It's high time to remove all fees and let guests and hosts win!

[Frederic54]

The Hospitality industry, and Gig Economy are bound to change dramatically. Airbnb's hosts and "exchange platforms' operators", who once thought they were part of a genuine partnership, are awakening to the cold reality that they were merely pawns to corporations willing to dismiss them in a blink of an eye, overriding policies, and ignoring their commitments. This pandemic has shed a laser beam light on decaying models and forces governing the majority of these multi-billions $ organizations.
- Fees, specifically platform fees (15% paid by guests, up to 10% paid by hosts), and payment transaction fees (up to 5%) must disappear!
- For consumers, real actual benefits and added values are born from a purely organic, self-policing, highly distributed, open source and frictionless transparent ecosystem. Think of Blockchain transforming financial services!
- The hospitality war between traditional hotels and Gig economy platforms needs a truce. Most guests enjoy both the predictable hotel, and the personalized experiences. If they are to survive, they'll need to join forces.
*solicitation removed*

[Frederic54]

Sadden by these attacks and bully tactics which are uncalled for. But there are many sick people in this world (maybe the confinement is making it worse?). In any event, am all for new models especially if their business model is free to users. Everyone is free to do whatever they want build their own web sites or look for alternatives. The barrier to entry for businesses such as Airbnb is now very low and it’s great to see innovation. 

[Sarah977]

@Helen3 One of the first things that jumped out at me when I looked at that site was exactly what you said- there was no "About us" heading, as most websites have, telling you who is running it, how they started up, what their agenda is, etc. It's about as non-transparent as you could get, despite Fredricks' statement to the contrary.

And here I always thought "organic" meant grown without herbicides, pesticides, or chemical fertilizers 🙂

[Sarah977]

It's something that irritates me about the computing, high tech, and touchy-feely newspeak world. They've taken normal words in many cases and decided that they mean something completely different.

Take "toggle". The definition of "toggle", pre-digital age, is a type of barrel-shaped button most often used on heavy winter coats and jackets. But I bet anyone under the age of 40 doesn't know that- to them, toggle is something you do on a screen. 

50 years from now, if coronavirus or the latest new pandemic hasn't wiped out the human race, kids will be asking "Hey, Mom, I'm reading this book from the olden days and everyone seems to be constantly "reaching out". Why didn't they just hang their shelves and cupboards at a height where they didn't have to reach out for everything?" 

[Debra300]

That dude needs to learn how to effectively communicate his proposal so that a layperson can understand.  His constant reference to blockchain technology without providing some relatable definition made me shut him out.  However, I decided to do a brief research (less than 30 minutes), and non-extensive (I visited just two IBM Blockchain site pages).

I think this is what IBM's Blockchain site is saying.  It sounds like a peer-to-peer network that manages data: access, storage, administration, and security.  For peer-to-peer, think about Napster from 20+ years ago where people logged their computers on to a network, which enabled them to share music and movie files by granting access to each others disc drives and download/copy them to their local computer.  In this file sharing model, the original owner of the file didn't have the ability to control access to the files and restrict who was allowed to be a file provider.  Anyone who logged onto Napster could host or retrieve files.

One of the basic features about Blockchain Technology is that the data owner chooses what type of network to share the data: Public, Private, Permissioned and Consortium.  Each network type has its own data management model (the data collected and centrally managed or is each data owner responsibility for maintaining and securing their data and grant access permission to the data) level of access restrictions and data security.  After the network type has been chosen, the use of it is based upon trust with the other contributors/users (I will assume that there is some form of vetting done before allowing other into the blockchain network).  For a general example, the site says that Bitcoin uses a public network - anyone can join.

So, that guy mentioning Bitcoin was confusing to me, because I inferred that Blockchain Technology required the use of Bitcoin or cryptocurrency to perform transactions, and that is not the case.  Bitcoin is just one type of Blockchain Technology user.  This technology is also used by traditional financial service companies, businesses and healthcare organizations, because it provides a high level of security and completes transaction extremely fast: 

So, it appears to me, that this what that dude should have been trying to explain.  The current Airbnb model requires that they facilitate the booking and financial transaction, and charge the guest and host fees (they are a middle-man).  In a Blockchain Technology model: 1) A data network is set up (I guess dude would be the one who volunteers to do that) ; 2) People are invited to join the network (as a host your data will be your listing information, including calendar, booking app, and amenities).  Since each participant is responsible for their own data and hardware, the network administrative cost should be low, but there probably will be some sort of fee because the network administrator will have overhead costs (or maybe they will want to run ads on the portal); 3) People who are looking for a place to stay will be able to run a search based upon their criteria and make a selection among the search results.  The booking would be done directly on the host's computer system via the peer-to-peer network (there will be no middle-man to collect fees); 4) Trust is probably achieved by the fact that every bit of data is traceable (network participants are granted permission to join (probably after some level of vetting) and the enhanced data security (data records are replicated across several locations, making it more difficult to highjack or corrupt) that Blockchain Technology offers; 5) A cryptocurrency transaction would probably be more secure than using your traditional financial instruments which are tied to all of your personal identification.

[Sarah977]

@Debra300  Thank you for taking the time to explain this in language a non-techie can understand (it's still a bit complex for me, but now it at least means something besides gobbledeegook). It always amazes me that techie folks so often seem to be incapable of explaining something in common words and terms that any halfway intelligent person can understand. They seem to think that high tech words and phrases are something everyone gets just because they and those they associate with do.

There are some that are good at explaining, but I remember many years ago, when I was trying to learn my way around computer stuff, so many of my friends or acquaintances who were good at it just didn't know how to teach it to someone else. They'd grab the mouse and start clicking away really fast, saying "See, it's simple, you just click on this and then toggle over here and then you scroll over to here and blahblahblah."  I'd be "Uh, dude, you lost me about 10 steps back. How about you let me wield the mouse at my own speed and just instruct me what to do next." 

[Branka-and-Silvia0]

I've seen his comments on another thread and he is a very rude dude.

[Sarah977]

@Branka-and-Silvia0 Yes, seems to think very highly of himself and although relentlessly pushing this site, refuses to explain it in a way a regular person with no high tech experience can understand.

[Mike-And-Jane0]

There is a scam here somewhere - First to identify it wins a prize.

[Mark116]

Who would be dealing with potential credit card fraud or other financial fraud in a 'free' system that has no staff?  Airbnb is bad at many, many things, but they are pretty good at at the financial end, in assuring that the guest credit card is not fraudulent and that the host gets paid.