In response to the city of Portsmouth, New Hampshire passing an ordinance effectively restricting ridesharing services from operating in the city, Uber driver and Bitcoin entrepreneur Christopher David started the Free Uber campaign. He has since led an activism effort to legalize ridesharing inspired by the swarm organizational model outlined in Swarmwise by Rick Falkvinge, founder of the first Pirate Party in Sweden .
We reached out to Christopher David to talk about his Free Uber activism campaign:
CoinTelegraph: Ok, so for the uninformed, what is Free Uber?
Christopher David: Free Uber is a grassroots campaign to defend ride-sharing against bureaucrats and red tape. We’ve been focused primarily on Portsmouth, New Hampshire, where a new transportation ordinance has created a turf war between taxi drivers and Uber drivers who are now operating illegally because of the ordinance. Free Uber is an effort to organize drivers and supporters to overturn the law and safeguard consumer choice. We believe adults should be able to make their own transportation decisions without outside interference.
CT: How have you gone about spreading this message?
CD: Mainly through a combination of distributing flyers around downtown Portsmouth and building up our Facebook page, with a little bit of paid advertising. Our flyer campaigns definitely had the biggest impact. On the day after one of our 10-person flyer distribution events, we’d hear reports of conversations about Uber breaking out in coffee shops and sidewalks all over the city. We thoroughly saturated the town and got everyone talking, to the point that city officials would complain about our flyers during their council meetings and in the newspaper. We definitely got our message out.
CT: How is this whole operation funded?
CD: As an independent entity with no legal structure or bank account, crowdfunding in bitcoinCT r: […]
