> Vested interests can fight as much as they want, but this is a done deal

I think this is absolutely the case. Right now we're seeing what happened in the early days of Napster. The RIAA and governments were shocked shocked at the widespread disregard for the law. Now a decade or so later it's common and widely accepted that breaking copyright is just something that happens.

Airbnb & Homeaway/VRBO & Craigslist are currently the exchanges for a p2p transaction, like Napster or Kazaa were for music. I suspect they will be targeted by existing interests and governments and they might even be taken down in some jurisdictions. But if they do, more will pop up in their place, as always seems to be the case in distributed p2p markets.

I expect the endgame to be similar. In some number of years, there will be "legitimate" ways of doing this, that let the governments take taxes easily and provide some sort of baseline regulation/dispute-settling/insurance, like how the Napsters and Kazaas paved the way and eventually led to services that work more inside the system instead of usurping the system. The under-the-table versions will never go away entirely, but if you can give me a basically hassle-free way of doing the same thing in a sanctioned manner (were I looking to rent out some space of my own, I'd greatly prefer a service that took care of the insurance, liability, and legality issues for me), I'm going to choose that. The question I'd love to know the answer to is just how much AirBNB plans on working with governments and insurers.

It's not about consumer protection. That's just a smoke screen. It's entirely about government revenue. Municipal taxes, sales taxes and government fees. Hotels and taxis and the like have to pay them and AirBnB and private rental models typically don't. By disrupting these models, these new services cut off revenues to cities and make it harder to justify the high taxes they milk the traditional businesses and tourists for. And cities are broke these days. And guess what, local voters also love (whether they realize it or not) the idea of raising taxes on out-of-towners instead of themselves whenever possible.

This is a very different situation in NYC.

1) Most people live in apartments, therefore a person who is an approved tenant is now inviting an un-approved tenant to take there place, giving them access to the building and common areas.

2) More importantly most NYC apartment buildings are co-ops and not condos. They are usually selective about owners and have appropriate sublet policy. Most Air BnB type sites would violate the sublet agreements in co-ops.

There need to be some protection for those that live in apartment buildings and don't share the same feelings about short-term sublets.

What you are talking about are private contracts - breach of contract is not a crime. The article is about the government persecuting AirBnB renters as criminals, and specifically refers to the protagonist as a homeowner.

> people own their stuff and they're damn well liable to do what they want to with it.

You own your car. You are not allowed to set up as a cab service without some kind of insurance and registration.

You own your home; you own the kitchen. You could not set up as a restaurant without a bunch of paperwork.

> Laws which were used to increase the quality of hotel stays back in 1890 have extremely little applicability today.

I want there to be an effective fire escape in case the building burns down. Is that law irrelevant?

I want the hotel to have a clean kitchen. Is that law irrelevant?

I would agree that perhaps there's too much paperwork for businesses.

(http://www.jwz.org/blog/2012/02/confiscating-your-ice-cream-...)

I would argue that your very sensible demands, for a sanitary kitchen and proper fire escape, can be seen to by market forces. Only rent AirBnB places whose reviews convince you they are appropriate. You can not be the only one who feels as you do. And with a new market like this, where people would not reasonably expect the automatic protection they ostensibly enjoy at traditional hotels, it is all the more plausible that they will select and review places sufficiently.

And I would respond that history has repeatedly demonstrated that market forces will not see to proper fire escapes or sanitary kitchens. If market forces had been adequate, we would not have such laws today.

Moreover, the type of people who would pay extra for a sanitary kitchen or a proper fireplace are not the type of people who would use AirBNB (or similar services) in the first place.

* If market forces had been adequate, we would not have such laws today.*

The problem here is what you mean by "market forces".

For a market to be truly open, free and efficient, buyers and sellers must be able to enter into transactions without hindrance. There must not be an overhead associated with transactions, and buyers need relevant information. People rail on "free markets" when really they miss the point. Unless the market is also open and efficient, being free doesn't amount to much.

In the past, you'd call a telephone number in New York and reserve a hotel. You had no relevant information about your purchase -- yes, you probably assumed a lot, such as "hotels in New York are nice" but you really didn't know. The market was open -- anybody could play.

