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Welcome To the 'Sharing Economy'
An anonymous reader writes "Thomas Friedman writes in the NY Times about the economy that's grown around Airbnb, a company built on helping people rent out their unused rooms to other users. He writes, 'Airbnb has also spawned its own ecosystem — ordinary people who will now come clean your home, coordinate key exchanges, cook dinner for you and your guests, photograph rooms for rent, and through the ride-sharing business Lyft, turn their cars into taxis to drive you around. "It used to be that corporations and brands had all the trust," added [CEO Brian Chesky], but now a total stranger, "can be trusted like a company and provide the services of a company. And once you unlock that idea, it is so much bigger than homes. ... There is a whole generation of people that don't want everything mass produced. They want things that are unique and personal."' Friedman refers to this as the 'sharing economy,' but a 'trust economy' seems more apt. He points this out himself: 'Afterward, guests and hosts rate each other online, so there is a huge incentive to deliver a good experience because a series of bad reputational reviews and you're done. Airbnb also automatically provides $1 million in insurance against damage or theft to nearly all of its hosts (some countries have restrictions) and only rarely gets claims. This framework of trust has unlocked huge value from unused bedrooms.'"
sounds neat, but I wonder if its gonna last...
corporations will finnd a way to get rid of them, or the system will itself sink in a swamp of administration
Garden sharing is another great thing. I wish something like this existed here. See http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2011/sep/02/garden-sharing-growing-vegetables. And here is a TEDx talk about this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ya6zndBObHY
The Locust Economy
Uh, this would be interesting if they'd linked to an article on the sharing economy, instead we were linked to a single page advertisement in the form of a NYTimes article.
Anyone care to link to a real article with a little more breadth?
moox. for a new generation.
Trust is nice, and touchy-feely and new-world 'n' all. Though indemnity is better - but it costs.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
Anyone care to link to a real article with a little more breadth?
Depth? Thomas Friedman?
Watch this Heartland Institute video
One purpose of airbnb is to find sex partners. You are kind of travelling and fucking as you go.
Just ask people who are heavy users. The couch gets used for other things thamn sleeping.
That's the payment right there, not exactly sharing.
That's actually a really good idea.
CEO Brian Chesky may be tapping into widespread anti-corporate sentiment, or he may really believe in the universality of the the concept of trust. Either way, I hope his company flourishes.
the idea is dead on arrival in my country (Finland) due to the amount of paperwork one would be legally obliged to do and the fact that "obviously" you need to pay taxes on all of this.
Someone actually reads Thomas Friedman as not satire? I thought the NYT just put him in for comic relief.
Proof that no matter how wrong you are about basically everything, no one will ever call you out if you stay on message.
Honestly, this guy is a complete fucking idiot, and a kept man married to an exceedingly wealthy wife. He has a history of idiotic pronouncements and bizarre triumphalist declarations that only resonate with those with no connection to reality.
early on, we teach children to share. sharing does not mean, "yeah, you can have the ball but it's going to cost you" which is _exactly_ what this is. this is renting. it's even been made this into a business and they call these "sharing" places, hotels and motels.
sharing is communism. your children are communists.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
You are right! The children *are* communists. Which is why no child likes to share his toys. (at least boys, dunno about girls).
Try the Paul Krugman NYT articles, although they're more height than breadth, as in: High Times at the New York Times!
Isn't this like unreported employment, where workers have no rights and the state gets nothing (for maintaining the infrastructures used). I know /. is US-centric and my little European country seems communist to most of you (I'm from France). But seriously unreported employment is a bad idea, although it might look better than unenployment. Firstly, it's a downhill to slavery, like the world was before the introduction of labour laws. And secondly, it's not sharing at all because there is no collectivity in such shemes. It's everyone is on its own without any place for a collective structure, which is obviously not the way humankind has eveloved for the last couple of thousands of years.
These deregulated systems are utopias that only work if people are equally smart and potent, which will definitely never be the case.
Video of some good progressive thrash music
http://s7.postimg.org/rqohe22ix/the_nyt_experience.png
As an analogy to paywall, I coin this privacywall.
Please stop using this stupid buzz word/phrase "Sharing Economy" because it is NOT sharing.
Sharing is when you give something to someone else for free.
This concept, or people leasing/renting short terms places in their house for money is simply that: ad-hoc amateur renting.
Most rental contracts I've seen specifically prevent you from sub-letting your apartment. Minor detail.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
It's a whole generation of people with no fucking job living in the same room.
The reason is because our government is forcing us to compete with manipulated currencies and our "employers" are lying cunts.
What a preposterous idea you have there. How will all the business insurance companies and lawyers make their living if we just go on dealing with losses that we can easily overcome?
I was promised a flying car. Where is my flying car?
If you own the property, it's usually not illegal. Mind you, a lot of cities are now in process or have already banned airbnb and similar services. They don't want residential areas become tourist infested, or they want to be able to tax the hell out of people making money with their properties.
