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Edit: bring on the downvotes! That's right, downvote a difference of opinion, and forget about logical or reasoned counterargument. Next time the internet lynch

by temphn 15y ago

Edit: bring on the downvotes! That's right, downvote a difference of opinion, and forget about logical or reasoned counterargument. Next time the internet lynch mob will come for your startup; hope that someone takes your side when they do. ---- Don't you think the CEO has to worry about the people he's paying? Who knows what their burn rate is; that funding could have been a life or death event, and in the event of death then a bunch more unemployed people would be hitting the streets. And that wouldn't help anyone, least of all this woman. AirBnB reported this to the police. They said they had someone in custody. What more do you want them to do? Go after them like Dirty Harry? Dollars to donuts this woman is planning a lawsuit and looking for a payday. Not against the drug addicts who trashed her apartment, but against AirBnB. She rents out a room to people she's never met in person and then acts surprised when sometimes it goes wrong. It's depressing to see the mob mentality here on Hacker News, and the extent to which Arrington delights in playing the organ grinder. A pedestrian is hit by a DUI driver, does he sue or blame Honda? No? So why all the hate on AirBnB when it was a bunch of drug addicts who committed the crime? Sell them into old school bondage and send the income to her, by all means, but let's be real: it was the criminals' fault first, her fault second, and AirBnB in a distant third.

bmj 15y ago
I think you're missing the point--the CEO asked the victim to take down her blog because it was bad press. If you were considering funding the company, wouldn't you want to know about potential issues?
ColinWright 15y ago
Putting aside the questions of blame, and the eventual intent of the individual. Putting aside the question of culpability, and whether anyone acted inappropriately. Thinking about this entirely from the perspective of AirBnB. Doing what a company is supposed to do, by law, and considering only the shareholders. Given what they've done, do you think it's the best thing to have done to give the company the best chance of long-term survival? I don't. Leaving out the morals and the ethics, assuming we only care about the company's survival, this issue has to be dealt with in an open, transparent, and above all seen by all to be fair manner. Providing for the short term care of this customer is vital. Whether it's right or wrong, ethical or moral, if they don't do it, people will say "That might have been me." Above all else, that will kill AirBnB, and they are seeming to do nothing about it. Leaving aside the moral and ethical considerations, working only according to the game theoretic standard of doing right by the company, what they are doing is clearly not in the best interests of the company. ======== ADDED IN EDIT: From http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html : Please don't bait other users by inviting them to downmod you. FWIW - I didn't down-vote you. I think you're wrong, and I don't think you've thought it through enough, but I didn't down-vote you. I took the time to reply because I think your view is common enough, and you had the courage to say it out loud. But as I say, the current actions (as we understand them to be) are not in the best interests of the company or its employees - really, they're not.
- temphn 15y ago
  Well, ok. While being entirely rational, let's also think about a related angle. The woman is out quite some money. She wants it back. The most coldbloodedly rational act on her part would have been to wait till they closed the round and then sue. Which, if you read her post carefully, is almost certainly what will happen in terms of timeline. A billion dollar co is a real juicy target, much more so than the actual bad guys.
  - ColinWright 15y ago
    Sure. And: a. She's in a fit state to be cold-bloodedly rational b. She knew AirBnB was about to close a round c. That closing was within a few weeks, and hence worth waiting d. In the meantime she has no home, and has to deal with d.1. the police, d.2. all the credit card issues, d.3. all the banks, d.4. AirBnB themselves Seems unlikely to me that she planned that. <shrug> You call them as you see them. I'm saying that I think AirBnB did the wrong thing to start with, and continues to make it worse, even discounting the ethics and morals. Add those in and it's even worse still. | Rock | AirBnB | Hard place | The real issue, again ignoring ethics and morals and just concentrating on optimal course of actions for the company - where is their risk assessment and contingency plan? If they don't have one, that's tantamount to negligence. And you can't claim 20:20 hindsight, because people have been expressing concerns over this issue ever since they started. As a director of two companies, one of which is involved in safety and security issues, I watch the unfolding - and perhaps unravelling - drama with interest (in both senses of the term).
- temphn 15y ago
  > I think your view is common enough, and you had the courage to say it out loud. Thanks, I guess. Philosophical: seems to me that the tone of HN has shifted. Not in the standard way, it's not less intelligent per se. Rather, there is a greater proportion of big-co employees, academics, and college students. People without profit/loss responsibility, who don't deal directly with customers, who've never been through a media firestorm like what AirBnB is experiencing now. While it's usually hard to pinpoint any particular change, it's safe to say the tenor of this thread would be very different if this was still Startup News. YC alums need not say AirBnB has handled this well (i concur that the mere existence of this thread shows that they made objective errors, though in my opinion not normative ones). But they would not be so quick to trash the startup.
robtoo 15y ago
What more do you want them to do? Well, for starters: company officers shouldn't be using weasel words to try and take credit for things they haven't actually done.
Klinky 15y ago
Don't you think the CEO has to worry about the people he's paying? Who knows what their burn rate is; that funding could have been a life or death event, and in the event of death then a bunch more unemployed people would be hitting the streets. Well, how bad is bad PR? Their service has this major flaw that your home can get royally trashed & there is no backup. If they let this stand AS-IS, all it's going to take is a couple news networks to pickup on the dangers of social housing & down the toilet a lot of their potential customers go. And that wouldn't help anyone, least of all this woman. AirBnB existing & doing nothing isn't any better than AirBnB not existing and being unable to do anything. Why should she really care about their livelihood if they don't seem to really care about her livelihood? AirBnB reported this to the police. They said they had someone in custody. What more do you want them to do? Go after them like Dirty Harry? Recoup her losses or at least make an effort to. Then instigate a plan to cover their asses the next time this happens, because if they continue as a service this probably will happen more often. If they are going to leave the homeowners wholly responsible for any damages without offering some sort of insurance or protection, then they're going to remain niche & their word is as good as dog poo. "Yeah, we provide a safe way to do this, we just won't guarantee it, because that's not really exactly true." Dollars to donuts this woman is planning a lawsuit and looking for a payday. Not against the drug addicts who trashed her apartment, but against AirBnB. She rents out a room to people she's never met in person and then acts surprised when sometimes it goes wrong. So AirBnB has a flawed business model. They can't vet people properly, their word is not guaranteed. Why should I ever trust AirBnB again? Let's play roulette with my housing. A pedestrian is hit by a DUI driver, does he sue or blame Honda? No? Terrible analogy. If Honda advertised that their cars were safe, but in some cases under normal operation their cars had catastrophic failure despite the owner not doing anything out of the ordinary, then yes, Honda would have a major issue on their hands. You seem to be pointing at how EJ was a fool for lending her house out to strangers, which just so happens to be the business model for AirBnB. So if she is stupid, what does that make AirBnB? "Social Housing For Stupid People", could win a lot of customer's with that slogan. I am not down entirely on AirBnB, but when I first heard of them I thought "ehh, sounds risky, what happens if someone trashes your place?" Well now I know what happens & it ain't pretty.
- Aqua_Geek 15y ago
rexreed 15y ago
Yup, this does indeed deserve the downvote.

