God View

This has been such a bad media week for Uber that I wouldn’t be surprised if they hired Bill Cosby to handle press relations. News that one of the company’s top executives floated the idea of digging up dirt on journalists who criticized the company caused an Internet uproar and the resurgence of the one word no one at Uber wanted to hear you scream: “Taxi.” In the NYT Farhad Manjoo writes of a company that is moving so fast, it might miss a turn.

+ In USA Today, Michael Wolff wonders if this was just an off-handed remark made by someone who thought the conversation was off the record. (Pro Tip: Threats to journalists are never “off the record.”) If it was just a random comment, then why did Uber employees warn another reporter that execs might snoop on her?

+ This is not Uber’s first rodeo. Bloomberg’s Emily Greenhouse wonders if Uber is too disruptive to fail. (I employed the same strategy in elementary school.)

+ In review, this is a story about tech companies, bro culture, the modern press, viral Internet stories, media, politics and big money. But mostly, it’s a story about your privacy. Uber threatened to track journalists because they can track journalists using an internal tool they call God View.

+ Think you can beat the system by walking instead of taking a ride? Sorry, Fitbit data is now being used in the courtroom.