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Airbnb expands to experiences

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Re: Airbnb expands to experiences

#41

Post by untog »

bsimpson wrote: post #37

I just got an EULA-wall asking to agree not to treat anyone on Airbnb "with bias or judgment" based on their origins. That's not how bias/judgment work. You can't just agree to be unbiased, though you can certainly try to be aware of your biases and to be accordingly more sensitive to situations where you may be biased. I wonder what the impact of this is. So many people blindly click "Agree" when presented with lega…

I'm not sure how that works legally. If I systematically discriminate against a race of people without being aware of it I'm pretty sure I can still be in legal trouble for doing so.

Re: Airbnb expands to experiences

#42

Post by enra »

kakkun wrote: post #32

Am I missing something, or is there no way to search the Experiences?

You can search them in the iOS/Android apps.

Unfortunately for now you cannot search them on the website, but you can browse and see some of them featured on the home page.

Re: Airbnb expands to experiences

#43

Post by untog »

11thEarlOfMar wrote: post #2

This is awesome. My wife and I are planning a round the world trip to celebrate our last college tuition payment. We've talked about becoming 'Citizens of the World' and eschewing the canned tourist experiences to instead live the same lifestyle as the citizens of the countries we visit: Stay in a neighborhood instead of a high-rise hotel, shop at the same grocery stores, eat the same home-cooked meals, get around vi…

It's a nice idea, but if the rest of AirBnb is anything to go by, it'll very quickly be filled with generic experiences that cut costs and under deliver.

I've had some great times staying at AirBnbs, but over time the ratio of good to bad/average is sliding fast.

Re: Airbnb expands to experiences

#44

Post by dominotw »

venantius wrote: post #9
drizzzler wrote: post #4

Airbnb has tried to do "experiences" so many times I've lost count. Here's the one where they partnered with Vayable, all the way back in 2011: https://techcrunch.com/2011/12/02/airbnb-to-partner-with-vay...

This is different. I work at Airbnb - we've been working on what was announced today for quite some time, and it has been our intent to fully own and provide an Airbnb-branding-appropriate offering.

can you expand on 'Airbnb-branding-appropriate offering' , sounds like marketing speak. what does 'this is different' mean in practical terms.

Re: Airbnb expands to experiences

#45

Post by wapz »

untog wrote: post #41
bsimpson wrote: post #37

I just got an EULA-wall asking to agree not to treat anyone on Airbnb "with bias or judgment" based on their origins. That's not how bias/judgment work. You can't just agree to be unbiased, though you can certainly try to be aware of your biases and to be accordingly more sensitive to situations where you may be biased. I wonder what the impact of this is. So many people blindly click "Agree" when presented with lega…

I'm not sure how that works legally. If I systematically discriminate against a race of people without being aware of it I'm pretty sure I can still be in legal trouble for doing so.

These EULAs often do not stand up in court (when encountering more serious laws) from what I've been told. Sorry I have no sources!

Re: Airbnb expands to experiences

#46

Post by ecesena »

bsimpson wrote: post #37

I just got an EULA-wall asking to agree not to treat anyone on Airbnb "with bias or judgment" based on their origins. That's not how bias/judgment work. You can't just agree to be unbiased, though you can certainly try to be aware of your biases and to be accordingly more sensitive to situations where you may be biased. I wonder what the impact of this is. So many people blindly click "Agree" when presented with lega…

I think you're reading a bit too much in it.

Say you hate Italians with a passion and I send you a request.

You can surely tell me no, politely declining with any excuse you like.

What you can't do is reply me in an offensive way, asking me for more money or anything else which strictly related to your hate.

Or at least, you can but if you do that they can now ban you from the service.

I was pretty surprised when I first read that, but evidently many more people than we think are being explicit about their igno...ehm, hate.

Re: Airbnb expands to experiences

#47

Post by mzemel »

bsimpson wrote: post #37

I just got an EULA-wall asking to agree not to treat anyone on Airbnb "with bias or judgment" based on their origins. That's not how bias/judgment work. You can't just agree to be unbiased, though you can certainly try to be aware of your biases and to be accordingly more sensitive to situations where you may be biased. I wonder what the impact of this is. So many people blindly click "Agree" when presented with lega…

They are not asking you to be unbiased. They are asking you not to treat others with bias. Thoughts vs. actions.

Re: Airbnb expands to experiences

#48

Post by Alex3917 »

bsimpson wrote: post #37

I just got an EULA-wall asking to agree not to treat anyone on Airbnb "with bias or judgment" based on their origins. That's not how bias/judgment work. You can't just agree to be unbiased, though you can certainly try to be aware of your biases and to be accordingly more sensitive to situations where you may be biased. I wonder what the impact of this is. So many people blindly click "Agree" when presented with lega…

It's interesting to me that we hold AirBnB to one standard and Tinder / OKCupid to a completely different one, even though they're both essentially apps for finding someone whose house you can sleep in.

Re: Airbnb expands to experiences

#49

Post by natrius »

Jeralt wrote: post #35
kveykva wrote: post #8

Went on a couple of these trips in Japan recently. Would definitely recommend to others. They've found some great people.

I have a feeling their beta experience hosts will be their cream of the crop. Once the general public starts hosting experiences, and Airbnb's quality control falters, we'll see a lot of complaints about shitty or scamful experiences.

That's what people thought about sleeping in strangers' apartments, but it turns out that reputation systems do a pretty decent job of culling bad experiences. "Don't get in a car with strangers" used to be common sense, but now people do it every day.

Re: Airbnb expands to experiences

#50

Post by Fuzzwah »

rorykoehler wrote: post #33
venantius wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is different. I work at Airbnb - we've been working on what was announced today for quite some time, and it has been our intent to fully own and provide an Airbnb-branding-appropriate offering.

What were your motivations for this? It seems like the opposite experience of what I use Airbnb for. If people were after hand holding tourism it's unlikely they'd be using airbnb. Does this signal a shift in strategy away from what made us all start using airbnb in the first instance?

From what I learned about AirBnB's origin story via an episode of NPR's How I Built This [1], the original idea of AirBnB was a kind of "stay somewhere with a local and experience the place not as a tourist" experience.

The fact that this kind of idea never went away even when everyone else found that AirBnB fullfilled a different requirement doesn't surprise me.

[1] http://www.npr.org/podcasts/510313/how-i-built-this

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