by temphn 15y ago

bmj 15y ago

I think you're missing the point--the CEO asked the victim to take down her blog because it was bad press. If you were considering funding the company, wouldn't you want to know about potential issues?

ColinWright 15y ago

Putting aside the questions of blame, and the eventual intent of the individual. Putting aside the question of culpability, and whether anyone acted inappropriately. Thinking about this entirely from the perspective of AirBnB. Doing what a company is supposed to do, by law, and considering only the shareholders. Given what they've done, do you think it's the best thing to have done to give the company the best chance of long-term survival? I don't. Leaving out the morals and the ethics, assuming we only care about the company's survival, this issue has to be dealt with in an open, transparent, and above all seen by all to be fair manner. Providing for the short term care of this customer is vital. Whether it's right or wrong, ethical or moral, if they don't do it, people will say "That might have been me." Above all else, that will kill AirBnB, and they are seeming to do nothing about it. Leaving aside the moral and ethical considerations, working only according to the game theoretic standard of doing right by the company, what they are doing is clearly not in the best interests of the company. ======== ADDED IN EDIT: From http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html : Please don't bait other users by inviting them to downmod you. FWIW - I didn't down-vote you. I think you're wrong, and I don't think you've thought it through enough, but I didn't down-vote you. I took the time to reply because I think your view is common enough, and you had the courage to say it out loud. But as I say, the current actions (as we understand them to be) are not in the best interests of the company or its employees - really, they're not.

