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Allegations of past and present Internet crime haunt Airbnb co-founder

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Re: Allegations of past and present Internet crime haunt Airbnb co-founder

#21

Post by badclient »

chubot wrote: post #15

So he's right? Every response on this thread seems to be ad hominem. No one seems to be defending AirBNB guys. It is relevant because any online business necessarily has a lot of information about its customers. Spamming is both illegal and immoral (free riding on the commons), so I would choose not to give my business/info to people with a known history of such activity.

Spamming is not illegal. That is the biggest lie out there, actually. You just have to adhere to some specific requirements when sending unsolicited email.

Also, spamming may be against many company's TOS but that does not make it illegal.

Go read the CAN-SPAM Act.

Re: Allegations of past and present Internet crime haunt Airbnb co-founder

#22

Post by prodigal_erik »

alsocasey wrote: post #5
martey wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not sure that this comment adds anything to the discussion. You can argue that Blecharczyk is reformed, that AirBnB is not currently spamming people, or even that the only reason he is bringing this up now is to generate interest in his anti-Money Transmission Act crusade. Insulting him does not explain why he might be wrong. Disclosure: I knew Greenspan in college, but I wasn't important enough to be included i…

I doubt the personal ethics of founders sway investors much (if at all), but perhaps the world would be a better place if they did. Either way, setting up a custom hardware/software stack to spam/peddle pornography as an 18 year old freshman is a pretty impressive feat of ingenuity, but it reflects poor judgement - by an 18 year old (whodathunkit!) Who knows what guy is like now. He might be a saint. Probably not tho…

> Who knows what guy is like now

When a spammer gets caught attacking the commons yet again via a new company's "contractors" who just happen not to have been prosecuted or sued or even identified, it's pretty obvious he is the creature he always was.

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2603844

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2610145

Re: Allegations of past and present Internet crime haunt Airbnb co-founder

#23

Post by chubot »

badclient wrote: post #21
chubot wrote: post #15

So he's right? Every response on this thread seems to be ad hominem. No one seems to be defending AirBNB guys. It is relevant because any online business necessarily has a lot of information about its customers. Spamming is both illegal and immoral (free riding on the commons), so I would choose not to give my business/info to people with a known history of such activity.

Spamming is not illegal. That is the biggest lie out there, actually. You just have to adhere to some specific requirements when sending unsolicited email. Also, spamming may be against many company's TOS but that does not make it illegal. Go read the CAN-SPAM Act.

Whatever, that's splitting hairs and not relevant to the main point.

If someone is writing a program to send out unsolicited e-mails on behalf of other parties, it's pretty unlikely that they're doing the due diligence. I don't know what happened but I think it's funny that all the responses are "Aaron Greenspan is a whiny loser".

Also, I don't read any company's TOS when deciding whether to do business with them. Do you? I go by their reputation. If a company has a bad reputation then it makes me less likely to do business with them.

Re: Allegations of past and present Internet crime haunt Airbnb co-founder

#25

Post by chubot »

[deleted] wrote: post #18
chubot wrote: post #15

So he's right? Every response on this thread seems to be ad hominem. No one seems to be defending AirBNB guys. It is relevant because any online business necessarily has a lot of information about its customers. Spamming is both illegal and immoral (free riding on the commons), so I would choose not to give my business/info to people with a known history of such activity.

[deleted]

Haha, funny. But in this case it is the refutation of the argument that has the fallacy.

So there is the original argument that he's a spammer, which hasn't been refuted. And there is the ad hominem counter-argument which is refuted by being ad hominem.

So I think I am still justified in believing the original argument without contrary evidence. So really you are profering a fallacist's fallacist's fallacy. :)

Re: Allegations of past and present Internet crime haunt Airbnb co-founder

#26

Post by badclient »

chubot wrote: post #23
badclient wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Spamming is not illegal. That is the biggest lie out there, actually. You just have to adhere to some specific requirements when sending unsolicited email. Also, spamming may be against many company's TOS but that does not make it illegal. Go read the CAN-SPAM Act.

Whatever, that's splitting hairs and not relevant to the main point. If someone is writing a program to send out unsolicited e-mails on behalf of other parties, it's pretty unlikely that they're doing the due diligence. I don't know what happened but I think it's funny that all the responses are "Aaron Greenspan is a whiny loser". Also, I don't read any company's TOS when deciding whether to do business with them. Do…

If a company has a bad reputation then it makes me less likely to do business with them.

Except if I read a bad review about a company from someone who has a record of bad experiences with companies, I do not take that person's review into account and discard it as an outlier. Aaron Greenspan has a pretty solid history of being that guy who has a problem with almost everyone of stature that he has come to know.

Re: Allegations of past and present Internet crime haunt Airbnb co-founder

#27

Post by daeken »

Gaussian wrote: post #14

An 18 year old would have to engage in some pretty dark stuff for me to indict them later in life as a subpar founder, partner or person. Spamming and porn don't even come close to qualifying.

When I was 15 or 16 (can't remember exactly), I ended up doing contract work for an "Internet Marketing Firm" (read: spammer). I built a ridiculously scalable email crawler and learned a whole lot in the process. I wouldn't do it again -- I would rather not make money than assist spammers -- but at the time it seemed like a good decision. Hindsight is 20/20 and all that.

Re: Allegations of past and present Internet crime haunt Airbnb co-founder

#28

Post by clukezic »

prodigal_erik wrote: post #22
alsocasey wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I doubt the personal ethics of founders sway investors much (if at all), but perhaps the world would be a better place if they did. Either way, setting up a custom hardware/software stack to spam/peddle pornography as an 18 year old freshman is a pretty impressive feat of ingenuity, but it reflects poor judgement - by an 18 year old (whodathunkit!) Who knows what guy is like now. He might be a saint. Probably not tho…

> Who knows what guy is like now When a spammer gets caught attacking the commons yet again via a new company's "contractors" who just happen not to have been prosecuted or sued or even identified, it's pretty obvious he is the creature he always was. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2603844 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2610145

The fact that people assume Airbnb was automating spam is entirely false.

At one point in our past we did have a small team of remote sales people that we contracted to acquire listings through person-to-person sales, but their efforts were largely ineffective. To set the record straight this process was never automated as purported. Our sales team emailed listings on Craigslist one-by-one and targeted only listings that they thought would be a good fit for our marketplace. At times they did contact people who did not want to be solicited to. However when alerted to these actions we ensured that they stopped immediately.

Re: Allegations of past and present Internet crime haunt Airbnb co-founder

#29

Post by dmix »

daeken wrote: post #27
Gaussian wrote: post #14

An 18 year old would have to engage in some pretty dark stuff for me to indict them later in life as a subpar founder, partner or person. Spamming and porn don't even come close to qualifying.

When I was 15 or 16 (can't remember exactly), I ended up doing contract work for an "Internet Marketing Firm" (read: spammer). I built a ridiculously scalable email crawler and learned a whole lot in the process. I wouldn't do it again -- I would rather not make money than assist spammers -- but at the time it seemed like a good decision. Hindsight is 20/20 and all that.

Same here, I was 17, learning web dev at a small company and the founder had me creating spam-blogs (splogs) back in 2004 when it was effective for gaming SEO. I know better now as an adult.
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