{"text":[[{"start":5.8,"text":"History turns on small twists of fate. If Archduke Franz Ferdinand’s car had driven the other way, would the first world war have been averted?"}],[{"start":13.78,"text":"So too for Airbnb’s chore war. Who could have predicted that the letting platform’s rule update would trigger such a fallout?"}],[{"start":21,"text":"Once the poster child for the circular economy, Airbnb offered visitors — or “guests” in its hokey parlance — a homely alternative to hotels, with the chance to walk a mile in a “host’s” slippers and dine at an off-the-beaten-track pizzeria. Vacationers could not only bask in the glow of self-satisfaction at being set apart from the all-inclusive hoi polloi, but also poke around a stranger’s drawers."}],[{"start":43.98,"text":"Over the years, however, the lettings platform has come under fire from locals complaining about overtourism and being squeezed out of neighbourhoods by landlords jacking up prices for visitors. Then there was the legal battle over Israeli settlers’ rentals on the West Bank and the backlash against co-founder Joe Gebbia joining Elon Musk’s pseudo-agency Department of Government Efficiency."}],[{"start":65.24,"text":"Along the way have come tales from hosts horrified that their homes have been used by marauding teens, escorts and sex parties. Though sometimes it is worse for the neighbours — like the ones in Norfolk this year who lamented such sessions in the “sauna of debauchery” visible over the fence."}],[{"start":80.9,"text":"But this pales in comparison to the latest salvo. Last week, Airbnb announced a crackdown on hosts demanding that guests “complete tasks that require significant effort or time, or would typically be performed by a cleaner, including stripping the bed, taking trash off-site, or washing and putting away dishes.” The platform said this was in response to guests’ complaints that house rules can be “confusing, onerous and hard to manage”."}],[{"start":105.78,"text":"Some guests welcomed this, like Josh Rincon, a personal finance influencer with 4mn followers on Facebook. “Airbnb hosts got so greedy that they accidentally made HOTELS attractive again,” he wrote. “Remember when Airbnb was supposed to be the cheaper, easier alternative? Now you book a place, pay hundreds in cleaning fees, and somehow leave with a SECOND JOB. Strip the beds. Wash the dishes. Take out the trash.”"}],[{"start":132.84,"text":"Hosts, however, were up in arms. One woman, after receiving the rule update, filmed her property after a stoner guest left it in a filthy mess, before threatening to post it not just on Facebook but on TikTok too. Some went further. “I’m ready to ditch Airbnb! This may be the final straw,” wrote one."}],[{"start":151.32,"text":"Matt Porsz, founder of Gotcha Stays, a London-based Airbnb and short-let property management company as well as volunteer Airbnb community leader, is “surprised by the reaction. I’m shocked by the way it’s blown up.”"}],[{"start":164.02,"text":"He has never asked guests to tidy up after themselves, but finds most of them do so anyway, partly because of the risk of a poor rating and also not wanting “to live in squalor themselves”."}],[{"start":174.84,"text":"Yet you can never really predict humans. Some suspicious hosts prefer guests to leave things as they are — woe betide any who strip the sheets, raising a red flag that can only mean one thing: concealment of deviancy, like snagging the Egyptian cotton or leaving a spoon in the fork tray."}],[{"start":191.44,"text":"Paul Belleflamme, professor of digital economics at UCLouvain, sees the move as a “calculated trade-off . . . hosts have invested in earning income from their accommodation.” While their threat to shift business is “credible in principle, its force depends on whether competing platforms can deliver comparable bookings and returns.”"}],[{"start":209.76,"text":"The future of the chore war depends on rivals and retaliation. Hopefully peace can be restored — I’ve got my eye on a nice city break in Sarajevo."}],[{"start":218.7,"text":""}]],"url":"https://audio.ftcn.net.cn/album/a_1793444424_9729.mp3"}