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How The Hell Is This My Fault?

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Re: How The Hell Is This My Fault?

#241

Post by redthrowaway »

ntoshev wrote: post #84
redthrowaway wrote: post #31

Sorry PG, but you have a steep hill to climb if you want to defend aribnb. The crux of your (and their) problem is this: Why, if, as you say, airbnb was being as helpful as possible from the get-go, did the victim write that second post? That's it. You cannot have a claim to credibility until you answer that question. Even if that answer is, "she was paid off", the existence of her second blog post puts the lie to ai…

> Why, if, as you say, airbnb was being as helpful as possible from the get-go, did the victim write that second post? Speculation: Airbnb offered money and support if she agreed not to sue them and not to feed the press the negative story about the service. She refuses to commit to this, they refuse to pay her without it. None of the two parties wants to be transparent about this part of communication. Technically,…

That's the first plausible explanation I've seen that at least partially bridges the gaps in the two stories. Still, that scenario doesn't match airbnb's claims. They claim they've been helpful and supportive throughout this. If that was limited to being nice for the first few days then trying to buy her silence, that's nowhere close to how they've characterized it.

Re: How The Hell Is This My Fault?

#242

Post by access_denied »

gobongo wrote: post #206
jamesgagan wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't imagine that AirBnb are "done for" after one such incident. I think the real issue here is that HN readers, the kind who root for startups to "stick it to the man", so to speak, are disheartened to see their champions acting like the old regime. That's why this topic, and the public bun fight in the aftermath have generated so much discussion.

I can easily imagine they are done for. Not because of the PR backlash, but because what they are doing is already quasi-illegal in a lot of places and one juicy story like this that the media, lawyers and politicians can jump on is just about all it will take to eventually remove the "quasi" part.

Now that you are saying it, I find that it also adds to the "bad integrity" flavour of AirBnB's actions in general. How can bet your career on a half-ilegal business model? I understand sometimes you have to be "crazy" to get a company going et al, but there is still something to the fact, that these guys were ready to do it, specially after 'craigslist' and 'EJ'.

Re: How The Hell Is This My Fault?

#243

Post by kragen »

jacquesm wrote: post #111
jcunningham wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn't the Airbnb guys have already given her contact info to PG if they had wanted to? What made you decide to do so and did you ask her for permission to pass on her details to a third party?

> Wouldn't the Airbnb guys have already given her contact info to PG if they had wanted to? Maybe. > What made you decide to do so and did you ask her for permission to pass on her details to a third party? I think that PG is a very smart guy and I have some personal reasons to believe that PG has his heart very much in the right place when it comes to things that are this personal. I can not go in to details there,…

> > did you ask her for permission to pass on her details to a third party?

> I did not ask for her permission

Jacques, that is not cool. Extremely, extremely not cool. Did you at least tell her you'd done it? Ask for forgiveness? What did she say? (Edit: downthread, jacquesm reports, "I have apologized to her that I did not seek her consent first, based on the note I received afterwards it seems that she is ok with it, but that does not diminish my mistake and I should be more careful with stuff like that.")

Look at it from her perspective. You passed the contact information of a homeless victim of a serious crime to a powerful, world-famous venture capitalist who has a billion-dollar incentive to shut her up. Against her will. If this was a movie plot, we wouldn't see any more blog posts from her, ever again.

Re: How The Hell Is This My Fault?

#244

Post by Nutella2 »

cageface wrote: post #90
rweba wrote: post #77

This might now end up affecting not only Airbnb but also the image of Ycombinator and pg. Also the important issue here is not just the (terrible) handling of this specific incident by Airbnb but the fact that it puts into question their entire business model: Is it really smart to rent out your personal residence to a complete stranger? Does the potential benefit($$$) outweigh the significant risks(being completely…

I think the crucial context is even larger than that. There's a lot of anxiety in the tech community about the recent valuations of several startups. First there was the revelation that a lot of Groupon's reported "profits" are products of clever accounting. Then Color implodes after a ridiculously disproportionate funding round. And now AirBNB, the poster child of internet disintermediation of old, hidebound industr…

"a business model threatening crisis that everyone should have seen coming"

Airbnb did see it coming and were careful to cover it in their TOS section 1.2 and 1.4. They have, however, been marketing their service very differently. They've now taken down the FAQ answer about security that had only a joke about grand pianos, but it shows that they were deliberately trying to obfuscate security issues in order to make more sales.

That makes it even more amazing that they had no PR or operational plan in place to deal with the inevitable criminal user.

Re: How The Hell Is This My Fault?

#245

Post by prodigal_erik »

sliverstorm wrote: post #52
suprgeek wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seconded. It is hard to write a defense of TC given past events. However in this case they are SPOT ON. None of the stories are overtly "drama" or "editorializing" on TC's part. EJs posts are dramatic enough. PG has come out in explicit defense on AirBnB's behalf when they are very clearly falling short in the ethical and "right thing to do" department, not to mention trying to censor somebody by pressuring them. Tak…

PG has come out in explicit defense on AirBnB's behalf when they are very clearly falling short in the ethical and "right thing to do" department Well, he is invested in them, and he is only human. While I am not saying that is why he is backing AirBnB, it's good not to forget where people are coming from and where their interests lie.

pg once cited Mark Twain's "Corn-pone Opinons" essay in a link from "What You Can't Say". I expect he's already given thought to his own biases here, and yes we also ought to remain aware of that.

http://www.paulgraham.com/cornpone.html

Re: How The Hell Is This My Fault?

