While you're right, it hasn't stopped them, "classifieds" have largely been eroded by things like Craigslist, which do allow you to do a bit of research and contact on your own. They don't prevent it. And I typically am not paying for the privilege of meeting my ransacker/assailant.

What's more, CL (and others) actively try to scare you with warnings about how not to get scammed and such. ABNB doesn't seem to take that approach, trying to wrap the whole thing up as a comfy/pleasing experience.

I know the father of one young person who was murdered after responding to a Craigslist ad looking for a babysitter.

http://www.startribune.com/local/south/41701952.html?elr=KAr...

(I met him after his daughter's murder.) The Craigslist founder Craig himself was involved in responding directly to that incident and appeared in public at a memorial event for the murder victim.

http://www.startribune.com/local/west/44272442.html?page=all...

These days, Craigslist has a lot of warnings about dangerous transactions, and for Airbnb to NOT have had similar warnings until last week suggests its lawyers weren't on the ball about what a reasonable standard of care is for being a third party arranging room rental transactions among strangers.

The young woman who was murdered in this part of the country was a kind, trusting, and perhaps hopelessly naive young woman who was surprised by a pervert with a deadly weapon. Airbnb regularly sets up situations, as in the recently reported incidents, in which the wrongdoer doesn't even have to confront the victim while stealing movable property, stealing identities, and destroying real property. Precisely because Craigslist incidents have been in the news for years now, it's crazy for Airbnb not to measure up to the industry standard of care.

"These days, Craigslist has a lot of warnings about dangerous transactions, and for Airbnb to NOT have had similar warnings until last week suggests its lawyers weren't on the ball about what a reasonable standard of care is for being a third party arranging room rental transactions among strangers."

It's still not similar.

How many people are going to really find that safety page? Compare this with Craigslist which has safety links on the search results and on the post.

And Craigslist doesn't take commission from transactions, so it's not really the same boat at all.

Craigslist is a classified site, and it's had it's share or rapes and killings:

http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=craigslist%20killing

Though interestingly, there wasn't nearly as much blame heaped on craigslist when this happened as is currently being heaped on airbnb.

CL is free and arms-length for rentals, while AirBnB is an active broker and financial participant in their rentals.

Are you kidding me? I read about the craigslist killings from every major media source that exists. ABNB is mostly in tech crunch, so far, and most of the heat they're taking isn't even about the fact that it happened as it is about their hamhanded response.

The difference is that airbnb takes 30% of the transaction fees and sounded it was safe everywhere in its website when it is clearly not.

CL doesn't do everything they possibly can to keep hosts from doing due diligence on their renters.

Then why do we need airbnb at all? Use craigslist for hotels too. The big issue here is that airbnb claims from the start that they are more than just classifieds, giving people a sense of security which is false.

>Then why do we need airbnb at all?

Website more pretty. They also have an intro video with a lady talking. Craiglist does not have a pretty site or video with a lady talking.

Exactly that false sense. I 've never used airbnb, but reading the positive hype i would be very positively biased to use it, while i would think Craigslist is "creepy". It's a matter of overinflated hype here more than anything else I think. With great hype, comes great responsibility, a wise man once said.

Well it doesn't necessarily have to be either or. AirBnB can adopt the same non-responsible legal stance as craigslist and still compete on user experience, strength of community, some level of non-guaranteed vetting, etc. I would agree though that they need be very clear and explicit about what they are and aren't responsible for, and they've apparently done a bad job of this so far.