Airbnb (YC W09): The Rise of the One-Room Hotel | Hacker News Reader

Airbnb (YC W09): The Rise of the One-Room Hotel

theatlantic.com

32 pointsrobg21 comments

Airbnb does run a risk of pushback by state/local governments. Cities create residential/business zoning for valid reasons. Airbnb disregards this zoning and turns every house into a potential hotel.

Nobody likes living next to a rental property.

That said, still a very ingenious idea and I wish them the best.

Hopefully state/local governments will realize the potential increase in tourist spending that Airbnb makes possible. I paid $X for a week of lodging via Airbnb. The equivalent hotel would have cost easily 3X. So now I've saved 2X... and since I'm on vacation I have no problem just spending 1.5X on purely fun stuff (restaurants etc). Also note that having to pay 3X for a traditional hotel would strongly discourage me from going on vacation all together.

Dear esteemed HN Editor,

Why add the YC branding to the title? If anything, the branding adds a weird reason to read the article. Without, it's simply an interesting idea in which a YC company is winning. I like the latter much better.

It's the default, which means the question is not when to add it, but when not to, and it's too much work to decide not to in a few cases where it might seem wrong for some subtle reason.

Seems like that default oversteps the need for editors. It's not adding clarity. It's pimping information for promotion, not genuine interest.

The default derives from the site's origins as a place for YC alumni to exchange links. HN is in effect like an alumni magazine that has gotten a broader readership.

I've never seen it referenced as such. Is that what you'd prefer it to be?

Rather than a default editorial action, why not simply ask the community to put the YC info in the title?

Like I said, it changes the interest for me. I'm less likely to read marketing. I could be in the minority even in this case as a happy Airbnb user.

Often the people who submit links do put the YC info in titles. But it wouldn't work to make it a rule that one had to, because a lot of submitters wouldn't know what batch a given startup was in.

That always seemed strange to me - a blend of advertising and ingratiation. I guess the difference here is I didn't think editors were responsible. Surely though the editors don't catch all YC references? If that's your desire, I'm sure many in the community would be interested in helping, even if the session year has to be corrected/added.

Surely though the editors don't catch all YC references?

The YC alums are the editors, that's why some things end up dead and others don't

a blend of advertising and ingratiation

HN is YC marketing, it didn't really start out as an alumni magazine either, but once they realized that they could use it to, you know, sell ...

Don't forget one of the side functions of hacker news is advertising for YC. There's a reason hacker news is news.ycombinator.com and not it's own separate domain.

Actually we originally intended to put the site at startupnews.com (when it was called Startup News), but the guy who controlled the name wouldn't let us have it. That turned out to be very fortunate, because if the site had been at startupnews.com it would have been much harder to change the focus.

You've had really good luck with people refusing to give you names.

(Viaweb was originally called Webgen, but another business was already using that name (and had the trademark, I think). They offered the other Webgen something absurd like 5% of the company to let them keep using that name. They said no, so they changed to Viaweb. I think Viaweb is a better name, and it almost certainly wouldn't have made them 5% more successful if they had been called Webgen.)

Yes. More generally it's remarkable how often not getting something you wanted turns out to be for the better. Perhaps because improving your situation often also constrains your options, and we undervalue lack of constraint because we underestimate how much things could change in the future (or how mistaken we could be now).

I think of it as providing more options. When one doesn't get what they want, they are usually forced to look into other different options, which subsequently provides alternate futures that they possibly never predicted because they were so set on a future dependent on the 'something' that wasn't acquired.

Organic advertising seems more genuine, and powerful, than simple branding. I'm happy to provide the advertising if there is an interesting phenomenon in which X is an instance. But I wouldn't post something simply to advertise.

Really like Airbnb hack for hotel system. I haven't used the service but following comment from the article makes sense. Does Airbnb have any process or protection to avoid this?

There's always the danger that something bad will happen to someone who rents a room, touching off a Craiglist-killer-like panic.

I'm also curious what protection or approach is taken to avoid bad things happening to single females renting a room through Airbnb.

I'm standing in a beautiful cottage I reserved via Airbnb right now. Using Airbnb has been a great experience and I've recommended it to about a dozen people so far. Keep up the good work!!

The hotels lobbying against airbnb and its likes in NYC comes off as cowardly to me.

Yes, there are health and security concerns and yes, they can be addressed by some common sense procedures such as checking ratings before you go and sending a friend the address of where you're staying, and maybe let them check in on you by phone if you're that paranoid.

Furthermore, the "craigslist killer" was also suspected to have been involved in three cases of assault and murder in actual, major hotels: Westin, Mariott and Holiday Inn based on similar criminal characteristics. Prosecution was stopped when he committed suicide. Crime can happen anywhere. Also, have you never heard of bedbug cases in hotels?

Viva creative destruction.

If you're talking about the bill that makes something like Airbnb illegal, their founder commented on it during StartUp School. If I remember correctly, he said that the bill was in response to people who would buy apartment buildings and use all the rooms to make them into an unlicensed hotel.

They talked with the sponsor of the bill and he said that they wanted to work with each other, or something to that effect. I haven't looked into it any more than watching his talk, so I could be wrong.

That's not to disagree with you, though. I find it a cowardly move, as well.

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