https://survivingtomorrow.org/an-open-letter-to-airbnb-8b1b58b4ad33
I write to you today in the hope that you will radically re-structure your company before it starts a class war in which you will almost certainly lose the lion’s share of your wealth, your moral conscience, your place in history as innovators instead of oppressors, and you and your family’s physical safety. To be clear, this isn’t a threat—I am a pacifist who never condones violence including war, but I’m also a DNA relative of Marie Antoinette and understand what happens to elites who forget about the masses — so this is a plea to do the right thing before more people, yourselves included, inevitably get hurt by the raging masses who you are making homeless by the millions.
Brian, Joe, Nathan; you started Airbnb with the best of intentions. You couldn’t afford to make rent on your San Francisco apartment, so you bought some air mattresses and served breakfast to your guests. Brilliant.
But things have changed since then. Now you control an $80 billion company that has devoured millions of housing units, evicted countless families, and turned their homes into full-time clerkless hotels, with a promise in your IPO documents to fight democracies in court for as long as you can afford to do so.
arthur~battram… 