This could be smoothed with some thoughtful UI design though.
Drivers could set their preferred areas and rates beforehand, creating an inventory of drivers.
For riders asking for a ride to a destination, they'd get a slider that has a preset 'Uber suggested fare,' based on their driver inventory. One could slide it up or down and see the wait time for a pick up and car quality change.
They can just hide it behind a non obvious ui and create it for compliance purposes. Effectively it will be the same since very few passengers or drivers will use it.
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In principle that sounds great. In reality, that introduces more steps as each price offer and counter offer produces a time delay and makes me think.
Right now the app follows KISS (keep it simple stupid) and "don't make me think" principles.
A free market price negotiation would introduce a lot more complexity.
One way I could see this working is if driver's set their own rate (per minute or per mile) and riders can accept or reject that rate.
This could be smoothed with some thoughtful UI design though.
Drivers could set their preferred areas and rates beforehand, creating an inventory of drivers.
For riders asking for a ride to a destination, they'd get a slider that has a preset 'Uber suggested fare,' based on their driver inventory. One could slide it up or down and see the wait time for a pick up and car quality change.
They can just hide it behind a non obvious ui and create it for compliance purposes. Effectively it will be the same since very few passengers or drivers will use it.