#246

Post by bane »

Is it just me or has this entire debacle resulted in an awful lot of beating up of otherwise upstanding HNers and armchair novice PR advice based on a case full of conflicting details where apparently nobody has the complete story?

I'm actually finding this entire thing distasteful from all possible sides. I'd rather just wait and see what happens while the various parties work this out in relative private.

Re: How The Hell Is This My Fault?

#247

Post by mst »

cbs wrote: post #161
jacquesm wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Paul is not just 'some AirBNB investor', if you want to picture it that way, sure go ahead. AirBNB has - in my opinion - been doing the very wrong thing here for much too long and this will blow up at some point if something isn't done pronto. Tracking her down sounds like it was real work, believe me it wasn't, and as I explained below I gave her some hints on how to make that a lot harder than it was last night. I…

>Paul is not just 'some AirBNB investor' I know we're posting on the HN temple of the YC church, so I always expect a little bit of fanboyism in attitudes towards PG, but you've really gone off the deep end if you think that in this situation Graham is anything but just another investor.

Except that this is a YC company, and YC was explicitly created to be a company that provided investment and mentorship - their core competency isn't picking companies that will make money so much as picking companies that they can help to make money.

So, in this situation, Paul Graham is definitely not "just another investor" - he's a mentor too.

Re: How The Hell Is This My Fault?

#248

Post by bugsy »

ajays wrote: post #200
niklas_a wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not the right thing to do - it seems like you are just freaking her out more. A better way would have been to pass PG's details to her.

I disagree. Giving EJ PG's details, and putting the onus on the victim to reach out to PG, is (IMHO) the kind of attitude that got us here. I think this is what happened with AirBnB too: they probably gave her a number to call "if you need anything", and then just moved on. The victim shouldn't have to go around knocking on doors to get help. Sometimes it's nice if the help comes to victim on its own volition.

The victim also shouldn't be stalked or contacted by investors in the company that has already intimidated her and whose gross negligence hampered a speedy resolution to the crimes that were committed against her.

Re: How The Hell Is This My Fault?

#249

Post by jacquesm »

bugsy wrote: post #239
jacquesm wrote: post #91

Everybody calm down please. EJ is real, she's a real person, it really did happen, just in case anybody was still wondering about that. I've passed her contact info to PG and him being the smart man that he is I'm pretty sure that he can come up with a solution that will satisfy everybody and will allow the victim to move on and get AirBNB past this crisis. Any words to the effect that AirBNB is 'setting precedent' a…

> I've passed her contact info to PG and him being the smart man that he Wow, that is some crazy talk. Given that PG sees her as the enemy and his friends at Airbnb the good guys beyond reproach he should not be contacting her. He has absolutely no business doing so. Also, unless she asked for it, it was a massive privacy violation to release that information to a third party. Outrageous. What is he going to do now?…

> What is he going to do now? Hire thugs to intimidate her?

Wow, that is some crazy talk.

Re: How The Hell Is This My Fault?

#250

Post by bugsy »

jacquesm wrote: post #129
jcunningham wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think she needs to explain every technicality of what happened. The police will deal with those matters. She's not on trial in the court of public opinion.

Actually, she chose to make this public, and she chose to do so apparently because AirBNB refused to move on terms that are acceptable to her. Nobody here is claiming that she is 'on trial', but when you go public with a story there will always be questions. That is because people will align with your story and your interests if they consider you to be the party that is speaking the truth. This is a fairly normal thi…

> she chose to do so apparently because AirBNB refused to move on terms that are acceptable to her

There you go again Jacques with your wording that is designed to raise suspicion on the crime victim and her motivations. You pass her personal identity to an investor with a billion dollar reason to silence her, you say she should show proof she was really robbed in the form of photographs on the internet of her personal private home that was already violated, and now you are implying that she went public because she is greedy and is leveraging negative publicity in a negotiation of settlement terms. Yes, you will respond to this that you are not implying any of that and, but that is bullshit. You know exactly what you are doing Jacques, it's quite clear. Jacques, I want an answer for you, what are your financial and professional relationships with YCombinator. That's two questions there.

Putting her on trial and stalking her is disgusting. Your claiming you are not doing it as you are doing it is not fooling anyone. You are a psychopath. Stop what you are doing right now.

You want to know why she went public? BECAUSE AIRBNB DID NOT KNOW THE IDENTITY OF THE PEOPLE THAT THEY ALLOWED TO ROB HER HOUSE. That is legal negligence on their part, but it also created a situation where she is not safe. Not that she "feels unsafe". This has nothing to do with feelings. She IS unsafe because the people who robbed her apartment stalked her by email, manipulated her, and were still out there at large a month after the crime was discovered. Their stalking was almost but not quite as malicious as you are being right here right now with your public insinuations.

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