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Airbnb Has Sued Its Hometown Of San Francisco (cnn.com)
Robert Mclean, reporting for CNN:Airbnb is taking its hometown to federal court. The company has filed a lawsuit against the city of San Francisco, objecting to short-term rental rule changes approved by its Board of Supervisors. A new ordinance set to take effect in late July would require all Airbnb hosts to register with the city. If they do not, Airbnb would be fined up to $1,000 a day for each listing, putting the burden on the company to make sure each listing is legal. But the city's $50 registration process is analog enough to turn off many hosts. It can't be completed online and requires submitting all the documents in person. Airbnb contends the new rule violates the Communications Decency Act, Stored Communications Act and the First Amendment.
Compliance with local regulations is the bread and butter of running an actual business. Airbnb must adapt its business model otherwise they are simply externalizing the costs associated with fraud after they neglect due diligence in verifying the legality of their listings. Inevitably this is more about publicizing that SF relies on a paper process, but the paper process has several advantages in terms of forcing residents to be local in order to rent out their property without actually rezoning it as a hotel or rental property and paying appropriate fees to account for increased traffic and sewage volume, etc.
A nice to place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there kind of place.
How about instead, San Francisco politicians pay a $50 registration fee which includes an IQ and ethics test?
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
They destroy our jobs, and obama is just doing nothing.
What jobs are being destroyed in San Francisco?
What makes you think it's Obama's responsibility for anything that happens in San Francisco?
If you like large cities, you would like San Francisco. If you do not like large cities, you probably would not like San Francisco. There are very few problems unique to the city.
The Daddy casts sleep on the Baby. The Baby resists!
What if the City of San Francisco required renters to also register their social media accounts with the City Hall — a government's attempt we roundly condemned just yesterday?
How is this requirement to register different in principle? There being a $50 registration fee makes it worse, not better...
Wow, that's an idea... How about a /. rule forcing anonymous cowards to submit their drivel on paper as well? To discourage control-freaks from living?
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Funny, how a registration requirement is Ok with people sometimes, whereas at other times it is an intolerable "invasion of privacy". Papers, please...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Keep this in mind:
There is so much wealth/money in SF its a joke.
We play the game with the bravery of being out of range
Sack up and deal with it Airbnb
So a company should comply with any regulation at all without complaint?
That other companies should be able to impose regulations in order to capture the industry by excluding any possible competition?
My take on it - any proposed regulation should identify a problem or opportunity*. There should be fairly solid numbers on the problem - IE X amount of criminal calls, complaints, accidents, and such per year. The regulation should identify how much it's expected to cost. There should be a metric to identify whether the regulation is fulfilling it's purpose adequately.
If the regulation turns out to be more expensive than anticipated or doesn't solve the problem in line with it's costs, it should be eliminated.
*And no, 'government makes more money' isn't an opportunity.
I don't read AC A human right
AirBnB should set up an online site to allow its members to perform the registration process, and once a week prints off the forms and sends them to City Hall with a check
Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
Karma: Chameleon
Some good reasons I can think of off the top of my head:
I'm sure there are more, but I only had a few moments to consider it. Conversely, the $50, and fill out a form seem like remarkably low burdens to impose. I mean, "I'm suing because this form isn't online" is pretty stupid.
Your ad here. Ask me how!
Well, it has the highest property crime rate in the US.
"If there was a gay Afro-Puertorican Linux distribution, I'd give it a try" ~lucm
Seriously? The Communications Decency Act? How the fuck does registering/taxing hotel rooms violate the Communications Decency Act?
Dear Airbnb: Hotels are regulated for very good reasons. Please fuck off now.
<troll>Watch this episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine for an accurate portrayal of present-day San Francisco.</troll>
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
No citation for some reason... Maybe, because it is simply not true?
Stay in a hotel. Or start your own company — and see, if you can win the business of the people like yourself from AirBNB.
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
I think the SCOTUS BS undue burden ruling on abortion yesterday should be taken and run with. I think any regulation where the state does not have solid evidence is effective at addressing an explicitly stated objective which restricts someones rights in anyway ( In this case AirBnb's right to advertise rent able units ) should be automatically considered unconstitutional.
