The only reason I can see to doubt EJ's story is if you're in the "this is a conspiracy against AirBnB" camp.
Suppose EJ is lying. Well, then, this business has a profound reputation risk which can be exploited by any given individual using (or claiming to use) the service. A risk which is going to tie heavily into some fundamental problems in vetting both guests and hosts.
Suppose AirBnB are lying. The company is exposed as being ungrateful, etc., as Paul Carr's excellent piece notes (conflict of interest or no, he captures the situation well).
Suppose EJ and AirBnB are both being truthful. Neither disputes that the house-trashing occurred, there's been some contact between AirBnB, and apparently at least partial assistance in finding accommodations, etc. We've still got a woman who's been hugely inconvenienced, has suffered real, physical, and psychological losses, and needs to put her life back together. And we've got a company with a real and apparently intractable problem with its business model, possibly running scared.
Inviting strangers off the Internet to come stay at your house is going to involve some very real risks, and some percentage, however small, of AirBnB experiences are going to end very badly.
As I noted in an earlier post on this subject, what happened to EJ isn't the worst possible case. A guest copying keys, returning to the home, raping and killing the host, would be ... a pretty bad day.
I think AirBnB are going to have to re-think what they're offering, whom they're catering to (for both guests and hosts), and what they can do to mitigate risks (guests are also assuming risks, though not to their real estate as hosts are).
Disintermediation via the Web is great when you've got a happy, happy crowd of people involved. The lesson from history is that this isn't a stable or scalable situation. Woodstock was followed by Altamont.
I've got my own suspicions as to who seems more credible, or at least is acting to type. None of us will know until more facts are known, police and criminal investigations are concluded (and perhaps tried), and the dispute between EJ and AirBnB is settled (perhaps also going to court). Even then much may remain vague, under seal, or otherwise obscured.
None of that changes any of what I've said: AirBnB simply involves too much risk exposure to all parties: hosts, gusts, AirBnB, and its investors/creditors.
It's going to have to restructure fundamentally, or fold.
Does anybody know what the facebook graph looked like in the airbnb case that went bad?
Her anonymous status really says something, like what? Well it says she's anonymous, that's it. Nothing more. This is pure hyperbole. The simple fact is, we don't have all the facts. It's her word against Airbnb's word. Neither side is more credible without more facts. Clearly both have demonstrated they will reframe their situation as circumstances change[1][2][3].
[1] http://ejroundtheworld.blogspot.com/2011_06_01_archive.html "I would be remiss if I didn’t pause here to emphasize that the customer service team at airbnb.com has been wonderful, giving this crime their full attention. They have called often, expressing empathy, support, and genuine concern for my welfare. They have offered to help me recover emotionally and financially, and are working with SFPD to track down these criminals." An initial perspective, pre-Internet mob: "EJ" made a first post about how helpful Airbnb has been, stating they have offered to provide "emotional and financial support".
[2] http://ejroundtheworld.blogspot.com/2011/07/airbnb-nightmare... "Airbnb has not assisted me in securing my safety, if that is the implication being made in Chesky's article" and "But the staff at Airbnb has not made a positive contribution to me personally or my situation in any way, particularly since June 30." Then in her second blog post she backtracks and claims that Airbnb has done effectively nothing to help her.
[3] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2822721 "Airbnb has been offering to fix it, from the very beginning. From the beginning they offered to pay to get her a new place and new stuff, and do whatever else she wanted." Here pg is commenting in regards to information he received from Airbnb, apparently contradicting the latest "EJ" post but corroborating the original.
"He said they would not reimburse her for damages, then talked about how they're just a service. Then we talked about something else for a bit. Then I read him what I wrote about what he said. then he said ok, but maybe we are doing something for her. I asked him if he wanted to me to write that they have no liability for damages at all, that they are just a service, that they are only helping her and the police find the suspect, and then say that the spokesperson changed his mind and said that maybe they were helping her but he wasn't sure and he had to check with customer service and get back to me? I suggested he figure it out and email me any corrections, which he did. It was one of the more amateurish moments I've seen, and if I had quoted the poor guy directly he would have looked like a fool."
I'm not taking sides: As I see it, both sides have reframed the story as it has progressed, with "EJ" retracting her original statement regarding help and Airbnb seemingly saying first one thing then another.
Finally, it's enough already: Airbnb should take measures to prevent this in the future and on the other hand people should remember they are inviting a stranger into their home. In my view, with the available facts, both sides are at fault in various ways or said another way: neither side is at fault.
Now can we move on with our lives and get back to Hacker News sans-drama?
Really? The ONLY reason? Your superlative-fu is strong.
Given that AirBnB offered her money and she isn't picking it up or returning their calls, but is talking to reporters, the most plausible explanation is that she's looking to get a huge payday in a lawsuit.
She didn't have to think of the idea herself. A lawyer or family member may have put the thought in her head. "This is a billion dollar company, you know!"
Do you really think she's not going to go for big dollars in a lawsuit at this point?
There's been conflicting reports about this. Airbnb told TechCrunch - on the record - that they wouldn't pay for anything, that they didn't want to set a precedent.
> she isn't picking it up or returning their calls
She says that they stopped calling her after she posted the blog, except to beg her to take it down and suggest she pretend everything is all better.
> is talking to reporters
She's posted two blog posts - the first one reporting the incident, and another a month later. That's not "talking to reporters." Your framing is disingenuous at best.
> Do you really think she's not going to go for big dollars in a lawsuit at this point?
