Agreed. It strikes me as correct that if I rent/own an apartment in NYC, I should not have to deal with my neighbor's AirBnB business. There is room for compromise, but I would tend to favor putting the burden on AirBnB.

How about a person that owns a free-standing house?

No different, IMO. I live in a typical suburb - 4 bedroom homes, quarter acre lots. I don't want my neighbor running a B&B.

Is there room for compromise? Maybe. On general principle, I wouldn't mind my neighbor renting his house for a few weeks while he's on vacation. But, if the renter isn't a good guest (noisy). Or, instead of one renter for the duration, it's a new guest each night, I probably have a problem. Until AirBnB can convince me nothing like that will happen, I'd just as soon keep the rules as they are.

You're still skirting hotel regulations and occupancy taxes. There's a difference between, "My friend's coming to stay for awhile," and "$100/night to stay at Chateau d'Moi!"

In Manhattan?

Yes. In fact, one listed on airbnb. https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/62891

"The interior space is one small room, furnished with a loft bed, kitchenette and separate, full bathroom. "

They exist. Just very expensive.

as far as I know, there is only ONE free-standing house in Manhattan, and it is currently on the market for $13m - http://www.corcoran.com/nyc/Listings/Display/877330

There's a bunch of free-standing houses scattered through Inwood and Marble Hill. Not that they're a large portion of Manhattan's housing stock, and they're certainly not central, but they're there.

That listing's claiming to be the only free-standing mansion - which sounds a bit arbitrary to me.

A good compromise for a start might be something about maximum number of nights per year allowed. Later on, the government can get out from regulating what people do with their property.

Oh, so you don't mind my PCB lab next door? It's awfully convenient to my apartment, the commute was killing me.

+1 for the first sentence.

The second on the other hand... governments all regulate what you can do on your property. Who wants a night club upstairs?

Nobody, but I hate the stuff government allows my landlord to do.

Just because it's to expensive to "own" a decent house in this part of the world I have to dance when someone shouts?

This gets at a distinction I think matters: landlords vs individual owners. Landlords using AirBnB strikes me as against the ideal of AirBnB and I am not happy that they allow this. In fact when I try to locate an AirBnB spot, I always try to single out the ones that aren't from landlords but from actual individual owners (not always obvious).