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The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

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Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#141

Post by barrkel »

chailatte wrote: post #123
wheels wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand the problems of setting a precedent. I don't, actually. If the financial industry has taught us one thing, it's that you can insure anything . Let's assume that this is a very rare occurrence and that the total cost of making this right (say, tops $100k?) can be amortized over the profit being generated. I have a hard time understanding how it'd be rocket surgery to get something in place to handle these…

AirBnb is illegal in some of the states (and when states/hotel industry/cities get a wind of this story, it will probably be illegal in all the states), so I doubt any legitimate insurance companies will be handling this affair.

That statement doesn't seem based in logic: it doesn't follow. Lots of things are illegal in different countries, but that doesn't stop legitimate businesses operating in countries where such things are legal. For example, online gambling is illegal in the US, but that doesn't stop legitimate (US-headquartered) credit card companies dealing with online gambling companies in the UK.

Also, if it were indeed the case that AirBnb is soon to be illegal, it would make more sense for insurance companies to sign them up: the risk of AirBnb being shut down ought to reduce the likelihood that they'll need to pay out.

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#142

Post by dxbydt »

wheels wrote: post #105
tc wrote: post #21

> I spoke to Airbnb about EJ’s situation. They won’t reimburse her for damages This is bad news. They're going to backtrack on this. The sooner they do it, the better for them politically. I understand the problems of setting a precedent. And there really is no getting around the fact that the hosts do have the final responsibility for screening travelers (and travelers for screening hosts). But rightly or wrongly, t…

I understand the problems of setting a precedent. I don't, actually. If the financial industry has taught us one thing, it's that you can insure anything . Let's assume that this is a very rare occurrence and that the total cost of making this right (say, tops $100k?) can be amortized over the profit being generated. I have a hard time understanding how it'd be rocket surgery to get something in place to handle these…

Such an insurance would probably be pretty much impossible. If you get a legit HTBRAI ( house trashed by random asshole insurance ), you've automatically created a market where these HTBRAIs are priced, bought and sold. That means you are essentially gaming burglary. eg. if I buy 100 HTBRAIs in some dicey neighborhood and there's an incident, my contracts automatically go up in value. That's a huge incentive for crime/arson/burglary.

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#143

Post by dools »

mcphilip wrote: post #76
dools wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

pg often asks people to change the title if they're editorialising. I posted the Nissan Leaf campaign page with the title "We don't need Flash(TM) anymore for anything ever!" and he emailed me and said "don't editorialise in titles" and changed it to "Nissan Leaf".

The counterargument here being that blog post's title was so generic sounding as to potentially not bring enough attention to the importance of the issue. The HN submission's original title didn't misrepresent the contents of the blog post in any way and helped attract more attention to the issue.

That was basically what I said to pg - "I'm not want to tell me HN buddies about the Nissan Leaf, the interesting part is their use of HTML5 video to create an ad campaign that would have traditionally been the domain of Flash(TM)".

pg's response was that if I want to share an editorial opinion about something, other than just posting the title of the page, then I should blog about it and then post a link to my blog.

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#144

Post by seagaia »

Most unfortunate, but letting a complete stranger into your house with VALUABLES was never the best idea, moreover, with a company that hasn't said anything about this kind of issue before. I suppose this system has worked, but it's beyond me how you could ever trust a stranger to live in a place that you live in regularly and store many valuables in.

I want to sympathize with the victim, but it's somewhat hard to given the circumstances. In any case, AirBnB should suck it up, fix this one situation, then go into full throttle with trying to come up with a plan to prevent future things of this sort.

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#145

Post by codyrobbins »

danilocampos wrote: post #136
codyrobbins wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The utter destruction of your home at the hands of a service that aims to help you monetize it is ipso facto a bug. Again, Airbnb didn’t destroy her home. Are you under the impression that someone from Airbnb itself was the one staying at her house? Intent: create value. Result: destruction of value. Bug! You’re basically defining what you want the responsibilities of Airbnb’s service to be and then faulting them acc…

Conveniently, you fail to address the point upon which this whole issue is predicated: " You can't talk to guests until the transaction is consummated. If that's so, it's on Airbnb to make sure that they're not sending a dangerous creep into your arms." No one thinks anyone from Airbnb blew up her home, dude. I'm not paid well enough to know if this meets the standard of tortious negligence. Yet it was negligence. Ha…

Well, you haven’t addressed any of my points, but that’s fine. To answer your question, just because the transaction was consummated doesn’t mean she had to let the guy into her house. If the dude was suspicious or ungoogleable, she could have called Airbnb and explained the situation or she could have simply not left her key. Instead she just got on an airplane without thinking about it. That’s not Airbnb’s fault.

