Uber is innovating in bookkeeping and creative interpretation of regulations, which is not the kind of innovation that benefits the world at large; they're employing marketers and lawyers, not drivers. They just built cute ways to work around the employment, road tax and health insurance costs their competitors pay, turning those costs into their margin. Good point, their competitors had to obey a cap and they didn't, raising the taxi cap by 30% to address demand made a lot of sense.

Some of the excuses are right out of the pimp playbook and deserve ridicule: our drivers are freelancers! no one is paying for a ride, these are voluntary donations! we don't encourage anyone to operate unlicensed taxis, we merely collect a referral fee!