Having had time to mull this over, I was not vitriolic enough. Disruption of sclerotic industries is a Good Thing. VoIP has destroyed the International call market and brought innovation to an industry that was impressed by Caller ID.
But if one company achieved success in the VoIP market over its competitors by dishonest, underhand or fraudulent means then they should be punished - enough to end the moral hazard.
This is why Über and the like are facing opposition from disinterested parties - because "disruption" of an industry by new technologies is a Schumpter style positive - but it is not a Cloak of Immunity for any particular company engaged in that disruption. We do not have a good track record in this - and that matters.
I'm not so sure. Where does one draw the line? A quiet restaurant fills its window seats first to make it look busy. New businesses give out their invoices starting from strange numbers such as 26792 rather than 1 to make things look better. I'm handed 2 for 1 vouchers by shops and food places to make them busier. Amazon sells (sold?) books at a loss to drive others out of business (a technique used countless times in the non-internet. There is a line there somewhere, but I'm not sure where it is. Obviously fraud and dishonesty is not ok, and most my examples I am fine with. However I'm sure that different people have different boundaries.
Elon Musk on Erick Jackson (author of Paypal Wars quoted in article):
"The only negativity in recent years was due to a book called The PayPal Wars, written by a sycophantic jackass called Eric Jackson. This guy was one notch above an intern at PayPal in the first few years of the company, but gives the impression he was a key player and privy to all the high level discussions. Eric couldn't find a real publisher, so Peter funded Eric to self-publish the book. Since Eric worships Peter, the outcome was obvious - Peter sounds like Mel Gibson in Braveheart and my role is somewhere between negligible and a bad seed. However, to his credit, Peter didn't realize the book would be as bad as it was and apologized to me personally at a Room 9 board meeting at David Sacks's home in LA."
In the case of the restaurant, they're not making up fake customers to fill out the other empty seats. The people who are in there are genuine diners. Invoice numbering is completely arbitrary, but the preceding invoices before the start do not exist. With two-for-one vouchers, the businesses take a hit in the profits; they are giving up something to bring in that extra business.
But online businesses and services are astroturfing and no one calls them on it. They're not giving up something to create business. They're not "filling the window seats". They're committing fraud and they know it.
But if one company achieved success in the VoIP market over its competitors by dishonest, underhand or fraudulent means then they should be punished - enough to end the moral hazard.
This is why Über and the like are facing opposition from disinterested parties - because "disruption" of an industry by new technologies is a Schumpter style positive - but it is not a Cloak of Immunity for any particular company engaged in that disruption. We do not have a good track record in this - and that matters.