Thefts puncture Paris bike scheme

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7881079.stm

by nickb • 17 years ago

27 38 17 years ago

news.bbc.co.uk

jacquesm3• 17 years ago

One more piece of evidence that it only takes a very small percentage of jerks to screw it up for the rest of us...

The same goes for the internet, nowadays if you design anything at all that has an end-user component you'll spend at least as much time at making it jerk-proof and doing all kinds of abuse analysis as you spend on doing features.

jackowayed4• 17 years ago

yeah, it sucks.

Like I think Twitter says they have <30 people, and 2 of them are dedicated just to handling spam accounts. That's ridiculous.

Think of the features it could have if those 2 extra people were actually getting stuff done.

gravitycop5• 17 years ago

nowadays if you design anything at all that has an end-user component you'll spend at least as much time at making it jerk-proof and doing all kinds of abuse analysis

http://www.google.com/search?q=%22always+blames+his+tools%22

Echoes of Kozmo: http://money.cnn.com/2005/09/14/technology/kozmo_redux

No more 50-cent deliveries [...]

Customers of Kozmo.com who fondly remember getting single pints of ice cream delivered on a whim won't get off that easy this time. MaxDelivery has a $10 minimum order, and there's a $4.95 delivery charge for orders under $50. Siragusa said this is to keep customers from abusing the system, as they did with Kozmo, and he says MaxDelivery's average order size is much different than Kozmo's.

"Someone ordered a pack of Mentos. Then two hours later they'd order a pint of ice cream," said Siragusa. "People did this because there was no penalty. Kozmo had a number of orders that were unprofitable."

Kozmo's founders designed its system to reward customers for making frequent low-value orders. When the customer base responded in a way that should have been predicted by the Kozmo founders, instead of recognizing and fixing their error, those founders instead called it "abuse".

RiderOfGiraffes7• 17 years ago

I'm perplexed by your implied comment that having to spend time making your product jerk-proof and performing abuse analysis is only done by poor workmen.

It seems to me that work must be done to create value, and work must be done to make the system idiot proof (despite the continuing ingenuity of idiots), and this is true regardless of the talent and abilities of those producing the service or product.

sounddust4• 17 years ago

True, but I think the bike theft issue is a much more easily solved problem than keeping jerks off the internet. If they could just cut the thefts in half, they'd be making a profit again. That could likely be accomplished with a minimal amount of clever thinking regarding security.

jackowayed4• 17 years ago

They should figure out a way where you rent them with a credit card, and if you don't return it and scan your credit card getting credit for returning it, they charge you to replace it.

They could still get damaged and returned as such, but at least they couldn't get completely stolen, which is the most valuable thing for criminals to do since that actually gets them money.

enqk2• 17 years ago

Here's the thing I don't understand. You cannot rent the bike unless you use a debit card (credit cards are very rare in france) or a monthly/yearly metro subscription. So they actually must know who rented the bike when it disappeared.

jackowayed4• 17 years ago

oh, that's weird. You'd think they'd just charge them for it then.

Also,

>credit cards are very rare in france

You mean you guys don't generally allow yourselves to get deep into debt at absurd interest rates? I can't imagine living in a country like that!

Next you're going to tell me that when you have

colins_pride• 17 years ago

If you can figure out how to trick the system, you get unlimited access to $500 bikes.

That's a much better incentive than the guy who built the system had.

mgornick• 17 years ago

Agreed. If the bike doesn't get returned, simply charge the account for the cost of a new bike.

It would also be helpful (and maybe costly) to implement some RFID solution to keep track of the unique bikes and the user pairs. If a bike is damaged, the rider can fill out a form online and the company can charge-back the previous user if its not standard wear and tear. This would cut down on the vandalism of the bikes.

mattmcknight• 17 years ago

And the pedals could power the transmitter. It could work on a dual RFID solution, one in the bike, one in your rental card. Riding the bike without a renters card could then trigger the giant sky magnet to aim at that bike and suck up the thief.

"The Bicycle Thief 2: Paris" coming to theaters next year? [ http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19... ]

sounddust4• 17 years ago

That's exactly how it works (well, you can use a debit or credit card) and in fact, if you're not a subscriber, a hold of 150€ is placed on your card until you return the bike.

But I think they have to put an artifically low hold of 150€ on the bike (instead of the real cost of 400€) because far fewer could and/or would use it if that much money was held.

A lot of the bikes are stolen from people who rented them (and in this case, maybe the person doesn't have to pay the 150€ if he/she can prove it?). Some are stolen from the trucks that are used to regularly transfer bikes across the city to even the distribution. Some people figured out how to hack the kiosk to give them multiple bikes for one payment (that has since been patched). Also, people can of course get them with stolen credit cards and by breaking the lock. You can see how the thefts can add up.

