I'm talking about the "it's better to force forgiveness than ask for permission" part, and they weren't in grey area - in a lot of places, they were doing plainly illegal business. I'm talking about their business model of "let's do illegal business and use deep pockets to keep regulators at bay, until we get enough public support to make ourselves invulnerable". Also known as totally unfair competition. I'm also talking about insurance and worker rights shenanigans, and a host of other sociopathic behaviors their management exhibited (all reported on in detail over the past years).

On top of that, cabs were awful in some cities in some places around the world. They worked well enough in others. Over here (Kraków area, Poland), we had private point-to-point transport companies that managed to change the law through a proper court process, like civilized people do.