[BLenkomo]

I don't think anyone at AirBnB wanted to solve a real world issue.

They wanted to disrupt a market, same as uber, and did this by circumventing laws and breaking everything.

There is a reason why we have zoning laws: To protect housing for people. AirBnB broke this. Took my city munich / germany years in curt to get the data from AirBnB.

While Covid, plenty of reports came up how suddenly good flats in good locations became available again for renting to humans.

My mother uses flats for her retirement (she is not employed by a company and therefore doesn't get benefits) and she always tries to keep the rent low. Just that someone tried to AirBnB HER flat for more money than the rent.

Uber, just in case you are not aware of, takes the cake from taxi companies. Taxis who are there even if uber is not available. The only problem with taxis i have: They fight accepting credit cards still today. "Oh credit card? Mh were do you want to go?" yeah fu...

[keiferski]

Taxis were a nightmare to use before Uber; and they often weren’t available at all.

The whole concept of taxi medallions is also extreme market manipulation with basically no benefit to the average consumer, which makes it doubly odd that someone would consider them somehow more ethical or less manipulative.

[BLenkomo]

The benefit is, that people who need taxis, get taxis. Old people or sick people.

I have not seen any uber in smaller cities.

Uber goes were the market is 'cake'

[keiferski]

Again: if you tried to get a taxi prior to Uber existing, it was a nightmare and not at all reliable. You called the taxi company and if they felt like sending someone, they would. Often they'd say, "Sure, we'll send someone in 2 hours," and the driver never showed up. More than once I was stranded somewhere because of an unreliable taxi company.

This experience doesn't exist anymore, because Uber/Lyft/ridesharing apps out competed useless taxi companies.

People who needed to get taxis certainly didn't always get taxis.

[BLenkomo]

I'm not sure where you made this experience though.

But at least here most cities i'm aware of, do not offer uber. But Taxis.

Big cities sure they have uber.

I also agree though, i don't like that uber is disrupting existing markets just because but taxis are shitty. Still i haven't seen an uber doing dialisis drive in my hometown, its taxis not ubers.

[rightbyte]

> Took my city munich / germany years in curt to get the data from AirBnB.

This is so strange. Why can't the beurocrats just read the listings as everyone else? Is it too cumbersome to prove an apartment is sublet?

[BLenkomo]

Yes its a lot of effort to scrape some website which might change its UI.

Also an UI is not a scraping API.

Also yes you also need proof. Just putting it online is not a problem. Even doing temporarily because you are really away for a period is fine.

[sureIy]

You can't link a web page to the person behind it. Maybe Airbnb is in the right to offer the service in the country, it's just nobody could verify/enforce the ability to rent short term.

[fkyoureadthedoc]

> There is a reason why we have zoning laws: To protect housing for people.

Really? In practice it looks more like zoning laws exist so NIMBYs can increase their property value and keep black people away.

[MyPasswordSucks]

You should probably consume less sensationalist activist propaganda and spend more time delving into the actual unglamorous history of how, where, when, and why they came about. Chesterton's Fence [1] is a very relevant concept here.

Can cars be used as a weapon? Yes. Was Henry Ford a racist antisemite? Also yes. Do cars exist so people can run over Jews and minorities? No. (Family Guy cutaway aside)

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._K._Chesterton#Chesterton's_...

[fkyoureadthedoc]

Don't have to consume any propaganda. I just need to look at the zoning in my town and the shitty actions of my own HOA

[ethbr1]

I would recommend not living anywhere with an HOA. Hell is your unqualified neighbors pretending they're lawyers.

[BLenkomo]

I don't know what you mean referencing black people.

The zoning laws i mean are: commercial vs. non commercial vs. heavy industry (loud, safety requirements).

[fkyoureadthedoc]

Zoning isn't as simple as that though. Zoning laws can restrict neighborhoods to with height limits, density limits, large minimum lot sizes, single family homes only, etc, with the aim of prohibiting affordable housing for undesirables.