I don't think the system is doomed though because people in Paris absolutley love the Velibs and want them to stay. I'm sure that they'll figure something out, whether it's higher rental costs, extra security or something else.

RiderOfGiraffes7• 17 years ago

This has similarities with the Prisoners' Dilemma:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prisoner's_dilemma

Although we'd all be better off if we all cooperated, there will always be those who take their personal advantage and screw everyone else.

It's too easy to label them as sociopaths, and in some sense they are, but game theory ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_theory ) predicts this behaviour.

It sucks, but you won't change it.

This also has consequences for social networks, such as Hacker News. It's OK when everyone shares a common purpose and common interests, but get enough newbies and the culture won't propagate.

The various car share schemes that require significant buy-in and have penalties for non-compliance and that shifts the game theory into a configuration that works. Maybe something similar will eventually be required for social networks too.

gcheong• 17 years ago

I was thinking that this fits more along the lines of tragedy of the commons.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons

ovi256• 17 years ago

Isn't Tragedy of the commons a variant of the prisoner's dilemma ? It has a high number of prisoners, but the payoff matrix is the same. Similar to an arms race too.

RiderOfGiraffes7• 17 years ago

Sorry, I should've been clearer. Yes, this is what's commonly known as the tragedy of the commons, but that is more-or-less a (large) multiple-player version of the Prisoners' Dilemma, which is easier to analyse and harder to condemn. There are differences, but the underlying principle is similar enough.

Too often these days people simply say "Tragedy of the Commons", wring their hands, and say that people are idiots. I was trying to make it clearer that game theory really does predict this behavior, that it's not irrational, that it is to be expected, and you have to change the rules to change the behavior.

Exactly how to change the rules is left as an exercise for the interested reader.

AlfaWolph• 17 years ago

Would something so simple as making a deposit that is released upon return not help?

ionfish• 17 years ago

The other side of the story: http://www.streetsblog.org/2009/02/12/reports-of-velibs-demi...

zupatol• 17 years ago

To sum it up: the bike system is operated by an advertiser, who is now using negative PR to strenghten his position in negociations with the city of Paris.

Why on earth is an advertiser operating bikes?

The city of Paris lets him use its outdoor displays for free. It seems the only advantage for the mayor is that he can claim the bike system works at no cost. This is probably the reason why he lets the advertiser keep secret the amount of his revenues from the displays. That barely honest financing scheme looks like the main problem.

wingo• 17 years ago

Agreed. Here in Barcelona we have the ignomious fate of Bicing (bicing.com) being run by /ClearChannel/, of all organizations. Jeez.

sounddust4• 17 years ago

Because it works (despite the advertiser's whining), and provides a service that otherwise wouldn't exist.

It's funny; I've lived in both Paris and Seattle, two cities which have the expensive and difficult-to-maintain electronic public toilets which automatically clean themselves after every use. The ones in Paris are run by JCDecaux (same company who is doing the bike rentals), and although they are dreadful to use, they work (and have worked) for years.

In Seattle, the city was approached by JCDecaux to build public toilets in exchange for putting advertising near them, but were refused. Seattle decided instead to use millions of taxpayer dollars to form their own ad-free version. The toilets rarely worked (and in any case were constantly occupied by crackheads). 2 or 3 years later, the city cut their losses and unsuccessfully tried to sell the toilets on eBay.

natrius• 17 years ago

JCDecaux's losses from theft are explicitly limited by their contract with Paris, so their sudden change of heart is probably more of a PR move to aid in contract negotiations than a true sign of the viability of bike sharing schemes.

http://www.streetsblog.org/2009/02/12/reports-of-velibs-demi...

Maybe one day, the peninsula will have a quality bike sharing network to help solve Caltrain's last mile problem. One day...

sam_in_nyc• 17 years ago

Why are they calling this bike rental company a "scheme"?

gravitycop5• 17 years ago

The company is not what is being called a scheme. What the company was being employed by the city of Paris to execute is being called a scheme:

Championed by Paris Mayor Bertrand Delanoe, the bikes were part of an attempt to "green" the capital. [...]

The original contract gave the advertising company a 10-year licence to exploit 1,600 city-wide billboards in return for running the scheme [...]

The scheme was modelled on one in Lyon [...]

It is also being copied overseas with London, San Francisco and Singapore all intending to set up similar schemes.

jgrahamc• 17 years ago

Toulouse has a similar scheme... it's not the bikes that seemed to get stolen, it's the shopping baskets on the front that either get unscrewed or simply cut off.

Thefts puncture Paris bike scheme

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