ensure data on its rides isn't released to the public.

But now the ride-hailing company appears to be changing course.

Uber announced Sunday that it's planning to share the ride and traffic data it's collected from billions of rides. The company is releasing the data to "help urban planners make informed decisions about our cities," it wrote in a blog post.

 

Uber to let loose loads of ride data

Uber's new "Movement" website is meant to help urban planners better understand traffic patterns.

Photo by Uber

Uber is known as a secretive company that isn't keen on divulging its data. It's had public spats with lawmakers in New York and Seattle to ensure data on its rides isn't released to the public.

But now the ride-hailing company appears to be changing course.

 

Trump offers olive branch to tech leaders

For President-elect Donald Trump, it's kiss-and-make-up time.

Trump met with more than a dozen executives from the biggest tech companies in the US -- a roundtable fraught with potential for awkwardness given Trump's repeated attacks on tech and the philosophical disagreements he has with some of the executives.

The president-elect instead pledged to do "anything we can do" to help continue the industry's success.

​After Uber brouhaha, CA looks to tighten self-driving car law

Uber flouted California law and rolled out its self-driving cars to passengers in San Francisco last month, without a permit from the state. Now, some local legislators are taking measures, in the name of safety, to ensure no company does that again.

Assembly member Phil Tang introduced a state bill on Thursday that would give the California Department of Motor Vehicles more ways to go after companies that illegally operate autonomous vehicles.

Uber challenged on diversity by Jesse Jackson

A long list of big-name tech companies have released statistics on the racial and gender makeup of their workforces, including Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google and Microsoft.

Uber isn't on that list. And on Thursday, civil-rights leader Jesse Jackson wrote a letter to Uber CEO Travis Kalanick pushing the ride-hailing company to make its diversity figures public.

"As we enter the new year...we urge Uber to 'lean in' and join the ranks of technology companies that are reporting your diversity and inclusion data," Jackson wrote, referencing the title of Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg's book about women in the workplace.