Table of Contents

Introduction: Using an App to Go to Work—Uber as a Symbol of the New Economy

1. Driving as Glamorous Labor: How Uber Uses the Myths of the Sharing Economy

2. Motivations to Drive: How Uber’s System Rewards Full-Time and Recreational Drivers Differently

3. The Technology Pitch: How Uber Creates Entrepreneurship for the Masses

4. The Shady Middleman: How Uber Manages Money

5. Behind the Curtain: How Uber Manages Drivers with Algorithms

6. In the Big Leagues: How Uber Plays Ball

Conclusion: The New Age of Uber—How Technology Consumption Rewrote the Rules of Work

Appendix 1. Methodology: How I Studied Uber

Appendix 2. Ridehailing beyond Uber: Meet Lyft, the Younger Twin

Notes

Index

About the Author

Alex Rosenblat is a technology ethnographer. A researcher at the Data & Society Research Institute, she holds an MA in sociology from Queen’s University and a BA in history from McGill University. Rosenblat’s writing has appeared in media outlets such as the New York Times, Harvard Business Review, the Atlantic, Slate, and Fast Company. Her research has received attention worldwide and has been covered in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, MIT Technology Review, WIRED, New Scientist, and the Guardian. Many scholarly and professional publications have also published her prizewinning work, including the International Journal of Communication and the Columbia Law Review.

Reviews

“A timely, accessible analysis of a Silicon Valley innovator that disrupted an industry.”
*GeekWire*

“This jargon-free and intriguing exposé offers food for thought for anyone interested in worker protections or societal changes driven by technology.”
*Publishers Weekly*

"Functions as an examination of both how Uber’s algorithms are changing the way companies operate and exert control over their workers and how those workers are experiencing these changes.”
*Slate*

"A timely look at the tensions between technology and the future of employment, and how ambitious startups might be changing the way we see and value work.”
*Mother Jones*

“If you care about the future of work, read Uberland by Alex Rosenblat.”
*Theodore Kinni, Strategy + Business*

“Rosenblat’s book is a combination of sociological analysis, excerpts from Uber-driver online forums, communications with Uber executives and employees, and an avalanche of in-person interviews with drivers from all over the United States and Canada. Her analysis isn’t a polemic; it is balanced and measured.”
*Los Angeles Review of Books*

“A fine work of technology ethnography. . . As someone who believes that technology is a positive force for driving change, I’ll admit to being deeply disturbed by reading Uberland."
*Inside Higher Education*

"The most important recent book written about Uber is undoubtedly Alex Rosenblat’s Uberland: How Algorithms Are Rewriting the Rules of Work, which unflinchingly exposes how Uber takes ruthless advantage of its drivers.”
*Medium/The Startup*

"Uberland will be of interest for anyone who cares about the future of work, the realities of working in the ‘gig’ economy and the consequences of decoupling work from existing employment relations systems."
*Journal of Industrial Relations*

"The book paints a complicated picture of the uneven realities of the gig economy set against the glossy sales pitch of Uber as the future of work."
*Allegra Lab*

"Uberland is a timely book as technology increasingly intensifies in our daily lives. It reads like book‐length investigative journalism, refreshingly jargon‐free. It stays truthful to the stories that drivers tell and is readable and engaging. It is suitable for undergraduate classes in sociology of work; science, technology, and society; and consumption."
*Sociological Forum*