temphn 15y ago
Well, ok. While being entirely rational, let's also think about a related angle. The woman is out quite some money. She wants it back. The most coldbloodedly rational act on her part would have been to wait till they closed the round and then sue. Which, if you read her post carefully, is almost certainly what will happen in terms of timeline. A billion dollar co is a real juicy target, much more so than the actual bad guys.
- ColinWright 15y ago
  Sure. And: a. She's in a fit state to be cold-bloodedly rational b. She knew AirBnB was about to close a round c. That closing was within a few weeks, and hence worth waiting d. In the meantime she has no home, and has to deal with d.1. the police, d.2. all the credit card issues, d.3. all the banks, d.4. AirBnB themselves Seems unlikely to me that she planned that. <shrug> You call them as you see them. I'm saying that I think AirBnB did the wrong thing to start with, and continues to make it worse, even discounting the ethics and morals. Add those in and it's even worse still. | Rock | AirBnB | Hard place | The real issue, again ignoring ethics and morals and just concentrating on optimal course of actions for the company - where is their risk assessment and contingency plan? If they don't have one, that's tantamount to negligence. And you can't claim 20:20 hindsight, because people have been expressing concerns over this issue ever since they started. As a director of two companies, one of which is involved in safety and security issues, I watch the unfolding - and perhaps unravelling - drama with interest (in both senses of the term).
temphn 15y ago
> I think your view is common enough, and you had the courage to say it out loud. Thanks, I guess. Philosophical: seems to me that the tone of HN has shifted. Not in the standard way, it's not less intelligent per se. Rather, there is a greater proportion of big-co employees, academics, and college students. People without profit/loss responsibility, who don't deal directly with customers, who've never been through a media firestorm like what AirBnB is experiencing now. While it's usually hard to pinpoint any particular change, it's safe to say the tenor of this thread would be very different if this was still Startup News. YC alums need not say AirBnB has handled this well (i concur that the mere existence of this thread shows that they made objective errors, though in my opinion not normative ones). But they would not be so quick to trash the startup.

robtoo 15y ago

What more do you want them to do? Well, for starters: company officers shouldn't be using weasel words to try and take credit for things they haven't actually done.

Klinky 15y ago

Don't you think the CEO has to worry about the people he's paying? Who knows what their burn rate is; that funding could have been a life or death event, and in the event of death then a bunch more unemployed people would be hitting the streets. Well, how bad is bad PR? Their service has this major flaw that your home can get royally trashed & there is no backup. If they let this stand AS-IS, all it's going to take is a couple news networks to pickup on the dangers of social housing & down the toilet a lot of their potential customers go. And that wouldn't help anyone, least of all this woman. AirBnB existing & doing nothing isn't any better than AirBnB not existing and being unable to do anything. Why should she really care about their livelihood if they don't seem to really care about her livelihood? AirBnB reported this to the police. They said they had someone in custody. What more do you want them to do? Go after them like Dirty Harry? Recoup her losses or at least make an effort to. Then instigate a plan to cover their asses the next time this happens, because if they continue as a service this probably will happen more often. If they are going to leave the homeowners wholly responsible for any damages without offering some sort of insurance or protection, then they're going to remain niche & their word is as good as dog poo. "Yeah, we provide a safe way to do this, we just won't guarantee it, because that's not really exactly true." Dollars to donuts this woman is planning a lawsuit and looking for a payday. Not against the drug addicts who trashed her apartment, but against AirBnB. She rents out a room to people she's never met in person and then acts surprised when sometimes it goes wrong. So AirBnB has a flawed business model. They can't vet people properly, their word is not guaranteed. Why should I ever trust AirBnB again? Let's play roulette with my housing. A pedestrian is hit by a DUI driver, does he sue or blame Honda? No? Terrible analogy. If Honda advertised that their cars were safe, but in some cases under normal operation their cars had catastrophic failure despite the owner not doing anything out of the ordinary, then yes, Honda would have a major issue on their hands. You seem to be pointing at how EJ was a fool for lending her house out to strangers, which just so happens to be the business model for AirBnB. So if she is stupid, what does that make AirBnB? "Social Housing For Stupid People", could win a lot of customer's with that slogan. I am not down entirely on AirBnB, but when I first heard of them I thought "ehh, sounds risky, what happens if someone trashes your place?" Well now I know what happens & it ain't pretty.

Aqua_Geek 15y ago

rexreed 15y ago

Yup, this does indeed deserve the downvote.