We are trying something new. Each Saturday, Times technology reporters Farhad Manjoo and Mike Isaac will review the week’s news, offering analysis and maybe even a few jokes about the most important developments in the industry. Subscribe to the Bits daily newsletter»

Farhad: Good morning, Mike! I’ve spent much of the week trying to find a decent bagel here in San Francisco, so I hope you’re having more fun in bagel-blessed New York.

Mike: Hello! I’m excited we’re starting our newsletter. So much so that I skipped the bagel cart in Times Square and treated myself to a sausage breakfast sandwich. We are decadent here.

Farhad: Right. So, let’s talk about tech. We had an unusually full week of news. Amazon surprised investors by making some money, Apple surprised investors by selling a slightly smaller mountain of iPhones than had been expected, and Microsoft, reeling from its troubled purchase of Nokia, reported its largest quarterly loss in history. And Square, the San Francisco-based payments start-up, is said to have confidentially filed for an initial public offering.

But the biggest news involved Uber.

Bill de Blasio, the mayor of New York, had been pushing to impose a cap on the number of for-hire vehicles in the city, like those operated by Uber. The de Blasio administration argued that apps like Uber were leading to traffic congestion. Uber — which opened its wallet on a knockdown political campaign that spanned TV, radio, phone calls, celebrity endorsements and even a “de Blasio” tab in its app — argued that the mayor was in the pocket of the taxi industry, and that the move to curb ride-hailing apps would kill jobs and make life inconvenient for New Yorkers.

Uber’s political maneuvering proved so effective that the mayor suddenly dropped his plan. So, Mike, you cover Uber closely. How big is this win for the company, and does this mean that other cities are powerless to stop it from happening to them?

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Mike: Up until the moment the news broke, everyone I spoke to had expected de Blasio to back the cap, come what may. Those who keep a close eye on the transportation industry ended up being pretty shocked. Also, the news interrupted my lunch, so that was unfortunate.

So here’s the thing: Uber has been engaging in battles like these all over the world, city by city, ever since they got off the ground. They have a similar strike plan: Guerrilla tactics, grass-roots organizing, and email campaigns that rally their supporters to hassle legislators. It’s an established playbook, bolstered by the fact that they now have David Plouffe, former adviser to President Obama, working on strategy.

That is not to downplay what happened here, though. Watching the mayor of New York flinch in the face of a five-year-old start-up is significant. I saw all sort of people on Twitter crying out “who will regulate Uber if not New York City?” Honestly, I don’t really have an answer to that.

Farhad: Sorry to hear about your lunch.

I agree this win is significant. The lesson here is not just that Uber knows how to fight and win but, on a deeper level, that Uber is popular. I think this is a message that many critics of Uber haven’t quite internalized.

Ben Smith of Buzzfeed spoke to one political official in New York who described the fight against Uber as a “boutique side issue” that is important only to “tech people who are reading Mashable.” This fight suggests that view was woefully misguided. By marshaling a constituency of drivers who see Uber as an important source of income, loyal riders who are frustrated by transportation and see Uber as a convenient alternative, and the larger public who finds the taxi industry to be generally unworthy of support, Uber has built lasting political clout that it can bank on to fight the most heavy-handed efforts at regulation.

Mike: Also! Don’t forget that David Plouffe shifted the narrative to this sort of populist argument, saying that the company helps the areas outside Manhattan, and also helps minorities who otherwise can’t hail a cab because of taxi driver discrimination.

Whether or not all of that is true, it seems to have been a brilliant political maneuver. I guess that’s why he makes the big bucks and I’m stuck buying knockoff Egg McMuffins on the street.

Farhad: Can you stop talking about food for a second?

I don’t think the win in New York means that cities have to give up in the face of Uber. The growth of ride-sharing companies bring up lots of important questions about labor, equality, accessibility, traffic management, urban planning and on and on. Rather than try to fight companies like Uber, perhaps cities will need to find a way to work with these companies — accept them, legalize them, and then help manage the problems they raise.

The New York case offers an example. The mayor says he’s worried about congestion. As some people have pointed out, car-sharing companies could become allies in that fight. One idea is to impose a surcharge on for-hire riders (both taxis and Ubers) in congested areas; companies like Uber, which already set their prices dynamically through software, could easily manage these charges through their apps. What’s more, cities could encourage ride-hailing companies to expand their car-pooling services (UberPool and Lyft Line) to encourage more people to get inside each car. There are several other ideas floating out there, too. It’s just not true that ride-hailing services stand in opposition to urban planning goals; in many cases, if cities work with them, they could advance urban planning together.

Mike: I feel like compromise is the end game here, as these companies don’t seem to be going away any time soon. Or not Uber, at least.

O.K., that was fun. Sort of. Till next week, then?

Farhad: Sure, talk to you then. Next time, eat a better breakfast first.