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mitfahrgelegenheit - important free German carsharing service becomes partially paid - role model for CS?
Posted November 13th, 2012 - 5:45 am by from Berlin, Germany (Permalink)
The German car-sharing website www.mitfahrgelegenheit.de (not a non-profit, but catering to people who favour self-organization) is the market leader in car-sharing announcements. Carsharing itself is a paid activity, but posting an add on the internet used to be free.

Lately an optional booking system (for money) was introduced which has two important effects:
1. mitfahrgelegenheit earns 11 % of the cost of the ride
2. there is a record who paid whom what and who traveled when where - interesting data for all kinds of authorities

Since November 5, 2012 this formally optional booking system is compulsory for rides over 600 km (eg Stuttgart-Berlin or Hamburg-Munich).

It is especially hurtful for people who are organizing long-distance rides with shared group tickets for regional trains (the cheapest travel option in Germany apart from hitchhiking).

As the CS act is still for free, there is no danger of CS imposing % fees, but of CS making optional parts of the service for money, and later for money only.

What do you guys think?

Link (in German):
http://www.mitfahrgelegenheit.de/news/viewNews/624



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Posted November 13th, 2012 - 10:01 am by from Banja Luka, Bosnia and Herzegovina (Permalink)
Hi, hmmmm... i was just trying to push for application of the http://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Template:MFG makes me not look good...

But do they also charge through their English site
http://www.carpooling.co.uk/ ?

For now I still find Hamburg-Munich rides which are paid cash, when does this policy change go live?

I guess with CS, there is already a good fork, http://bewelco.me, and the more CC will make this site shitty, the more people will tell each other about the alternative...

For mitfahrgelegenheit, not sure it it makes sense to fork it....

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Posted November 13th, 2012 - 1:15 pm by from Berlin, Germany (Permalink)
After posting I also found still "open" Mitfahrgelegenheiten (lifts) over 600 km. However, it has to mean something that they officially announce the compulsory fee to the users.

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Posted November 13th, 2012 - 2:22 pm from Catania, Italy
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