Lets exploit this shabby reasoning to its max.
Nice thought, but we both know such interpretational standards will only be selectively applied where it favors TPTB's agendas and goals, and deliberately not where it favors those opposing the agendas and goals of TPTB.
Law for thee but not for me. The Rule of Law is dead in the US. Sadly, the US has become no better in that respect than some totalitarian banana republic.
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
SF is truly one of the great shitholes of the world.
The city of San Francisco receives federal funds (for something or another, I assure you).
Trump?
Actually, if don't want to relieve yourself on the sidewalk, San Francisco has open-air urinals now... Please keep up with the times ;^p
We have people charging an entire months rent of their entire just for a room
Why exactly should someone not be allowed to rent out a room?
If you like large cities, you would like San Francisco. If you do not like large cities, you probably would not like San Francisco. There are very few problems unique to the city.
Extreme housing prices inside the city without a large network of cheaper suburbs within an hour commute is the main problem San Francisco has, that is probably only shared by New York city and maybe Los Angeles. And after visiting many times for work and for vacations attached to work trips, San Francisco doesn't have the same kind of entertainment / culture and food options you get from a city like New York to make the COL worth it.
I live in the Chicago suburbs, and areas such as the northwest suburbs (where I live) provide great public schools, low crime, a 3000 sq ft home for around $400k, and about an hour commute to downtown. If you are okay with just decent schools, you can get the same but for only $300k. And Chicago is still among the largest and most expensive cities in the country.
Perhaps I'm wrong, but I'm not sure where I would live to have an hour commute into San Francisco where there is low crime, great public schools, and have a large house for under even $2 million. Maybe someone will reply and educate me.
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
In Minneapolis/Saint Paul, all TNC drivers are required to present their car for inspection annually
But the DRIVERS are required to do it there, not Lyft. If this were the same thing Air BnB is having to do in SF, Lyft would be required to bring in the cars for inspection, not the drivers...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Dear Airbnb: Hotels are regulated for very good reasons
And those are??? You make a pretty big assumption that the regulations help consumers instead of offering ample opportunity for graft from the local government. Which I guess you support... I guess that makes sense though as foul-month people tend to be among the most corrupt and uncaring.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
There are a number of cities that rely on the tourism industry that are undergoing negative changes due to AirBnb.
More rooms are available -> Hotels cant charge as much for rooms due to competition, and collect less taxes for the city. So the city has more tourists to support, but less tax revenue
Real estate prices go up -> Long term residents have incentive to sell/rent, renters have incentive to live elsewhere
It's similar to gentrification, but instead of replacing poor people with yuppies, its replacing residents with absentee landlords. There are increases in tourist dollars to local businesses, but less money from local residents. The overall effect is unhealthy for the city as a whole, since it drives residents away. Ultimately a city cant survive without locals who actually live in it.
which restricts someones rights in anyway
C'mon, you know that since Wickard, at least, the rule has been that if there is money involved you have no Constitutional rights.
Because, y'know, the Framers only expected the Constitution to apply to people who are starving to death.
From what I've seen, most of the /. hive-mind is perfectly content with this arrangement.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
This is also a (potential) violation of the First Amendment: the government is directly controlling what AirBnB can/cannot post on its own website.
No it's not, no more than the government is restricting Craigslist's First Amendment rights by telling them they can't post ads for prostitutes, hit men, and drugs. If the property owners aren't registered and complying with the local ordnance then the listing is illegal.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
Try exercising 2nd Amendment rights...
The paperwork, etc. required is very onerous and invasive, requiring disclosure of otherwise HIPPA protected medial information.
While I'm complaining, I'd like to say we should drop the invasive notion of drug tests for welfare recipients. Instead, just normalize the requirements with those for concealed carry: show up in person, with multiple forms of approved ID (citizenship and residency), get fingerprinted, fill out forms disclosing previous felonies and mental disorders, affirm that the benefits are for yourself or dependent children, (remember: lying about any answers is a felony!), have a wants&warrants background check run, sit for another ID photo; repeat the process every few years as required. As it's for welfare, we'll waive the non-inconsequential fee normally associated with firearms licenses.