And you’ve just illustrated my point perfectly: if she hadn’t used the service, she would be fine now. But she used the service of her own volition; nobody forced her to; and she made the decision herself. Airbnb might have made the gun the guys used to trash her apartment with, but Airbnb isn’t the one that fired it: she pulled the trigger. Again, the people who trashed her apartment committed the crime here, though.

This is a business problem

I never said it wasn’t a business problem—that’s exactly what it is. But it’s not an issue of morality.

in what universe can you trust a service like Airbnb now?

I would never in a million years use Airbnb. Why would I leave a complete stranger alone in my house so that they could trash it and go through my things? You realize how insane that is, when evaluated outside the reality distortion field of the startup craze we’re in right now, right?

I think the genesis for your arguments is your desire to live in a world where you can trust a service like Airbnb. But if you just think about it for five seconds you realize anyone could do this and Airbnb in no way prevents it from happening. Just because Y Combinator funded it doesn’t mean it’s magical.

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#146

Post by pg »

Before you all rush to judgment again, notice the update at the end of the article:

"Update: I spoke with Brian Chesky. He says the company has offered “to assist financially, find new housing for the host, and anything else she can think of to make her life easier.” He says they intend to “go above and beyond” to make the situation right for her."

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#147

Post by Cushman »

alex_c wrote: post #113
Cushman wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their attack surface is way, way lower, though. Airbnb would only be insuring the contract between two parties that Airbnb knows, so they're lightyears ahead of homeowner's insurance when it comes to recovering money from a claim. Fraud would mean the owner having an accomplice renter who destroyed something, Airbnb compensating the owner, and then being unable to track down the accomplice for redress. That's only a…

An accomplice renter - or destruction or property - isn't necessary. The owner can just claim theft, at which point it's their word against the renter - "They stole my HDTV!" "There was no HDTV to start with!" At that point Airbnb is put in an impossible situation - they either pay for what may be fraud, or they refuse to compensate what may be actual theft.

I don't get it. They require you to file a police report, just like insurance companies do. In fact, since they know the identity of the renter, they can require that the renter's name appears in the police report, and Airbnb can call the police station themselves to follow up with more information. A claim against the fund necessarily means pressing criminal charges against another individual.

So as the owner, it's my word against the renter with the cops involved. They're going to figure it out eventually. Maybe I'd be able to float a few grand for a while before it caught up with me, but surely there are easier ways for me to turn false testimony to my advantage than screwing over the web site that's earning me money?

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#148

Post by OstiaAntica »

barrkel wrote: post #141
chailatte wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AirBnb is illegal in some of the states (and when states/hotel industry/cities get a wind of this story, it will probably be illegal in all the states), so I doubt any legitimate insurance companies will be handling this affair.

That statement doesn't seem based in logic: it doesn't follow. Lots of things are illegal in different countries, but that doesn't stop legitimate businesses operating in countries where such things are legal. For example, online gambling is illegal in the US, but that doesn't stop legitimate (US-headquartered) credit card companies dealing with online gambling companies in the UK. Also, if it were indeed the case th…

U.S. insurers are heavily regulated by the states. They aren't going to get involved in a line of business that appears shaky or is crossways with the political tide.

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#149

Post by raldi »

dools wrote: post #143
mcphilip wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The counterargument here being that blog post's title was so generic sounding as to potentially not bring enough attention to the importance of the issue. The HN submission's original title didn't misrepresent the contents of the blog post in any way and helped attract more attention to the issue.

That was basically what I said to pg - "I'm not want to tell me HN buddies about the Nissan Leaf, the interesting part is their use of HTML5 video to create an ad campaign that would have traditionally been the domain of Flash(TM)". pg's response was that if I want to share an editorial opinion about something, other than just posting the title of the page, then I should blog about it and then post a link to my blog.

Seems like a good compromise would have been "Nissan uses HTML5 instead of Flash for their new Leaf campaign"

Re: The Moment Of Truth For Airbnb As User’s Home Is Utterly Trashed

#150

Post by [deleted] »

dkokelley wrote: post #132

While the right PR thing for Airbnb to do is cover the damages done, I am a little disappointed by the Airbnb hate I'm reading here. Why should they be held liable for the damages? Were they negligent? Airbnb offers a service. They match renters with houses. Do they make any warranty as to the reputation of the renters? Go to http://www.airbnb.com/terms and read the very first section. I'll admit that the victim has…

[deleted]
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