gobongo
gobongo on Hacker News
Your "EJ" moment will be someone dying of e-coli poisoning. Until then, have a ball!
I hesitated to even bring it up because I didn't know how to say it without it sounding like a personal attack, but FWIW, I didn't mean it as one.
We all have photos taken of us that convey personalities that aren't really our own. I don't think you're a douche, but the photo gives that impression a bit.
IMO the problem isn't that he looks 20, but rather that he looks pretty douchey in that photo. Looking young isn't so bad in this context, but looking like you just stepped off of the set of one of those MTV 'reality' shows is.
I'm fairly certain this is going to get me down-voted through the floor, but please at least view the picture in question prior to down-voting me for saying this.
Have any news sources stated whether or not EJ owns the place that got ransacked? I often see it referred to as her "apartment" in various places and was curious if she actually owned it or was a renter who was subletting it herself? Perhaps part of the problem Airbnb has coming fully clean with the entire story is the whole can of worms that potentially opens up if/when it becomes common knowledge that a lot of their business is built on subletting that isn't even technically legal (according to most rental contracts) in the first place.
I can easily imagine they are done for. Not because of the PR backlash, but because what they are doing is already quasi-illegal in a lot of places and one juicy story like this that the media, lawyers and politicians can jump on is just about all it will take to eventually remove the "quasi" part.
The criminals already know everything about her (real name, likely her social security number, etc), what on earth does she have to lose by "extremely public" blogging?
This post is spot on and the fact that airbnb keeps tripping over this point is just baffling. Are they ignorant or evil? They have to be one or the other.
Isn't it common sense that asking someone "What can we do to help?" is about as useful as yelling "Someone call an ambulance!" to a crowd? Anyone with half a lick of sense says "Hey, YOU (Point), call an ambulance" or "Here's what we're going to do to help you..." (and then actually do it). How can you be the CEO of what is supposedly a billion+ dollar company without realizing these basic things?
Madness.
All of this discussion about what airbnb should or shouldn't do is ultimately moot now. Unless they can prove "EJ" is totally fictional and/or an insane liar the company is essentially dead in the water already (at least as a US operation). Not just because of the PR hit (though that is substantial), but because of the inevitability of media, lawyers & politicians circling the wagons around this story.
Airbnb's business will be explicitly illegal throughout much of the US by year's end, and honestly in its current incarnation I'm not convinced that it is a bad thing (for obvious reasons this is clearly a market which needs more regulation and process than they provide).
Nice experiment... too bad about all of that flushed away money though.
Don't you understand? You're not Google's customer, you're Google's
product!
Wait, wait, that isn't the right groupthink response for this situation.. Give me a second....
This is not a bubble this time, this is a real new new economy, the old rules (nor the old new rules) don't apply.
Wait, that's not right either... nm, I'm not sure how to think about this one so I'm just going to downvote you.
Thanks for the self-reply. It allowed me to downvote you twice!
"But until I don't hear a confirmation from Dropbox I am going and assume that all this never really happened and it's just a prank."
Various big-name dropbox people are likely aware of this thread now based on their quick responses to previous threads here at HN. The fact that they've said nothing here is virtually an admission that there was a problem. It only takes a few seconds to bang out a 'this claim has no merit' post if it indeed does have no merit.
The question is, are they working on some sort of official statement to make (which would have to be exactly worded and thus I can understand the lag time) or are they ducking down and hoping this will just blow over?
IMO they absolutely need to address this very soon, and not just as a one line email that promises it'll never happen again.
Best not to talk about it in public, but let's just say Steve Jobs has another liver lined up, should he need one.
You know who complains about slavery? Slaves. I've never heard of a plantation owner who complained about slavery.
"When it comes to war (and, yes, this is war"
Spoken like somebody that has never been anywhere near a war. How many casualities have there been in this Google/Facebook war? How many innocent civilians killed as collateral damage? How much forced migration resulting in starvation, out-of-control refugee situations, etc?
It is a shame your developers allowed you to commit perjury in such an automated fashion.
With all due respect to you and your company (and while I fully support your right to invoke your TOS to take down content within your own service) I'd actually love to see one of the people you DMCA'd slam you on that aspect of this situation legally if for no other reason than to make other companies think twice (or three times) before they improperly invoke the DMCA to scare people into submission.
Indeed! This company seems to be gettin' a bit too big for its britches! Somebody oughta knock 'er down a peg or two!
Looks like you're getting downvoted, but really the OP should be downvoted for bad writing.
"in the past 7 days, my partner has failed to make ONE meeting"
Dear OP, this states that your partner has made it to 6 out of 7 meetings. I know you didn't actually mean that, but that's what you said (well, typed).
You're gonna get so sued for this.
No (assuming it isn't a subpoena, which this isn't).
Yes.
He has just as much position to whip off a letter to Steve Jobs as anyone else, though his letterhead means he's probably less likely to receive a "no big deal" response.
That's for the voters in Minnesota to decide.
Apple to release all iOS libraries under LGPL?
... Rumors are circulating!
AAPL will keep going up because it always goes up, like home prices! You'd be a fool not to buy shares.
That may very well be the worst headline I've ever seen here on Hacker News, and not just because of the Etsy typo (though that plays a part in it).
I couldn't even parse what it was trying to say until after clicking through to the link.
Abused housewife says would consider return to husband.
Nice site!
All of this attention means you're going to get a nice C&D letter from the lawyers of Henk Roger's Tetris Co. LLC real soon, though.
I pay $25 a month for unlimited data and text on Virgin Mobile. Granted, nothing "unlimited" is really unlimited, but I stream music on my Android phone on this plan all the time and have not hit any soft or hard cap.
> 4 points by clvv 2 hours ago | link | parent | flag
That's 2 hours ago.
I have to say, I agree. Just think about all those starving kids in Ethopia with no upvotes and here we are on HN sitting in our comfortable Aeron chairs just pissing our upvotes away.
Proof positive we are in the karma bubble here!!