As a benefit(!) each recipient would have an additional ID to use for voting ID requirements.
"It can't be completed online and requires submitting all the documents in person." ... makes me feel like "Fuck you, Board of Supervisors"
That's not funny, is sad. And it's the same with self driving cars, tibia, 3d printers, and artificial intelligence. The problem isn't a lack of innovation, it's existing corporate interests, unions, and luddites.
Something I forgot to mention in my comprehensive response (above) - There's no reason to assume those 33,000 employees would be anything close to fulltime. They could easily be contractors paid piece rate, or 1/10 time employees.
Your ad here. Ask me how!
What jobs are being destroyed in San Francisco?
Service industry jobs. I'm told it's getting pretty hard to find people willing to commute into the City to work a kitchen three days a week.
Breakfast served all day!
If I understand you correctly, you are saying: "People who want to rent out their house/apartment as a business have to register like any other business. This proves that the Rule of Law is dead in the US."
I'm not sure of your gender, so I don't feel right calling you a Drama Queen. Maybe Drama Royalty?
Government has always had the right to regulate commerce. To me, this seems quite reasonable. Sure, sometimes it regulates poorly, in which case I can spend my days wailing about how I'm being oppressed like a peasant in a Monty Python skit, or I can vote for people who will improve it, or (since I have enough money) I can move somewhere where the government works the way I want it to. I prefer the second method myself, and am glad that the third method is available to me.
In the US we get the government we want, by voting in the people we want. Different regions have wildly different laws because of this fact. Seems like a good thing to me.
I'm told it's getting pretty hard to find people willing to commute into the City to work a kitchen three days a week.
That's an easy fix. Convert the part-time job into a full-time job and pay more. If that isn't doable, the restaurant owner need to rethink the business model and/or move to a city with available labor.
It would probably be cheaper to AirBnB to just create and hand over a system to SF that automates the registration and payment process. For a tech company that would be trivial, compared to government bureaucracy. Offer SF a solution for online registration and payments and you can probably even get them to pay a small fee to have AirBnB administer the site for them. Happens all the time,.
Warning: Teh poster of this messaeg is lysdexic
The City finally found a replacement for the BART escalators.
I have to disagree about NYC. There absolutely *is* a large network of cheaper suburbs within an hour's commute of Manhattan, on both sides: Brooklyn, Queens, Jersey City by PATH, a large part of northern NJ by bus and train, etc.
I don't see that as a problem. Maybe eventually all the restaurants and other stores will close, and the city will finally be forced to build high-rises.
Are you sure you've replied to the correct post?
I said that those in government and those powerful interests aligned with government (cronies) don't have to follow the same set of laws, rules, and regulations that Joe Sixpack is forced to comply with, and that those same "above the law" types and those in government use the selectively-enforced and interpreted laws/rules/regulations as weapons against those they consider a threat.
In the US it's quite common for established businesses to influence government to pass laws and regulations dressed up and sold as being for the greater good when they are actually only there to create barriers to competition and protect outdated business models.
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
Tokyo, motherfucker. Do you know where that is?
It's really incredible the depths this shitty site has descended to.
"Airbnb contends the new rule violates the Communications Decency Act, Stored Communications Act and the First Amendment."
When has law and/or common sense stopped the City of San Francisco from doing what it wanted?
I have to disagree about NYC. There absolutely *is* a large network of cheaper suburbs within an hour's commute of Manhattan, on both sides: Brooklyn, Queens, Jersey City by PATH, a large part of northern NJ by bus and train, etc.
I cannot claim to know that much about the area, other than the complaints of two friends who live in the New York city area (Brooklyn and New Jersey). From their accounts, if you want low crime, great *public* schools (9+ Great Schools rating, 90%+ college enrollment of graduates, etc), a private yard where your children can play (at least quarter acre), and a decent commute to Manhattan (an hour or less), your home will cost well over $200 per square foot of living space.
