A few savvy New Yorkers have figured out how to game a Citi Bike program that rewards members who help move bikes to locations with low inventory—to the tune of thousands of dollars every month. While the side hustle requires a lot of time, coordination, and exercise to earn that kind of cash, the New York Times poses a bigger question around the ethics of the practice. The scheme involves exploiting an algorithm that Citi Bike uses to reward people who move bikes from full stations to empty ones, especially at peak periods. Riders called flippers line up with the app in hand to fill up and empty stations close by, racking up "points" (which can be exchanged for cash) in bursts. The most proficient earn $6,000 a month.
"I'm probably a vulture in some people's eyes," flipper and actor Mark Epperson tells the Times. "And I guess that's fair." Critics—see this Reddit message board—say these so-called "Bike Angels" hurt actual users of the program because stations get artificially emptied and filled as a way to benefit from the reward system rather than as a reflection of real-world conditions. They compare them to parasites, cheaters, and real-life bots. The Times brought in the big guns to weigh in on the ethics of the flippers, and University of Oxford philosopher Brent Mittelstadt takes their side. "There has been a subtle but very significant shift in power in favor of the tech companies," he says. That a few hustlers found a way to exploit the system in a relatively harmless way "makes me smile." (Read the full story.)
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uBlock 
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Ghostery 
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