Aron Szanto
Jul 10, 2017 · 1 min read

Thanks for the thought! We’ve thought about this, and we think that in the sharing economy, consumers find it incredibly important to be transacting with someone who is in some way tangible. This means that Uber drivers and riders each have real names and photos, not just usernames. Similarly, Airbnb requires both renters and hosts to provide their real names, which should match up with the name on their government-issued ID. For this reason, Airbnb (and indeed most companies) has to make a difficult decision between utility and privacy.

    Aron Szanto

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    Machine Learning @Kensho. AI, CS+Econ @Harvard. Coder, researcher, cellist. Coffee and political junkie. Eschewer of obfuscation. @aronszanto | aronszanto.com