I'd like to host Brian Chesky. I would pick him up from the airport with my small, grey, dented hatchback, disguised as a Ferrari. The next morning I think we’d take a streetcar because the streetcars go slowly, like the great old records on the turntable. I’d show him a Milan most people will never see.
I’m sure he would like to extend his stay here, but, meek and immovable like an AIRBNB’s case manager, I’ll say: "I'm sorry, Brian, I’m booked into the next week. A new guest will soon come in, a certain Mark Zuckerberg”.
I would like him to come here for a reason. Sometimes the rules of friendship impose to say inconvenient truths.
"It’s OK if I call you Brian? Although we don't know each other, I managed some of my father's houses, working for you for seven or eight years, I can’t remember, and all my most cherished memories are still on your server, even if my father's profile is no longer active.
I followed your orders, I followed your rituals, I responded at once to individual requests, I opened doors, washed sheets for your $ 30 billion company and you didn’t even drop me a line once, I say once.
Just to say hello, I am one of the richest men in the world partly because of you, Emily. You helped make that happen, so thank you, say hello to your father and keep it up, please.
But you never did. For all these years I've worked for you like a dog, not a word to say hello, not a line to thank me for the close cooperation, not even a glance. Nothing.
You didn't drop me a line. Look, Brian, I didn’t expect you to do this. It was fine if Mr. Algorithm did it for you. Well, that would be enough for me.
Look, Brian, I really respect you – I guess that’s something you don’t care about – I admire you, I was saying, for hundreds of reasons, but above all because I was gripped by your dream. You set my life on fire, you moved it and changed it. Fires spread passions and it’s nice to see someone’s passion be rewarded.
But when your company took its first steps into adulthood, the original essence of hosting has been largely replaced by a neurotic business that has sucked up all that magic from the traveler spell.
Turns out I was trapped on a single path prepared by a mathematical model. I had to do what an algorithm asked and didn’t give a **bleep** about me. I don’t like hosting generated by an algorithm.
You turned me into a precarious worker (the Superhost medal only lasts for three months), with a low level of job security (if I receive few bookings or bad reviews, you close my account), and few rights (the guest is always right, and if he’s not right, never mind, it’s always the host that pays).
High risk, low pay and seriously messy. You just keep me alive, but with very high productivity ratios (4.8 + 50% reviews) and with the obligation to provide you the same means of production! (a few years ago a 20-dollar airbed on the hardwood floor, today a house, tomorrow an elite hotel).
You see, dear Brian, I think it was my contribution, combined with the contribution from Robin, Sarah, Branka, Ben, Jessica & Henry, Cormac, Paul and every other segment of the world organized by your algorithm, that made it possible to make your dream come true. Our job is the reason you are invited to speak at conferences as one of the most wealthy men on Earth.
That, my friend, should make you bow to them in front of you to give full respect, you should thank them more often, and not humiliate them because they do not comply with your new “guidelines”.
Don’t make fun of them with those unreasonable changes cunningly masquerading as improvements. You should recognize the importance of their good work. The important thing is to make them important because they deserve it. There are so many fragile things everywhere, people break so easily, and so do dreams and earthly passions”.
That is clear, dear Brian, I know there‘s so little chance of you reading these lines, but you know what scares me the most? Okay, all right, you'll never come to my house, I know, but just in case you have the urge for a trip in Milan, well, dear Brian, just know that you’ve got always a bed in my place. If that happens, then my joy would actually be perfect.
Your friend forever
Emily
