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Reporting back from Brian Chesky / Kara Swisher interview at large tech Lesbians who Tech conference in SF yesterday.
Pertinent to hosts: Chesky was asked where he saw the biggest impact of Airbnb property dominance on neighborhoods (‘now the parties issue has been largely solved’) - he spoke to his worry about impact where AirBnB properties overwhelms a neighborhood or small town. His proposed mitigation was the new ‘categories’ where instead of orienting to a destination, people would now be searching for eg a cabin in Sonoma (instead of starting with eg ‘Guerneville’ because you’re looking for a cabin experience) - result would be more evenly dispersed across geographies.
Second biggest topic (and biggest cheer from the audience) - you guessed it - cleaning fees.
Most of discussion was around re-orienting the ways of working / living, sourcing talent wherever it lives etc, his experience living in Airs with Sophie, big tech as a platform vs accountability for social harm.
nothing like wealthy “educated” elites from CA, representing a tiny minority group with a big loud activist megaphone, thinking they understand the real world.
also, i’m sorry but HOW do you search for "cabin in sonoma"? once you click cabin you get cabins in your local area. if you input a location, the “cabin” category is dropped.
I haven’t experimented with the search function lately, as I’m not planning on booking anything, and while I have availability for the next few weeks, it is still is the time of year when I seldom get bookings and I am busy doing landscape and maintenance work, so really don’t care if anyone books right now.
But the search function seems really screwed up. My home page is populated with places in and around Mexico City, which say they are 10-16 kilometers from my location, when it is actually 880 kilometers. Even if you take into account that my internet gets routed through a server in Guadalajara, that’s still 552 kilometers distance.
I bet you can’t search for a cabin in Sonoma. Bet you have to search for Sonoma with dates and number of guests and then slog through the listings to find a cabin, or be open to booking a cabin anywhere through the categories. But maybe someone else knows better and it’s totally possible.
And there is a thread on the Airbnb CC where guests are asking how they can turn split stays off (which they can’t), as they are absolutely not interested in such a thing and it is making their search frustrating. Which hosts said was going to happen when this was so stupidly introduced. Way to go, Mr. Chesky. Piss off your hosts and your guests. Send them to VRBO. Great business sense.
One of the characteristics I have observed of many millennials, especially the privileged ones, is that they can’t ever admit that they were wrong, that they implemented a bad idea. I truly think that this is one of the main factors that contributes to all the things that are so aggravating and ill-conceived about Airbnb.
And they will say anything they think will make them look good in the moment, then turn around and not follow through on anything they said. While absolving themselves of all responsibility due to their self-perceived good intentions.
I know that’s not a politically correct thing to say, but I don’t care.
Sorry I shouldve framed that better. It was the journalist who stated ‘what negative impact do you think AirBnBs have on neighborhoods, now the parties issue has been largely solved’. But Brian Chesky didn’t correct her.
agree on the meaninglessness of the response, which he wasnt challenged on. The weird thing was he walked this problem into the conversation, and then provided an inadequate response to it. Seemed like he was shopping around for an actual business application or value for his new searching system ‘which has changed how travel has been searched for, since 1994’.
I watched an enlightening video where body language and speech pattern experts analyzed a video of Elizabeth Holmes of Theranos fraud fame being interviewed about her company, before her downfall.
They pointed out how and when she deflected, when she was lying, the phrases she used like “the team” to absolve herself of being seen as the primary decision maker, the mannerisms and words she used to present herself as someone the average person could relate to, and so on.
You can see exactly the same sort of practiced body language and wording with so many of these millenials in positions of power.
Sometimes these tactics are used in horrendously criminal enterprises. There’s a fascinating 7 episode CBC radio podcast called Escaping NXIVM, about a cult with lofty sounding goals of “self-improvement” making the world a better place, being a team player, etc, that managed to suck in thousands of people, largely millenials, before it got blown open, its leader, Keith Ranier, having been sentenced in Oct. 2020 to 120 years in prison on convictions of racketeering, racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking, sex trafficking conspiracy, forced labor conspiracy and wire fraud conspiracy.
Even if you take into account that my internet gets routed through a server in Guadalajara, that’s still 552 kilometers distance.