| I disagree. Don't take me as a "hurrr corporations" person, I am not - hotels, even chain hotels, are at the end of the day run by real people. Your local Best Western is likely run by a family, not suited, faceless corporate officers. The difference between reviewing them and reviewing an AirBnb isn't how faceless they are, it's how much they can afford it, and how much they can actually use the review as an impetus to improve. That review does no good if it simply means the business folds. > "The thing is Airbnb originates from the couch surfing and hostel ecosystem" Ehhhh... I'm not sure if I buy that line of argument. Couchsurfing.org originates from the couch surfing and hostel ecosystems, where the focus is on experience with the host/guests instead of a plainly quid pro quo exchange. AirBnb has no real focus on this experiential exchange and instead has always been very firmly in the "make money on your place" camp. AirBnb likes to portray themselves as being related to the populist communities of couch surfing and hostels, but I don't see any evidence that they were ever in that space. They certainly aren't now. I was initially an ardent supporter of AirBnb, but their persistently dishonest PR positioning has really turned me off lately; that includes their persistent and annoying efforts at positioning themselves as some sort of populist revolution. When's the last time AirBnb ever marketed themselves as "find a place, meet cool hosts, go adventuring with your hosts/fellow guests"? Because that's a fundamentally core part of the hosteling and couch surfing ethos. AFAIK this has never been an AirBnb angle. In fact, if you look at the featured properties (curated by AirBnb themselves) you will see a dramatic dominance in luxury properties, not cute little bungalows where you're likely to hang out with a cool host. The descriptions are also always strictly about the property, not the host, and the photographs are also strictly of the property, not the host. The host is a small-print detail in the AirBnb model, which makes it almost entirely antithetical to hosteling or couch surfing. |
To me the property focused listings are a way for Airbnb to attract people who are too nervous to try the real couch surfing community by making Airbnb appear more like a property first hotel system. You can't blame them for this, because the subset of people who are willing to try this kind of thing if it was purely host based would be quite a bit smaller.
But the problem is that Airbnb obviously isn't a normal hotel system, and so some people who go into the experience expecting a hotel experience can be turned off by it when it doesn't meet their expectations.
On the other hand people like me who enjoy the chance to meet new people enjoy the social aspect but also like the slightly added safety of the reviews, pictures, and the payment system. Of course it depends on the host, but I've had some amazing experiences with hosts during some Airbnb stays: going to rock concerts, restaurants and bars, eating meals that they've cooked, and of course just talking to them and learning about their lives. My favorite experience was getting to stay with a couple who were aerialists for Cirque du Soleil, and months later returning to NYC to see an amazing opening performance by their own troupe of performers.
So to me Airbnb seems on the surface to be property based like you said, but underneath has a strong host ecosystem like couchsurfing.org The problem is that Airbnb is using properties to attract guests instead of the host experience. Of course this attracts people who are more demanding about the property and when the property falls short people are naturally unsatisfied.