Airbnb’s War on Porn Stars | Hacker News Reader

Airbnb’s War on Porn Stars

thedailybeast.com

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Most of the big web companies are A North American and have the prudishness that goes with that. For all the talk of inclusion this sort of thing shows how it's hollow.

I'm guessing this has nothing to do with prudishness and everything to do with people putting their places and Airbnb and finding out porn was shot at their place and it's now a hazmat site.

I'm super curious how shooting porn would make a place any more unsanitary than a normal couple staying somewhere and having sex. If anything, porn stars ought to be safer and cleaner - they are regularly tested and porn shoots won't be anywhere near as messy as regular sex between two normal people.

The only angle I can understand is having your apartment in a porn movie, which is unacceptable because you rent it out for people to stay in, not draw commercial profit from it through film production. But calling a porn shoot a "hazmat site"? Nope, don't agree here at all.

I think assuming porn production is intrinsically 'dirty' in a way that, say, a cocktail party with 20 ppl wouldn't be is exactly the sort of prudishness you're claiming is irrelevant here.

Hell, a family with three kids and a gallon of ice cream seems more likely to create an obscene mess than all but the most avant garde of porn (though I don't have kids and have never made a porn, so this is speculation)

So you’re telling me if you were renting out your house for $100/night, you would be OK with a porn crew filming scenes in your bed/rooms in an effort to skirt the system (of porn companies paying thousands per day per location) instead of renting to a family of 4? Seems highly unlikely and those homeowners have every right to ensure a covert porn scene is not shot in their homes.

Me personally? Yes. It doesn't matter to me if the people being intimate on my bed while I am away are married or porn stars. I am planning on washing the sheets just as thoroughly either ways.

My point wasn't that I'd be a-ok in the homeowner's shoes.

I'd be pretty pissed off if people rented my place for any business purposes under the guise of tourists.

...Newman.

I would be somewhat annoyed, but I don't think much can be done about that. Turning away porn actors probably isn't an effective way.

Are you missing the taxes they would have paid?

How would it be worse than if they filmed a snuff movie there? Or a commercial for a cause the host vehemently disagrees with?

I could see a point if they were banning accounts that use rented paces for commercial activity, assuming it were against the rules. But banning people for work they do is going a big too far. Although not unexpected from SV's "world-changing" hucksters.

Ten years ago (pre-AirBnB), a renter used my house as a porn studio. We found out when a friend sent us a link to a dvd's trailer, saying "this may look familiar". Opening scene was in our shower, then bed, then couch, then a group scene on the kitchen worktop, of all places.

While this was disturbing at first, the 'ick' feeling quickly went away and we could see the funny side of it.

What really hurt was the renter skipped out leaving two months' unpaid rent, plus sky high heating bills (needed to keep the apartment warm enough for naked actors, apparently...)

This got more upvotes than any of my technical HN comments. Proving the adage that sex sells!

P.S. I thought about including the link to the online trailer. But I'd probably end up banned. It's definitely NSFW.

porn was shot at their place and it's now a hazmat site

That is a ridiculous statement. What about "regular" couples having sex in an AirBnB? Or only pornstars have sex?

Amen. Maybe Airbnb should mention that a) normal rental agreement doesn't permit porn production.

b)and if a residence is used for porn that the host and Airbnb gets a share of revenue - separate contract.

It was a hazmat site whether there was porn shot there or not.

Porn happens, with or without the camera. Its called sex.

A lot of us have it at AirBnB precisely because thats the point.

Not for nothing, but most companies beside following applicable laws, typically also follow the mores of the people they serve --so they will bend to this or that public pressure, irrespective of whether it's the right thing to do, from a perspective of justice.

In some cases it means they do the right thing (avoiding prejudice, other times it means that same pressure results in a different prejudice, as evidenced here). But again, I'm not sure I'd want to rent out my property to people using it as a stage location, unless remuneration was commensurate with what they are doing.

But the person in question was just using Airbnb for trips, never for shooting anything. Airbnb had no evidence that she was anything but a normal user, other than Google stalking and finding out her occupation.

AirBNB as a company simply disgusts me.

So after forcing every user on their platform to agree to a "Non discrimination policy" pop up window which feels pretty weird and accusatory - I mean i'm trying to book a villa on a beach, what does my opinion of other people have to do with anything? Take my fucking credit card, make the booking, and my thoughts and opinions are none of your damn business.

