Airbnb Tries New Screening System for 'High-Risk Reservations' After 'Party House' Fatalities (buzzfeednews.com) 48
"The CEO of Airbnb has announced that the company will be banning 'party houses' and doubling down on getting rid 'of abusive host and guest conduct' in direct response to the deadly shooting that broke out during a Halloween party held at an Airbnb rental in Orinda, California," reports BuzzFeed News:
On Thursday, renters of the home in Orinda threw a party attended by more than 100 guests, despite the Airbnb host stating that parties are not allowed at the property. Five people were fatally shot after gunfire broke out, and the Contra Costa County Sheriff's Office is continuing to investigate the tragedy.
On Saturday, Airbnb's co-founder and CEO Brian Chesky wrote a Twitter thread announcing a plan of action to carry out a site-wide ban on "party houses," including implementing a system that will screen for and flag "high-risk reservations." Additionally, the company will be "creating a dedicated 'party house' rapid response team," Chesky tweeted, before also pledging to take "immediate action against users who violate these enhanced guest policies, including removal."
When asked how exactly it will determine which listings are "party houses" (or be potentially used for parties), an Airbnb representative told BuzzFeed News they're still in the process of figuring out these variables. "All of this is being determined as part of the 10-day review being spearheaded by our new VP of Trust, Margaret Richardson," the representative said.
On Saturday, Airbnb's co-founder and CEO Brian Chesky wrote a Twitter thread announcing a plan of action to carry out a site-wide ban on "party houses," including implementing a system that will screen for and flag "high-risk reservations." Additionally, the company will be "creating a dedicated 'party house' rapid response team," Chesky tweeted, before also pledging to take "immediate action against users who violate these enhanced guest policies, including removal."
When asked how exactly it will determine which listings are "party houses" (or be potentially used for parties), an Airbnb representative told BuzzFeed News they're still in the process of figuring out these variables. "All of this is being determined as part of the 10-day review being spearheaded by our new VP of Trust, Margaret Richardson," the representative said.
Reward and Liability (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Reward and Liability (Score:4, Insightful)
The gig economy isn't worth it when the liability sits on your head.
Damn straight. If there's one thing the sociopaths in Silicon Valley are good at, it's coming up with ideas that harvest cash to them which pushing risk off to others.
Laws, regulations, customs, working conditions......these are mere externalities to them.
Not externalities. TOOLS. (Score:2)
Laws and regulations are mostly written by their think tanks and signed off by their lobbIst "politicians", to further their goals.
And if some competitor did it, they make you blame "the government"... implying that that is not *them*.
There are two types of AirBnB users (Score:2)
The next are foreign investors looking for a place to stash money, usually from their governments and the tax man.
The former don't have any real options and will roll the dice, the latter don't really care since they were just going to pay the money out in taxes anyways.
And as always
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And can't rent them because AirBnB short term rentals make more money than long term rentals.
Why rent out your house for $2000/month when you can charge $100/night? Get it occupied and that's $3000/month, or 50% more than a tenant who rents it for a year.
A lot of long term rentals are being converted to short term rentals using AirB
Re:Reward and Liability (Score:4, Interesting)
The gig economy isn't worth it when the liability sits on your head.
Except that it doesn't. Airbnb reservations have automatic $1M liability insurance.
Host protection insurance [airbnb.com]
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Which they didn't start to feature until 2014, [wikipedia.org] at about the same time they finally stopped openly evading paying taxes.
You know... when it became obvious that it was either follow the rules or go to prison time.
As for the issue above...
Only way it makes ACTUAL difference is if they start featuring either random inspections by humans OR 24/7 surveillance of the premises.
Followed NOT by fines or lawsuits but by calling the cops on the party goers.
Or are we to expect that teenagers stealing mom and dad's credi
$1 million isn't a drop in the bucket (Score:4, Insightful)
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The gig economy isn't worth it when the liability sits on your head.
Except that it doesn't. Airbnb reservations have automatic $1M liability insurance.
Host protection insurance [airbnb.com]
Just reading the link you gave it's mostly third party injury insurance, and $1 million may not cover much if a person is seriously injured or if multiple people are involved. My normal home insurance without AirBnB has $10 million third party coverage.
It also won't cover the landlord for damages if a bunch of partying assholes decide to trash the joint. In some local incidents the damage to houses have approached $100,000.
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Sure, but which clowns are providing hotel or guest house services without proper hotel insurance?
Surely nobody would be stupid enough to put their property on Airbnb without the relevant commercial use insurances?
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It's amazing all the logical twisting that needs to be done to lay moral resonsibility at the feet of deep pockets.
Asses threw a party where they shouldn't, and problems happened.
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Please state authorities, don't regulate us! (Score:5, Insightful)
We still don't give a damn if your host cancels at the last minute or they put hidden cameras in the rental. Y'all are on your own with that shit.
Here is what will happen. (Score:3)
They will come up with a system that successfully identifies high risk renters. They will face extra scrutiny, restrictions or outright denials.
But these high risk renters will fall into some protected class and through the twisted and perverted principle of âoedisparate impactâ be sued for discrimination of some kind.