I don't think that a lawsuit would do well considering she said several times in her initial blog post that AirBnB is not at all to blame for her experience and that she held a significant amount of responsibility.
Here's where you're taking it: she's not the victim, AirBnB is the victim. She's the "extremely difficult customer," or as Robert Scoble put it, "batshit crazy" and a "drama queen." She's not a victim, she's just a bitch. Right. I don't like demonizing victims, but I know in the male-dominated tech world this kind of framing is an easy sell.
http://travel.usatoday.com/destinations/dispatches/post/2011...
"Meanwhile, I communicated by email and by phone late Friday with a woman who said she was "EJ," a corporate events planner who later asked me not to be identified by name because of her continuing fears that other suspects may still be at large and because of the online furor surrounding her experience. (She also said she was speaking to the San Francisco Chronicle, and I confirmed portions of her information with the San Francisco police department.)"
This is your problem. You're thinking in terms of "victims" and "villains" when, instead, you should be thinking about the available facts and information.
"There's been conflicting reports about this."
- good news! We've been updated.
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2822721
That is the latest report from pg/airbnb.
And TechCrunch has already commented on this (http://techcrunch.com/2011/07/30/how-the-hell-is-this-my-fau...), which is why I said there are conflicting reports:
> 2. Airbnb’s Christopher Lukezic told me on Wednesday that the company was not responsible for EJ’s losses, that they would be paying anything for her losses, that they are just a service to match people and that they were helping the police find the people who did this. This was on the record, and it was a call we emailed about first. I didn’t take him by surprise. And I read this back to him before I posted.
> 3. Paul Graham says instead “The spokesman, who’d been told by their lawyers that he couldn’t go into detail about that because of the precedent said “I can’t comment on that.” So Arrington, in typical Arrington fashion said “Well, unless you tell me I’m going to write that you’re not willing to do anything for her.” And he did. Really not cool.
> That’s a lie. What he said is what I wrote in no. 2 above, and what was in the original post.
I suspect that AirBnB are telling themselves "We did no wrong, we didn't trash her appartment, she's a litigious who is dragging our name though the mud". Fair enough. Grow up, you are running a company that is going disrupt the hotel industry - get used to it. Everyone else in hospitality is capable of dealing with ugly situations. Many of them remain good people, despite the ugliness.
I really doubt that AirBnB are a bunch of "nice" people though. Their business is basically illegal in virtually every state. They might be charismatic. They might even have good intentions. But I doubt they are all stereotypical Boy Scouts (as opposed to real Boy Scouts, who are often capable of being very streetsmart, if the situation calls for it).
On the one hand you admit they are disrupting the hotel industry, so they should suck it up and suffer random abuse yet remain good guys and totally affable. (But you wouldn't say the same to the woman).
On the other hand you presume them to be evil and say that their business is "illegal in every state" (which it isn't).
Don't you think that's a mite contradictory?
Or she doesn't want "hush" money, or she's feeling scared and hurt.
This is incredibly naive. It could be the case that this was a setup. And it would be very easy to set such a thing up. And there's an entire industry with a lot of old money invested in that industry continuing. That means motive. Nobody here can say yet with 100% confidence what really did or did not happen. Could it have really happened in a non-setup fashion? Of course, and arguably it is/was inevitable. Could it also have been a "hit job"? You bet. Whenever you've got people in one camp with millions if not billions in existing revenue on the line, you have a motive. And the means and method are both easy and obvious.
No, it's based on all the existing evidence currently out there.
> It could be the case that this was a setup.
This is based on speculation.
> And it would be very easy to set such a thing up.
It's easy to do lots of things.
> And there's an entire industry with a lot of old money invested in that industry continuing.
So? Any evidence? Anything other than liking Airbnb/YC to suspect this?
> That means motive.
You've shown the hotel industry has motive. Not EJ. This is irrelevant.
> Nobody here can say yet with 100% confidence what really did or did not happen.
Nobody can say anything with 100% confidence when two stories conflict. We don't even require juries to be 100% confident, we ask them to be sure beyond "reasonable doubt." What you have here is not a reasonable doubt. It is concocted
> Could it have really happened in a non-setup fashion? Of course, and arguably it is/was inevitable.
Yes, it was inevitable. This is a good reason to suspect
> Could it also have been a "hit job"? You bet.
My water could have been poisoned by my next-door neighbor because I had a loud party one night. I have no reason to believe this, but it could be happening! In fact, that silly scenario has better motive (which you emphasize) than your concoction since it actually ties the accused to the motive, which you haven't done.
> Whenever you've got people in one camp with millions if not billions in existing revenue on the line, you have a motive. And the means and method are both easy and obvious.
That's a delightful story, but again... you've presented nothing but pure speculation.
It could also be the case that the founders running Airbnb have a mildly sociopathic personality style. (I don't mean that in a derogatory sense - I'm calling it a personality style, not a personality disorder... while such a personality style might represent a disability when it comes to forming intimate personal relationships, it would be an advantage when hustling to get a startup off the ground.) Of course, when such individuals are called on for a display of genuine empathy, compassion, or humanity, they will be left feeling confused and won't know what hit them - they might even start to believe that they are being victimized.
I've made my point why I think she's the most believable currently. You, however, don't want to acknowledge that you doubt her.
I think the better question is, where does this doubt come from, and where do the attacks against the victim come from (just a difficult customer, batshit, drama queen...)? I suspect purely loyalty.