8 ms·

Living and Dying on Airbnb

173 points by 147 11y ago

jimjimjam 11y ago
Beyond the raw and heartbreaking nature of the author's loss, I am amazed that this story was published on Medium with the participation of Medium staffers. At a time when there is so much criticism of the state of tech writing, it's incredible to see this pseudo-journalistic platform for techies by techies be the channel for such a damning critique of a major tech darling like Airbnb.
- jonny_eh 11y ago
  If this can be considered "self-critical", then that speaks to the trustworthiness of the "publication".
- untog 11y ago
  Uh. Are you suggesting that Medium should never publish anything critical of a tech company because they're part of the tech industry? Because that sounds very sinister to me.
jzwinck 11y ago
It is horrible what happened to the author's father. But it is also inevitable. Like a morbid million monkeys mashing away on keyboards, operating at scale in meatspace all but guarantees that someone will die whilst using the service. In America we have become accustomed to guard rails everywhere, and signs announcing the smallest hazards. This is OK so far as it goes, but perhaps it makes us a bit soft. Here we read about a tree swing that fell down when a full grown man used it. At least 90% [1] of tree swings in America are built without professional engineering or even inspection. I'm not apologizing for the host in this case, but I do think that some people are open to living in a world where not every conceivable danger has been mitigated. The hard part is finding anyone so willing once a freak accident happens to them. [1] I'm lowballing this estimate so much that it should be obviously true to anyone who grew up in the non-urban US.
- reviseddamage 11y ago
  could i have resumed your post with "shit happens, sad though." ?
  - TeMPOraL 11y ago
    IMO yes, and it would have been a perfectly correct way of putting it, but people are... sensitive about truths like this one, hence the need of an elongated, delicate approach.
- jimjimjam 11y ago
  You're missing the point. Airbnb does not assume any responsibility when it comes to inspecting the "soundness" of a listed unit, including any means of evaluating very basic things like working fire alarms, interior mold, bed bugs, etc. I agree that this was something of a freak accident, but that doesn't invalidate the central argument that Airbnb has no real way to ensure even the most basic level of safety of its guests.
  - bmmayer1 11y ago
    Of course they don't. That's why they don't assume any responsibility for it.
    - jimjimjam 11y ago
      So this begs the question...why would any sane human being decide to risk staying at a home with no safety record or proof of fire/mold/bed bug inspection to speak of? I think potential guests need to be more aware that renting an Airbnb is nothing like booking a hotel subject to rigorous safety standard governed by law. Part of the purpose of this story is to point that out.
      - jzwinck 11y ago
        Lots of people travel to places outside the US where none of these things can be taken for granted. I think most of them are sane humans. In 2013 two people died in a Best Western hotel (in the US) due to an improperly and illegally installed water heater. Seven weeks after that, one more person was killed in the exact same way, in the very same room. [1] Are you sure conventional hotels "ensure" safety? [1] http://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/special-reports/nc-medical-examiners/article9093794.html http://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/special-reports/nc-med...
cwilkes 11y ago
Thanks for posting, it was a interesting, and heartbreaking, read. An AirBnB mission statement of sorts: We also stopped trusting each other. And in doing so, we lost something essential about what it means to be a community. After all, our relationships with people I literally threw up in my mouth when reading that. Your company makes money by renting out rooms by skirting hotel laws and you're wrapping yourself in a flag of "we're getting back to trusting one another!" What about the trust of that you bought into a place that isn't a fly by night hotel next door?
- _delirium 11y ago
  There's a bit of both going on: AirBnB is used by regular people renting out a spare room of a house or apartment they occupy, which sometimes has a vaguely couchsurfing-but-not-free feel to it. But it's also used by fly-by-night hoteliers running illegal hotels and hostels. And lately, it's also used by legal vacation-rental brokers as a competitor to VRBO/Homeaway/etc. The marketing materials obviously prefer to emphasize the first, but the second category does a lot of volume (the percentage seems to vary heavily by city). What's most annoying as an occasional user is that it's sometimes very difficult to determine which is which: is this someone's spare room (may actually lead to friendly personal interaction, probably won't cause significant problems for the neighbors), is it one of 50 "spare rooms" that this person is operating as a black-market business (impersonal, likely to be contributing to neighborhood social problems), or is it a VRBO-type rental unit just cross-listed on multiple sites' inventory (impersonal, but at least probably legit)? You can sometimes guess by looking at their other listings, but some people split their operation across a bunch of accounts. AirBnB could probably make life harder for people running the larger-scale operations if they wanted to, emphasizing the site's focus on lodging rented out by regular people, which could bring the site a bit more in line with the marketing copy. But I don't think that's the likely trajectory.