So you ended up in a flea trap in a high-crime neighborhood and the manager took all of your money. You complained, and New York took action (Note that I'm making a generous case for regulation here. You could make a case that most regulations were the result of trumped up charges by monopoly players) People had no idea of what they were getting into. There was a lot of money and perhaps lives wasted due to people making deals in which they were unaware of the consequences. The market was not efficient.

What New York was doing, in a way, was creating a brand as a way to increase efficiency at the expense of market freedom. So when people came to New York they would know generally how hotels would treat them. This increased the amount of knowledge the buyers had, so it made the market more open. (But less free)

But that is _somewhat_ an outdated model. Note in my story I specifically said I was able to compare or contact previous tennants, look at the property on a satellite map, check references, and so on. The internet has made the market vastly more efficient. I no longer make a blind phone call and then show up and see what I get. There's still risk, of course, but the risk is distributed throughout the system. One bad actor steals 2 or 3 people's payment, then that property is effectively blacklisted. In a way, the penalties on the sellers is much more harsh than it used to be under the old system.

So this isn't an argument about free markets or some kind of laissez-faire capitalism. What we're talking about is simply what's necessary for people to trade efficiently. For many things (but not all) we simply don't need the same kind of government guarantee that we used to.

The problem was never in "market forces". It was in creating efficient markets. We've made some progress on that problem since those rules were enacted. We don't have to tear down all the rules, but we should at least acknowledge changing conditions. I'd argue in this case existing rules exist much more to protect vested interests than anything else, but that's just me.

> Note in my story I specifically said I was able to compare or contact previous tennants, look at the property on a satellite map, check references,

Cool. Do you check for "Number of patrons who've died in a fire"? Because having working smoke detectors, or adequate fire escapes, are not the kind of things that work for market forces.

"but this is a done deal: people own their stuff and they're damn well liable to do what they want to with it."

Not speaking specifically about your situation and experience which was positive for you but the laws also have other purposes. For example when you live in certain residential neighborhoods you're not expecting to have transient population.

Many communities restrict single family homes to "1 family" and many condo buildings restrict rentals to "1 lease per year" to prevent occupancy by people who presumably create a different atmosphere than regulars.

"the owner was magnificent, and I'm not about to share where it was!"

I love the old school way of thought. (Reminds me of not wanting to share a good mechanic or babysitter for fear that they won't be available when needed for ones own work!)

In 1890 it was not uncommon to rent a room in one's house to a stranger either.

In defense of these laws, that sort of thing was generally for a month or longer which is not against the law in New York. Short term stays were the domain of hotels.

> people own their stuff and they're damn well liable to do what they want to with it

Morally true, perhaps, but not legally the case.

It's another example of how laws are extremely difficult to enforce if they go against the public morality; an extreme example was how difficult it was to outlaw dueling until the fashion finally turned against the practice.

A more modern example is how most people really want laws against plagiarism instead of the copyright laws we actually have in most of the world: People get up in arms if someone plagiarizes someone else's work, but will gladly support copyright violators who are scrupulous about proper attribution.

A large number of people seem to think that's actually how the law works. This doesn't stop any prosecutions, but it makes the prosecutions no more effective than trying to bail out the Titanic with a colander.

So shall it be with this law, I predict.

I'd argue not even morally true. I support drug legalization, but I definitely want legal protections against someone else setting up a meth lab in the condo next to me. Externalities nearly always exist, and market imperfection makes it impossible to contract them away.

It's a genuinely thorny issue in this case, though. On the one hand, you can easily imagine mechanisms where allowing widespread commercial short term tenancy in your building would increase crime rates and put your own self and property at risk. At the same time, it's abhorrent to me to imagine my condo building saying that I can't have non-paying visitors over several nights per week, which would likely have identical effects.

So where does the line fall?

don't be so sure. in los gatos a woman tried to turn her lovingly restored victorian into a bed & breakfast and vigilant neighbors shut it down. people who are paying $1 mln and up to live in a neighborhood will know what is happening and will vigorously defend their zoning