Comment by hitekker | Hacker News Reader

Comment by hitekker | Hacker News Reader

Interesting.

I've hosted over 40 couchsurfers in Manhattan so I have a few concerns.

My largest one is that HackerCouch lacks a reference system so that people "know" who is a good or bad host or guest. Googling every one who messages me, the host, may not yield as much info as I would like, since most folks aren't 1000-twitter-followers, ten-thousand-github-commits, Forbes-interviewed, rockstars (Like Me![1]). Accordingly, HackerCouch needs some faculty to indicate and ensure the trustworthiness of its listings: perhaps like the kinds founds in Couchsurfing.org, BeWelcome or AirBnb. Otherwise, all hosts ought to have and to link their listings to at least one other platforms so guests can see their pictures, reviews, and other metadata, to make an informed decision to stay with someone who is, essentially, a stranger.

On this note of having to use another platform: I know I would also have to create a staging email address for managing requests. Having received 400+ requests in 4 months, I can safely say that 1% of people will go to... creepy lengths if they feel like they aren't getting the attention they deserve. Clearly showing off all my contact info is fine on my marketing site, but not fine when I'm offering something up for free that people can take free advantage of. AirBnB and Couchsurfing offer a comforting layer of messaging for the host: allowing me to interact cordially with most potential guests without fear of the crazies.

Please note I'm not saying this to discourage you; I would just like this promising idea to avoid the many painful lessons Couchsurfing.org has learned. (... and then ignored.)

[1] This is sarcasm. But if we meet in real life, I'll be sure to scream about it with conviction[2].

[2] This is not sarcasm.

I'm still figuring this out, so thanks for the concerns and suggestions.

Reference System: I think I saw a website on reddit recently that let you rate your experience on multiple platforms (Can't seem to find it now). But that doesn't work for everyone. For eg, I don't even have a listing on any other platform. Couchsurfing isn't very big here. I'm sure having the entire revision history in git would be of some help if I build a reference system. I'm open to ideas on how to exactly go about this.

Request Management: I could setup some form of email forwarding (How to get your real email over a side-channel might be an issue). Somebody asked me about setting up chat.hackercouch.com for a similar purpose, and I'm open to doing that as well.

On a different note, do you have any suggestions on the trademark issues surrounding Couchsurfing? We have an open PR to replace CouchSurfing with Hospitality Exchange and I'd love to hear your thoughts. [0]

[0]: https://github.com/captn3m0/hackercouch/pull/4

Thank you for being open minded.

> Reference System

I would suggest piggy backing off another platform for now so that you can get the legwork out of the way and focus on the more unique/cool stuff. Tons of people have multiple listing across AirBnB, Couchsurfing, etc, so I don't see any kind of argument against adding yours into the mix. On your side, this would entail forcing all hosts to link to at least one verified platform and making sure that all their contact info matches what is available in that link. You wouldn't want someone to misrepresent themselves by saying "hey this is my cool place in SF!" and having an email address with a suffix of .co.kp

> Request Management

Same idea as above. Implementing internal messaging is unfun and feature wise would probably not compare to the more established platforms. So, for now, allow hosts to suggest their preferred method of communication[1]. You'll probably won't be able to capture the conversations and, in my mind, that's fine at the starting gate. For now it's all about getting a good liquidity, i.e. guest lookings vs hosts accepting. Regardless of if this is intended to make a profit: guests want lots of open places/people, and hosts don't want to be overwhelmed.

The trick is to make sure your platform has a value-add ( so guests + hosts clearly realize it's helping them!), I'd recommend suggesting to hosts to tell prospective guests to write things like "Yo, I saw your thingamajig on HackerCouch!"[2]

> Couchsurfing trademark issues.

Is there another fun word that conveys what you want out of this platform? It's definitely not worth tangling with Couchsurfing the company.

[1] Chats like slack or IRC are generally not a good medium for requests/pre-hosting conversations, in my opinion. Hosts don't like feeling pressured to respond in the way a chat medium kinda-sorta-implies you should, and requests can tend to be on the longer side. Note: longer messages like emails are pretty always the case for any dialogue with a trust deficit; chats work much better once the two parties have gotten to know each other/don't have to carefully formulate their words.

[2] I have strong feelings about the way requests & references work, in ways that may not be scalable. So I'll try not to push my opinion too hard.

I like the idea of building a reference system in.

One thing to note is that you actually validate the user owns said account on another site.

On B/S/T forums back in the day, a semi-common "scam" was an impersonating user saying "here's my 1000+ feedback eBay account", which may have the same username but they did not actually own.

I don't want to be a middle-party for most of the experience. I don't want to have your data about who you are visiting or when. I wouldn't want that data.

As such, I'd ideally like people to communicate over a trusted third-channel. We could provide them a proxy email, I guess to anonymize them somewhat, but seeing as we are already asking for social links, its somewhat moot as your real email should be easily searchable using those social media links.

Makes sense to have HackerCouch being referred on couch requests. I'll add a note and a pre-written subject/body on the contact email link.

I'll look into verifiable platform links and see if I can figure out something. Thanks for your inputs.

Since all this makes sense, would you mind (me ?) creating issues on the github page for discussions ?

Not at all. Feel free to do so.

Slightly off topic but... I've never couchsurfed but have Airbnb'd quite a bit. I've held the unfounded assumption that couchsurfing accommodations would be questionable, in unsafe locations, have issues with scams or theft, etc.

Can you comment on how this compares to reality in a place like Manhattan where short-term housing rentals can be pricy?

And also, philosophically why you choose to host couchsurfers vs paid guests?

I can't talk specifically about Manhattan, but the basic idea behind this site is to help hackers find other hackers willing to couchsurf. Its not a way to make money (for me or the host). Its just a nice way to meet cool people.

I am wary of meeting strangers on the internet. I don't have a Couchsurfing profile, or an airnbnb listing, but I am far more open to fellow hackers.

We've hosted both in Japan. It's a very different atmosphere, couchsurfers tend to be long time world traveling hippie types that are interesting to host just to hear their stories and help them out. They often arrive by hitch hiking and we've even had some who are walking hundreds of km across Japan.

Surfers have low expectations for accommodation and usually the day is spent chatting and going to places together.

AirBnB is for example couples and people who expect something closer to a hotel and more privacy, they may be busier and prefer to pay for convenience. Say career people who only have a week or two to spend in Japan, so they pay to make things go as smoothly as possible.

Most hosts do it for the social benefit -- people to hang out with, traveling without having to leave their own home (via stories/info from those staying with them), and building new relationships across the globe.

More on host incentives: http://www.horizonapp.co/blog/incentives-hosting-hospitality...

Agree. Also, "ten-thousand-github-commits" doesn't make a person automatically a safe host. Would you want to couchsurf with Hans Reiser?

Tongue-in-cheek-aside, I was going for "I can google this person and see their background." At least with Hans Reisers, I would have hopefully been able to see the court case :)

Sage advice. I read this after seeing a couch-offerer on this site with a name of "trouble"...!

I happen to know trouble personally, and that is really his nick at most places.

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