  - TeMPOraL 11y ago
    Don't forget the category 1a - regular people renting out a spare room even though it's against terms they themselves rent their flat on. This can sometimes also contribute to the neighbourhood social problems.
codinghorror 11y ago
Terrible tragedy. I can definitely see the argument that Airbnb hosts should carry insurance for freak accidents / deaths that occur on their property in cases like this.
- jimjimjam 11y ago
  Yeah the hosts should assume all liability and pay for cost of freak accident insurance...of course not Airbnb!
  - TeMPOraL 11y ago
    Does a newspaper bear responsibility for classifieds they post?
    - jimjimjam 11y ago
      If you're talking about Craigslist...they have a far better warning and flagging system than Airbnb does. I.e. If you try to buy a car they warn you about possible scams before you can look at the listings. Airbnb certainly does not do enough to proactively warn potential guests that they cannot vet the safety of any unit listed on their website.
      - TeMPOraL 11y ago
        Ok. Fair enough.
    - mik3y 11y ago
      Probably not much, but it's a silly comparison since newspaper classifieds do not work the same way: It surely helps that the newspaper is not managing the inventory, payment processing, photography, and customer relations on behalf of their sellers.
- omarforgotpwd 11y ago
  AirBnB should sell insurance that covers common issues hosts have, or partner with insurance providers, or adjust their % cut a bit and include this insurance for 100% of bookings
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
0xdragon 11y ago
I'm on a trip to Taiwan soon... And I booked an Airbnb. Ouch.
- GFischer 11y ago
  As jzwink said, you don't have any guarantees with a hotel either ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10531693 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10531693 ). I've had positive experiences every time I rented through AirBnB, the same cannot be said of hotels - I actually trust AirBnB a LOT more than hotels (as long as the property has some reviews). Maybe in the U.S. things work, but in other countries they don't... I've had the roof leaking BADLY on a hotel in Brazil (with lots of positive reviews in TripAdvisor), all guests' property stolen (also in Brazil), and I never had any recourse. People thinking about starting a lawsuit have never experienced 3rd world judiciary systems... (it can take a lot of time and money for very little returns). I fully expect you'll have a positive experience with your AirBnB in Taiwan, let's hope so :)
reviseddamage 11y ago
Erk... some of the comments here are brutally rational and ruthlessly logical. I would fully expect this narrative from decisioning AI units, not so quickly out of humanoids, at least not yet.
- aardshark 11y ago
  I don't know why your comment annoys me so much, but it does. What other response could you reasonably expect (or indeed, want)? If there weren't any rational and logical responses to this article, that would be truly saddening.
  - reviseddamage 11y ago
    I can help as to why it is annoying. I felt the same way before typing that out, but still wrote that. I seriously tried to honestly tell myself whether I would have the same opinion and view, was I in the shoes of the author. Would I be able to rationalize it the same way? Would I be able to marginalize that event to a statistical "nonevent"? I don't think I would. But I assumed that everyone commenting on it had already exercised that viewpoint, and still shared those views. That is what I would expect of perfect decisioning AI units. That's not a bad thing. I just didn't expect it so early. What do I think should be the response? Um, well, sue the shit out of the host and by extension the provider, or require insurance by the hosts. The alternative would be that this guest's death is reduced to a reputation negative (statistical nonevent).
RockyMcNuts 11y ago
A bit sad that this is buried off the HN front page. There is literally a story with 0 votes submitted an hour later directly above it on the third page, and on the front page there are older stories with fewer votes. https://twitter.com/newsycombinator https://twitter.com/newsycombinator tweets about images of the French revolution with fewer votes, but not this, which seems a bit more relevant to tech, startups, sharing economy etc.