No one absolutely needs all of these things, especially a large house with a private yard, but most major cities (including Chicago) offer this in suburbs within an hour of the city (during rush hour).
If you do know of particular neighborhoods near New York city that do offer all of this, please respond and let me know. As I said I have a couple friends who have moved there within the last five years who are both planning families right now and would love any assistance they can get. Right now they both expect to pay over $1 million for 2000 sq ft 4-bedroom homes with low crime and access to merely decent schools. They both also assume private school is in their children's future. It would be great if they are wrong about this being their best option.
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
I know this will be an unpopular comment, especially with the group of people who use "statist" as a slur of choice, but lets be honest - Airbnb, Uber, and the whole so-called "sharing" economy needs to stop mincing words to get out of paying and adhering to regulations that everyone else has to do so. They choose to use the word "disruptive", but what it really comes down to is running an unlicensed hotel or so-called "gypsy cab" service.
Uber (and most other competitors) isn't a "ride share" service (ie I'm going where you are, let me pick you up), but a full fledged taxi/sedan service that you just happen to call or hail via an app. How they manage their entire business is evidence of this. However, they claim they're "ride sharing" and thus get around all of the regulations on what it means to be a ride-for-hire business in areas where they operate. AirBNB is no better, with legitimate "couchsurfing" being replaced with running unlicensed hotels/BNBs. Hell, there are many areas where it has impacted the real-estate market because now businesses and individuals alike are beginning to buy out residential property and then post it on AirBNB which means legitimate tenants are going to find housing even less affordable. Prior to the loophole being exploited, it would have not been possible to run short term rentals/hotels in these areas, without having to have the insurance and inspections required, collect taxes if necessary in said jurisdiction etc... but hey, they're "just a disruptive app for the sharing economy".
On Slashdot and elsewhere we rightly become irate when we hear that governments use "Because its happening on a computer, its somehow worse/different/not bound by the same rights and protections", don't we? When someone gets a decades long prison sentence for some sort of hacking issue tried under RICO? When your digital correspondence can be grabbed without a warrant in a way postal mail could never be? So why are we okay when some corporate entity uses that same excuse to justify this scam? If you want to run a hotel or limo/car service, that's great. However, you have to follow the same standards as everyone else. This doesn't mean we shouldn't change and modernize those rules, but if you suggest that regulation itself is somehow the enemy or that we should just give these businesses a pass, then you're complicit in pushing this nation even further over the ledge for the goods of corporate profit, damn the consequences.
The suit against AirBNB is valid and they exist and in fact, profit, exclusively through being a "wink wink nudge nudge couchsurfing site". Now they're whining because the "compromise" they asked for, which would still allow them to basically exploit short term rentals in a way you couldn't and frankly shouldn't in most residential zones, could actually require them to do some due diligence on their part? They should be thankful it isn't more dramatic legislation. I'd favor putting an end to these loopholes all together, forcing AirBNB (and those that list their properties within) to comply with bed-and-breakfast/hotel ownership regulations. This, in hand with modernizing those regulations and making them both more sensible and easier to understand and comply should make a better experience for everyone.
Tech companies and those behind them seem to comport themselves as being "better, more socially conscious" than the "bad, old money professions" such as finance and the like, but they share the same "fuck everyone else, I should be able to 'disrupt' the industry, externalize my risk/costs onto the public to reap in even larger private profits" attitude. Driving a Tesla while you foist another weight on an already overburdened, affordable housing market is no better than going to four and five figure a plate galas for poverty, while your business practices put millions into said poverty in the first place. Corporate and financial interests must be monitored and if necessary, cowed, for the
Check out Summit, New Jersey. It takes about an hour (if that) to get to Manhattan by NJ Transit train, and is a rather upscale town. It's not going to be super-cheap though (nothing near NYC is if it's any good), but you really should be able to find houses much cheaper than $1M. The property taxes are high though. Also check out Morristown. It's a little farther out though. Millburn is really nice too, and slightly closer than Summit.