What's next, all their male users must be forced to attend online "how not to rape" classes to be able to make a booking?

So here we are - Airbnb caught with their pants down being absolute hypocrites. Turning away a user because of her chosen career in the sex industry. How is that not discrimination?

I think it's time AirBnb got out of the ideology politics game and just ran a damn booking service.

They are a typical SF company -- lots of posturing and virtue signaling while screwing people and entire communities over.

But ofcourse it’s less ok to screw people the natural way than the money way...

For all of the SFBA's supposed progressiveness, in the end they are still almost as prude as the rest of the US...

Let's assume, for the sake of argument, that "never ... in my name" just means aliases were involved and she was involved in shooting porn in an Airbnb rental. That still leaves open the very serious question of how Airbnb was able to make the connection. Possibilities range from investigating a legitimate host complaint to questionable use of user data to outright stalking by an employee. Anybody who uses Airbnb should probably consider which is more likely, and what that means for their own privacy/safety.

They mention that they kept asking her for different forms of ID and then a clearer picture. Here's a scenario that's consistent with what they've said:

She shoots a porn in an AirBnB rented by someone else. At some point the host pulls up some porn and recognizes his house. He reports this to AirBnB. AirBnB looks at the porn, suspends the account of the person who rented it, and then tries to figure out who the performers are.

They get the real names of the performers, and then search their system for people with that name. "Jay" matches the search, but they want to make sure it's the same person as in the porn, so they ask for a clearer picture. After they're confident that she is the person who filmed a porn in an AirBnB without the permission of the host, and they discover that she's also listed on an escort site, they suspend her account. If this is what happened, and I think it's pretty likely, AirBnB did exactly the right thing.

Quote from article: "I’ve never shot porn in any Airbnbs in my name, and I didn’t have any complaints" - Sara Jay.

The report and Sara Jay say they have never done a porn shooting in an AirBnB, although this could be a he-say she-say scenario, because will need an investigation. But shouldn't have immediately stopped the account before notifying the actual Airbnb user and then proceeding with an investigation.

She did say any Airbnb in my name. The qualifier means she did at an Airbnb which someone else booked. Otherwise she would have said I never shot any vidio in an Airbnb rental the need for a qualifier makes it suspicious.

Or it means she knows she’s never rented a place via Airbnb for the purposes of porn production, but can’t say one way or the other about each and every location she has worked at.

Do you think that Robert Downey Jr. knows the contract details of every location for every movie he’s ever worked on?

In your scenario, how is air bnb doing the right thing? She doesn't have a contract(nor a terms and condition) with airbnb. But you think it is OK to suspends here account because someone else broke the rules?

Suppose Led Zeppelin rolls into a hotel room and trashes it, as they frequently did. Will the hotel chain just ban the band's manager because he was the one who booked the room? Presumably they don't want any of 'em back.

What Jay is saying is: "I promise that whenever I go to someone's home who thinks we're a quiet couple on a weekend getaway, but really we're bringing a camera crew, and your house is now going to be on PornHub, I will do it under a different account. Please let me use this account normally." AirBnB is saying that if you lie to your hosts and shoot a porno at their house, you're banned. Simple, obvious.

> If this is what happened

If. That's one way it could have happened. There are several others, all less reassuring than that. In light of what we know about privacy practices throughout the industry, and about Airbnb's practices in particular, I don't see how your optimism is justified.

I know this is old news on this thread, but I created https://www.kinkbnb.com after AirBNB kicked one of my dominatrix friends off their site three years ago. Making a profit off AirBNB's posturing - they just posted a "dominatrix experience" too, making themselves look especially hypocritical.

>I’ve never shot porn in any Airbnbs in my name

Why the qualification about "in my name"? Does this mean that she shot porn at an AirBnb but it was under someone else's name? If that is the case, then AirnBnb would have a good argument that she was violating the terms of service.

Presumably the name was of the person renting it, perhaps the producer.

Maybe… but I've never once asked to see the lease at a client site to verify the terms under which they were allowed to do business there.

Or maybe she's done tons of shoots at tons of different cool/expensive houses and has no idea how they were booked so thought she'd cover herself just in case.

It's both typical and despicable.

Did this site redirect me to a shady add-site on the scrolldown-event?

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