I agree, ride sharing with self driving cars is going to be pretty normal in the near future.
What will be cool is once they are self driving, they will be able to auto calculate quickest routes to pick people up, drop off, etc while being able to re-calculate to pick up people along the way.
I didn't really read it that way. I read it more like treat people with respect, don't force them to create work that is a nice or should when they should be relaxing... but people who love their job will be happy to go the extra mile, work weekends, etc when there are Must or Mission Critical things that need to get done.
In this situation, It sounds like he got more out of life by following his original goal of hanging out with his family since they all die in the end anyways.
Agreed to mailing list... but "oh well" is what I say to that. If it's easy to implement then great, but there is a cost to him for even 1 of your customers.
I would focus on the businesses that can pay $20/month (even for 1 month) to test something to see if it's for them than worry about someone who may need it in 4-6 months down the road, if there product doesn't go under before they "roll out major client work".
I am not trying to sound harsh but my guess is his money and time is better spent acquiring users who can pay $20 from the start. It's just basic marketing: How much would this cost to acquire a customer from. If he pays the girl $30 an hour to call delinquent accounts and she can call 10 an hour then that's a cost of $3 per delinquent customer of yours that it costs him and you are asking for a free tier that is incredibly low of ONLY 10 customers which actually = $30 of free value he is giving away. My guess is a Google Adwords campaign could get him paying users for less than that easily.
It's just not worth it to go after customers like you... yet..is my guess and I have been in his shoes... the people wanting free shit scream the loudest but bring in the least value.
I am sure this is what you are already thinking, but I wouldn't spend to much worrying about a free plan.
We made this mistake on our last startup, we got a ton of feedback saying, oh it's too expensive, I'd never use it.. make something cheaper/free.
The truth is... until those businesses are making more money that justifies $20 a month, you probably don't want them as customers... they will take up a TON of time, with adding little to no value and will have no problem jumping ship when you say, hey, you reached the size you said you were interested in paying $20 and we would like you to upgrade.
People want the world... focus on customers that find $20/month to be a huge value to them.
Oh come on. I can think of a hundred applications Facebook could use the technology for and I am not a smart man. Just because Facebook does a few things well doesn't mean they can't... you know... grow and adapt with new technology. Facebook as a whole is probably a lot smarter than you and wouldn't spend 2 billion dollars on something without a "clear" route.
I get the same feeling, especially because I know someone working on this and has a small working model already.
Here are a few ideas that could make this work easily. Self driving vans via google plus drones in the back that fly out when they pass the delivery location with the package delivers it and returns to the truck. That is a great starting point and then when drones become better, longer lasting, you start sending them from UPS delivery locations at airports.
This is like that Article about how Amazon is a dumb idea from the 90's. So narrow minded.
Yup, it wasn't as much, but I magically had 10k show up after I made a deposit through a bank teller that stayed there for 2 weeks before finally disappearing.
What will be cool is once they are self driving, they will be able to auto calculate quickest routes to pick people up, drop off, etc while being able to re-calculate to pick up people along the way.