I was promised a flying car. Where is my flying car?
We had something like this in the 1800's and earlier
Corporations won because they offer a consistent experience. I rent a home on airbnb in Orlando I have no idea what I'll get. I've read of horror stories of people renting out their homes to multiple guests at once. With Disney resorts I know what I get.
Ride sharing is too expensive unless done very rarely. Might as well buy a car.
The brands and corporations won almost 100 years ago because they give people a consistent experience and are somewhat helpful if there is a problem.
A lot of these kind of services are successful because people tend to stay under the radar of tax collecting agencies. Once the gubbament starts figuring out how to tax all this, most of these sort of initiatives die because it's no longer economically viable to a lot of the people offering services. The side effect is that often, because people have to make it their official business, they will need to get mandatory permits, licenses, diploma's and insurance as well. These and taxing often kill informal "small businesses" and kill the economy. We need a side economy, or a "liberal enough" legislation to allow initiatives like these to foster. Unfortunately, with the current fear and economic crisis, it's going to be hard to keep that from happening.
I was promised a flying car. Where is my flying car?
Spam, harassing phone calls to sell their services. Yep, great non-corporate service. Please.
Come on Friedmann, key parties aren't new, they've been around since the 70s!
Monstar L
" "It used to be that corporations and brands had all the trust," added [CEO Brian Chesky], but now a total stranger, "can be trusted like a company and provide the services of a company."
--
And the government too, d'uh!
16. Yea, I hated all my labour which I had taken under the sun: because I should leave it unto the man that shall be after me.
17. And who knoweth whether he shall be a wise man or a fool? yet shall he have rule over all my labour wherein I have laboured, and wherein I have shewed myself wise under the sun. This is also vanity.
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
I'm from Europe, and France looks communist from here too.
I am not an economist myself but I think the big news would be if one day people woke up to the real impact of easy credit to their lives. The crisis of 2008 should have already served as an important tale of the damage credit can do. But the pattern appears to be repeating itself. Most people still rely heavily on credit and credit ends up accounting for a good chunck of the economic activity in a country. Here in Canada, the average amount of consumer debt has already surpassed the level the USA recorded just before the crisis.
When you hear someone say that a country has grown 'x' percent per year, you would have to understand how much of that is due to credit expansion because the reality is: Unless each one of those activities financed with credit derives a profit, there will be eventually a contraction. This is obvious. Nobody gives money away in the form of credit unless they can make money out of it.
Easy credit is touted as an equalitarian force that allows the middle class to move upward and dream big. That half a million dollars house in the school district you dreamed of is now accessible to you. That's non-sense. The only reason why that house costs half a millions dollars to being with is because people who cannot afford it can get a loan to buy it. If we were all credit averse, these prices would go down substantially.
and they change taxi like rates any ways.
insurance / liability is a big one do you want be in an accident be in your car, in an lyft car, a pedestrian, and so one. So while you are in the hospital with billes racking up as the all of insurances are fighting over who has liability?
Some of the same stuff can come up with pizza drivers who auto insurance likely does not cover pizza delivery and you can be in a place where the drivers insurance says we don't cover that and your own insurance says why should we pay when you are not at fault.
Who cares what Thomas Friedman says, anyway? I read one of his books, and it was mostly name-dropping about all the famous people he knows. Apparently meeting Heidi Whoever from the Weather Channel was the peak experience in his life.
The hotel industry exudes waste. Rooms constructed for the sole purpose of hosting strangers, suffer from 66% occupancy rates, despite huge capital investment. Fully one-third of hotel rooms lie fallow, incapable of monetization. Marriott’s tens of thousands of individual shareholders, often capable of hosting guests themselves, lack the necessary infrastructure. Platforms like Airbnb provide that infrastructure. Shareholders can now rent direct and avoid corporate waste, both capital and operating.
If there is no contract, then there is no warranty of any sort nor any guarantee that the work done will conform to what was desired. Which means that you'd have to be extremely naive to use this sort of service as you could end up in serious trouble.
If there is a contract, then there is nothing special about this. It's just regular work.
Putting your apartment on AirBnB can net you a $40,000 fine. Say "thank you" to the hotel companies.
The military is hoping on board this trend, and relatives of generals are building their own trebuchets.
Table-ized A.I.
First good laugh since I arose yesterday morning - I thank you.
I loved it for Zagreb. Had the best flat & owners I'd ever met. Guy even got me a prepaid phone to use while I over there so I could txt/call friends and buy tram tickets. Was super clean, had washer and balcony with rack for drying. Very near to Upper City and main train station. 6 nights for 400 bucks for whole apartment. Will go back, will stay at same place.
London was ok, but far cheaper than hotel. And by far cheaper, I mean *FAR FAR* cheaper.
Anyways, if you do your homework, airbnb isn't a bad thing at all. Helps a lot to know the area and ask plenty of questions of your hosts before you go.