[joshvm]

Yes. I work for a small company and recently had to spend a few nights in a foreign city. Airbnb let us have an apartment in the centre of the city (we were 100m from the central square) for a fraction of the cost of an equivalent hotel. We didn't care about food because we were eating on expenses for each meal and the local restaurants were probably better than hotel fare. All in all it was a very pleasant stay.

I don't care about getting a gift basket or gym membership or being recognised personally at check-in. Perhaps if I travelled significantly more it would make sense. WiFi and a power socket next to the bed is enough.

The downside was mostly that we couldn't instabook, there's still some required interaction with the host. It means you need to be there on time and so does your host. If something goes wrong, you're at the mercy of a random person to fix it whereas in a hotel there's normally some chain of command.

For instance, our outbound flight was 6 hours delayed (different city) and we arrived at 3am. We were thankfully booked into a hostel for the first two nights with 24 hour reception. If we'd gone for Airbnb, we would likely have been sleeping on the street.

We had a great stay because Airbnb worked. If something had gone wrong, it would have been hell.