173 points by 147 11y ago

Beyond the raw and heartbreaking nature of the author's loss, I am amazed that this story was published on Medium with the participation of Medium staffers. At a time when there is so much criticism of the state of tech writing, it's incredible to see this pseudo-journalistic platform for techies by techies be the channel for such a damning critique of a major tech darling like Airbnb.

jonny_eh 11y ago
If this can be considered "self-critical", then that speaks to the trustworthiness of the "publication".
untog 11y ago
Uh. Are you suggesting that Medium should never publish anything critical of a tech company because they're part of the tech industry? Because that sounds very sinister to me.

jzwinck 11y ago

It is horrible what happened to the author's father. But it is also inevitable. Like a morbid million monkeys mashing away on keyboards, operating at scale in meatspace all but guarantees that someone will die whilst using the service. In America we have become accustomed to guard rails everywhere, and signs announcing the smallest hazards. This is OK so far as it goes, but perhaps it makes us a bit soft. Here we read about a tree swing that fell down when a full grown man used it. At least 90% [1] of tree swings in America are built without professional engineering or even inspection. I'm not apologizing for the host in this case, but I do think that some people are open to living in a world where not every conceivable danger has been mitigated. The hard part is finding anyone so willing once a freak accident happens to them. [1] I'm lowballing this estimate so much that it should be obviously true to anyone who grew up in the non-urban US.

reviseddamage 11y ago
could i have resumed your post with "shit happens, sad though." ?
- TeMPOraL 11y ago
  IMO yes, and it would have been a perfectly correct way of putting it, but people are... sensitive about truths like this one, hence the need of an elongated, delicate approach.
jimjimjam 11y ago
You're missing the point. Airbnb does not assume any responsibility when it comes to inspecting the "soundness" of a listed unit, including any means of evaluating very basic things like working fire alarms, interior mold, bed bugs, etc. I agree that this was something of a freak accident, but that doesn't invalidate the central argument that Airbnb has no real way to ensure even the most basic level of safety of its guests.
- bmmayer1 11y ago
  Of course they don't. That's why they don't assume any responsibility for it.
  - jimjimjam 11y ago
    So this begs the question...why would any sane human being decide to risk staying at a home with no safety record or proof of fire/mold/bed bug inspection to speak of? I think potential guests need to be more aware that renting an Airbnb is nothing like booking a hotel subject to rigorous safety standard governed by law. Part of the purpose of this story is to point that out.
    - jzwinck 11y ago
      Lots of people travel to places outside the US where none of these things can be taken for granted. I think most of them are sane humans. In 2013 two people died in a Best Western hotel (in the US) due to an improperly and illegally installed water heater. Seven weeks after that, one more person was killed in the exact same way, in the very same room. [1] Are you sure conventional hotels "ensure" safety? [1] http://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/special-reports/nc-medical-examiners/article9093794.html http://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/special-reports/nc-med...

cwilkes 11y ago

Thanks for posting, it was a interesting, and heartbreaking, read. An AirBnB mission statement of sorts: We also stopped trusting each other. And in doing so, we lost something essential about what it means to be a community. After all, our relationships with people I literally threw up in my mouth when reading that. Your company makes money by renting out rooms by skirting hotel laws and you're wrapping yourself in a flag of "we're getting back to trusting one another!" What about the trust of that you bought into a place that isn't a fly by night hotel next door?

_delirium 11y ago
There's a bit of both going on: AirBnB is used by regular people renting out a spare room of a house or apartment they occupy, which sometimes has a vaguely couchsurfing-but-not-free feel to it. But it's also used by fly-by-night hoteliers running illegal hotels and hostels. And lately, it's also used by legal vacation-rental brokers as a competitor to VRBO/Homeaway/etc. The marketing materials obviously prefer to emphasize the first, but the second category does a lot of volume (the percentage seems to vary heavily by city). What's most annoying as an occasional user is that it's sometimes very difficult to determine which is which: is this someone's spare room (may actually lead to friendly personal interaction, probably won't cause significant problems for the neighbors), is it one of 50 "spare rooms" that this person is operating as a black-market business (impersonal, likely to be contributing to neighborhood social problems), or is it a VRBO-type rental unit just cross-listed on multiple sites' inventory (impersonal, but at least probably legit)? You can sometimes guess by looking at their other listings, but some people split their operation across a bunch of accounts. AirBnB could probably make life harder for people running the larger-scale operations if they wanted to, emphasizing the site's focus on lodging rented out by regular people, which could bring the site a bit more in line with the marketing copy. But I don't think that's the likely trajectory.
- TeMPOraL 11y ago
  Don't forget the category 1a - regular people renting out a spare room even though it's against terms they themselves rent their flat on. This can sometimes also contribute to the neighbourhood social problems.

