Brian Chesky, co-founder and CEO of Airbnb, took the stage this afternoon at the DLD Conference in Germany for a keynote covering his views about the ‘sharing economy’.
In terms of news, there isn’t much to report based on his talk, but Chesky talked about the fact that sharing used to be an integral part of human life and ‘hardwired’ into our DNA, that it disappeared after the second World War because of increased consumer spending and individualism, and that we’re now at the beginning of the return to sharing.
Access, Chesky purports, will eventually become more powerful than ownership again.
Later, he referred to Airbnb riding a ‘third wave of the Internet’. Chesky asserts that the first wave of the Internet was about bringing commerce online, the second wave was about connecting with others online, and that the new wave is enabling shared offline experiences through online platforms.
Chesky zoomed in on New York City, claiming that you can literally find an Airbnb in every single block in the entire city these days. In total, there are about 10,000 Airbnb homes available in NYC alone, Chesky said.
Hosts are making money from renting out space to travelers, too. According to Chesky, Airbnb hosts in NYC make $21,000 a year on average, and some even up to $100,000 a year, which I think everyone would agree is a decent chunk of cash for anyone.
Chesky also talked about how an interesting side-effect of Airbnb is that it tends to stimulate local economy in a lot of the cities in the 190 countries the company is now active.
He brought up New York City once more, pointing out that most of the hotels in the city are centered around Times Square, but that you’re most likely to discover the ‘real New York’ and, say, a great local coffee shop if you stay at an Airbnb place located in the Lower East Side area instead.
At one point in his DLD keynote speech, Chesky said that one of the goals for Airbnb is to get a point where, in 2 years time, people from every single country in the world will have stayed at an Airbnb-listed place in every other country on the planet.
Check out our other DLD coverage:
DLD 2012 – Andrew Mason: Groupon Now Boasts 10,000 Employees, 70% Outside Of The US
DLD 2012 – @Jack Dorsey: “Twitter Has A Business Model That Works”
Brian drives the company’s vision, strategy and growth. Always pushing the status quo, Brian aims to disrupt the industry with ideas that change the way people live. To grasp the full impact and experience of Airbnb, Brian rid himself of an apartment and has been living in the homes of the Airbnb community since June of 2010. He is committed to assembling a passionate, top tier team to deliver on this promise. Before Airbnb, Brian ran an industrial design shop...
Founded in August 2008 and based in San Francisco, California, Airbnb is a trusted community marketplace for people to list, discover, and book unique spaces around the world – online or from a mobile phone. Whether an apartment for a night, a castle for a week, or a villa for month, Airbnb connects people to unique travel experiences, at any price point, in more that 26,000 cities and 192 countries. And with world-class customer service and a growing community...
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