[dangrossman]

Airbnb essentially just e-mailed people that listed rentals on Craigslist with a message that said "hey, you should list this on Airbnb.com too". You could call that spam, but there's nothing fake about the content of the message, nor is the linked website purporting to be anything it's not.

[martey]

"...there's nothing fake about the content of the message,..."

It has been almost 2 years since this story broke, so I think it is beneficial to read the original article and the HN comments that appeared at the time: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2603844

I think nhagen - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2604918 - summed up what is wrong with the emails best:

"I don't hate that they did this, but I hate that they tried to pretend they were anonymous women that happened to really like AirBnB. Why be so shady about it and instead why not just be honest?"

I think it is clear that AirBnB also understood that the Craigslist messages were not above board, based on the apology that Christopher Lukezic, their spokesman, sent to several news publications.

"We have since learned that some of these remote contract sales people were apparently aggressive with their outreach and may have used Craigslist to attract customers to our service who were not open to solicitation. This is not a tactic we condone or endorse, and it is our policy to forbid such actions."

[rush-tea]

I thought airbnb also posted a fake CL ad stating that a room is available, then when someone contacts the ad, then it says that the renter also posted at airbnb and redirect users to airbnb as well?