codinghorror 11y ago

Terrible tragedy. I can definitely see the argument that Airbnb hosts should carry insurance for freak accidents / deaths that occur on their property in cases like this.

jimjimjam 11y ago
Yeah the hosts should assume all liability and pay for cost of freak accident insurance...of course not Airbnb!
- TeMPOraL 11y ago
  Does a newspaper bear responsibility for classifieds they post?
  - jimjimjam 11y ago
    If you're talking about Craigslist...they have a far better warning and flagging system than Airbnb does. I.e. If you try to buy a car they warn you about possible scams before you can look at the listings. Airbnb certainly does not do enough to proactively warn potential guests that they cannot vet the safety of any unit listed on their website.
    - TeMPOraL 11y ago
      Ok. Fair enough.
  - mik3y 11y ago
    Probably not much, but it's a silly comparison since newspaper classifieds do not work the same way: It surely helps that the newspaper is not managing the inventory, payment processing, photography, and customer relations on behalf of their sellers.
omarforgotpwd 11y ago
AirBnB should sell insurance that covers common issues hosts have, or partner with insurance providers, or adjust their % cut a bit and include this insurance for 100% of bookings

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

0xdragon 11y ago

I'm on a trip to Taiwan soon... And I booked an Airbnb. Ouch.

GFischer 11y ago
As jzwink said, you don't have any guarantees with a hotel either ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10531693 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10531693 ). I've had positive experiences every time I rented through AirBnB, the same cannot be said of hotels - I actually trust AirBnB a LOT more than hotels (as long as the property has some reviews). Maybe in the U.S. things work, but in other countries they don't... I've had the roof leaking BADLY on a hotel in Brazil (with lots of positive reviews in TripAdvisor), all guests' property stolen (also in Brazil), and I never had any recourse. People thinking about starting a lawsuit have never experienced 3rd world judiciary systems... (it can take a lot of time and money for very little returns). I fully expect you'll have a positive experience with your AirBnB in Taiwan, let's hope so :)

reviseddamage 11y ago

Erk... some of the comments here are brutally rational and ruthlessly logical. I would fully expect this narrative from decisioning AI units, not so quickly out of humanoids, at least not yet.

aardshark 11y ago
I don't know why your comment annoys me so much, but it does. What other response could you reasonably expect (or indeed, want)? If there weren't any rational and logical responses to this article, that would be truly saddening.
- reviseddamage 11y ago
  I can help as to why it is annoying. I felt the same way before typing that out, but still wrote that. I seriously tried to honestly tell myself whether I would have the same opinion and view, was I in the shoes of the author. Would I be able to rationalize it the same way? Would I be able to marginalize that event to a statistical "nonevent"? I don't think I would. But I assumed that everyone commenting on it had already exercised that viewpoint, and still shared those views. That is what I would expect of perfect decisioning AI units. That's not a bad thing. I just didn't expect it so early. What do I think should be the response? Um, well, sue the shit out of the host and by extension the provider, or require insurance by the hosts. The alternative would be that this guest's death is reduced to a reputation negative (statistical nonevent).

RockyMcNuts 11y ago

A bit sad that this is buried off the HN front page. There is literally a story with 0 votes submitted an hour later directly above it on the third page, and on the front page there are older stories with fewer votes. https://twitter.com/newsycombinator https://twitter.com/newsycombinator tweets about images of the French revolution with fewer votes, but not this, which seems a bit more relevant to tech, startups, sharing economy etc.