It depends on how AirBnB does it (Score:2)
If they ban, say, black people, because their algorithm says they are more likely to start parties, then yeah, they're gonna have trouble. Moreover, skin color is generally not the factor here, it's more a matter of things like income, the person's neighborhood, education, etc. A 25 year old black professional with a $150k/yr who lives in a 4000 s
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Identifying high risk renters is the problem. It's pre-crime. Of course it's going to be biased because it isn't based on something they have done, like putting out a message on Facebook, it's based on some bunch of inferences about them.
AirBNB already bans people who trash the place, this is some new pre-crime detection system. It's scary how quickly people can be convinced to support this kind of shit just by framing it as "we could be safe if it weren't for the SJWs!"
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Risk Management is, "Pre-Crime".
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airbnb knew this was a problem worldwide in coastal towns well before this happened - you taxi et all drivers probably know the local party houses.
Sure not all airbnb clients are assholes but it was a matter of time before somebody it an issue.
Not sure what is worse getting shot or being known for that house where the shooting took place.
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"Today, we are pleased to announce that our new VP of Trust, Margaret Richardson, is being promoted to an even newer position, VP of Marketing Trust. Her existing VP of Trust role will migrated to a newly-formed Safety and Liability team, which will be spearheaded by the candidate we eventually hire. For those interesting in applying, the position requires candidates to possess thirty years experience with Internet-based subletting in a crowd-sourced economy."
Good luck with that filter algorithm (Score:5, Insightful)
Based on all my years attending a university, I've learned this: *Any* house, apartment, dorm room, break room, public park, parking lot or street can be used to stage a big ol' party.
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Without guns people find other ways to kill each other.
In Germany people getting pushed in front of a train has become a regular occurrence. In the UK it's knife stabbings. And in Sweden it's bombings.
Fatal violence is on the rise in all these oh-so-social countries with restrictive gun laws.
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Without guns people find other ways to kill each other.
In Germany people getting pushed in front of a train has become a regular occurrence. In the UK it's knife stabbings. And in Sweden it's bombings.
Fatal violence is on the rise in all these oh-so-social countries with restrictive gun laws.
A better argument against limiting guns is that Canada and Switzerland, which both have massive numbers of armed civilians, achieve practically zero murder rates.
The biggest mass killing in the UK using a knife was the London Bridge attack [wikipedia.org] in which 8 people were killed and 48 injured. By comparison the Las Vegas shooting had 58 people killed and 413 injured, not quite ten times the number. With far more terrorist attacks, the UK ends up with far fewer casualties. So it's not that there aren't killings
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By comparison the Las Vegas shooting had 58 people killed and 413 injured, not quite ten times the number.
However, had the perpetrator lacked access to firearms he could easily have achieved a comparable casualty rate through use of explosives, improvised or otherwise.
Shit, you could build your own GPS guided mortar shells these days.
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Sweden:
While the use of explosives in Sweden is a problem, there been no fatalities so far (to my knowledge). It's not as if Swedish families keep hand grenades around for home defense. The problem is primarily organized crime.
Germany:
In Germany there was an incident in July this year, where a crazy person pushed a boy in from of a train, killing the boy - but it's hardy a growing trend.
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Most of that is suicides, which is a problem, but is used in a weasel word context to suggest violence out in the streets.
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Don't bring logic and statistics with context into this discussion! We're talking about GUNS!
Nonsense aside, a pragmatic, data-driven look at risk assessment for rentals (or gun ownership, and so many other things) would be helpful. But what happens if the data shows that a certain otherwise legally protected group/status (age/race/religion being easy examples) are higher or lower risk? Today, we prohibit that type of behavior ... unless you're an insurance company or live in a retirement community of co
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Americans, the most generous people on the planet, who produce half or more of everything invented every year?
Pal, your nation needs to be more like us, not the other way around.
You gotta be crazy to AirBnB (Score:5, Interesting)
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Limited liability is useful and not a workaround of anything. It stops business screw-ups from sucking up all the business assets then going after the owner's personal stuff, which did happen all the time.
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How is AirBNB responsible for this? (Score:1)
Apparently people have to actually die (Score:2)
...so AirBnB will intervene to attempt to protect landlords.
But when AirBnB tenants are dealt horrible experiences from scammy landlords that shift people into run-down "party houses," they stonewall and protect their own profits.
https://www.vice.com/en_us/art... [vice.com]
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Easier Way (Score:1)
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Boom...try to collect that. Well, first try to prove it. Then try to get a court to enforce it. Then try to collect it.
Then give up because the cost to do so will greatly exceed any 'surcharge' they could possibly justify.
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https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7125655/Bachelorette-party-guest-went-psycho-trashed-Nashville-Airbnb-drinking-two-bottles-wine.html [dailymail.co.uk]
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/24/business/the-other-side-of-an-infamous-hamptons-house-party.html [nytimes.com]
Airbnb (Score:1)
They should focus on actually running background checks on hosts. They mislead consumers by saying ID verified but they don't actually verify jack.