5 ms·

This is horrifying. I know we feel like there's nothing we can do and this type of thing is old news, or maybe a risk no matter where you are... but I can't do

This is horrifying. I know we feel like there's nothing we can do and this type of thing is old news, or maybe a risk no matter where you are... but I can't do business with a company that reacts this way.

bpodgursky 5y ago
Do you have a reason to think AirBnB is doing anything less moral than existing hotel or motel chains? I would expect most operators to call the police and hire lawyers to ensure that their liability stays at 0, and not much else. AirBnB is offering victims sometimes millions of dollars to settle claims, but they cannot force the victims to do anything. It turns out that as individual agents with free agency, the victims sometimes prefer to have millions of dollars.
- rhizome 5y ago
  >Do you have a reason to think AirBnB is doing anything less moral than existing hotel or motel chains? I don't know about their morality, but their ethics appear to built upon Not Invented Here syndrome, where they don't allow themselves to learn from the (long) history of hotel and motels.
- blagie 5y ago
  I'd take millions of dollars over unencumbered free speech! That said, it's rarely millions. Total settlements = $50M. They have 100 full-time safety agents. This means each agent handles an average of $500k per year. If we assume each agent handles 4 incidents per day, times 200 days, that's 800 incidents, or under $1k per incident. The scale of the problem, per the article, is striking.
  - bpodgursky 5y ago
    I think the 4 incidents a day is an exaggeration, but each "incident" is also not a rape or murder. Most are going to be for stuff like "the toilet overflowed" or "the power went out". $1k is not at all unreasonable for most "routine" emergencies.
    - blagie 5y ago
      It was a best guess with large error bars, not an exaggeration. My assumption is that minor incidents would take 5-15 minutes (e.g. in your case of the toilet overflowing, perhaps a refund). If this dominated, you'd be looking at 30+ cases per day per agent. More serious incidents would probably take a few days. I kinda took a geometric mean, but I have no idea the threshold for incidents escalating to this team.
- bingidingi 5y ago
  It's one thing to offer support, it's something else to use support to make silencing someone palatable. I will disagree with this no matter who does it. Even feeling as strongly as I do about this, I would personally have a hard time turning down millions of dollars — the power imbalance is so large here that it's the illusion of a choice.
- srslytho 5y ago
  everyone's bumhole has a price. whats yours?

bpodgursky 5y ago

Do you have a reason to think AirBnB is doing anything less moral than existing hotel or motel chains? I would expect most operators to call the police and hire lawyers to ensure that their liability stays at 0, and not much else. AirBnB is offering victims sometimes millions of dollars to settle claims, but they cannot force the victims to do anything. It turns out that as individual agents with free agency, the victims sometimes prefer to have millions of dollars.

rhizome 5y ago
>Do you have a reason to think AirBnB is doing anything less moral than existing hotel or motel chains? I don't know about their morality, but their ethics appear to built upon Not Invented Here syndrome, where they don't allow themselves to learn from the (long) history of hotel and motels.
blagie 5y ago
I'd take millions of dollars over unencumbered free speech! That said, it's rarely millions. Total settlements = $50M. They have 100 full-time safety agents. This means each agent handles an average of $500k per year. If we assume each agent handles 4 incidents per day, times 200 days, that's 800 incidents, or under $1k per incident. The scale of the problem, per the article, is striking.
- bpodgursky 5y ago
  I think the 4 incidents a day is an exaggeration, but each "incident" is also not a rape or murder. Most are going to be for stuff like "the toilet overflowed" or "the power went out". $1k is not at all unreasonable for most "routine" emergencies.
  - blagie 5y ago
    It was a best guess with large error bars, not an exaggeration. My assumption is that minor incidents would take 5-15 minutes (e.g. in your case of the toilet overflowing, perhaps a refund). If this dominated, you'd be looking at 30+ cases per day per agent. More serious incidents would probably take a few days. I kinda took a geometric mean, but I have no idea the threshold for incidents escalating to this team.
bingidingi 5y ago
It's one thing to offer support, it's something else to use support to make silencing someone palatable. I will disagree with this no matter who does it. Even feeling as strongly as I do about this, I would personally have a hard time turning down millions of dollars — the power imbalance is so large here that it's the illusion of a choice.
srslytho 5y ago
everyone's bumhole has a price. whats yours?