Airbnb Host Imposes No Mining Rule After Guests Rent Her Property to Mine Crypto

August 3, 2024 Bitcoin.com

7 real-world cloud computing examples to know

March 21, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Airbnb

From streaming videos to cloud storage solutions, cloud computing has become an integral part of our everyday lives.

Cloud computing has become an important part of our lives, whether we realize it or not. Many of the services and applications we use on a daily basis, such as messaging and streaming music and video, are powered by cloud computing.

Here are real-world cloud computing examples to know.

Netflix

Netflix uses cloud computing to provide streaming services to millions of users worldwide. By hosting its content on cloud servers, it can ensure reliable and scalable delivery to a global audience.

Netflix uses a variety of cloud computing services and technologies, including Amazon Web Services (AWS) and content delivery networks (CDNs). The majority of Netflix's cloud computing requirements, including storage, processing power and data management, are met by AWS. Netflix makes use of CDNs to guarantee that its users receive its content fast and consistently. To enable users to access the content from the closest location, CDNs keep copies of the content in many locations around the globe.

Also, netflix uses CDN (Content Delivery Networks) and they have servers around the world hosted on AWS (Amazon Web Services). The file/video you request is sent to the Content Delivery Network closest to you.
— Timi (@_timiowo) April 13, 2020

Slack

Slack is a cloud-based messaging and collaboration platform that allows teams to communicate and collaborate in real time. It utilizes cloud computing to provide scalability, reliability and accessibility to its users. Slack's cloud infrastructure allows it to support a large number of users and messages, and to provide seamless access to its platform from multiple devices and locations.

Slack runs on cloud-based architecture that is designed to be highly available and fault-tolerant. It uses multiple data centers to ensure that its services are always available, even in the event of a failure in one data center.

Salesforce

Salesforce provides customer relationship management (CRM) services through cloud computing. This allows businesses to manage customer data, automate workflows and streamline sales processes.

Salesforce cloud computing involves the use of a variety of cloud services and technologies, including:

Infrastructure as a service (IaaS): Salesforce employs IaaS companies like Microsoft Azure and AWS to supply the underlying infrastructure for its cloud-based platform.
Software as a service (SaaS): Salesforce offers its software products as an SaaS platform rather than as traditional software that must be installed on local devices.
Platform as a service (PaaS): To enable developers to create and distribute unique apps on the Salesforce platform, Salesforce also makes use of PaaS technologies like Force.com and Heroku.
Mobile computing: Salesforce also offers its users mobile apps that provide them access to their customer and sales data whenever and wherever they are.

Airbnb

Airbnb is a cloud-based platform for the sharing economy. Using Airbnb's website or mobile app, hosts may offer their properties for rent, and visitors can book such rentals. Massive amounts of data, including property listings, booking information and customer preferences, are stored and managed by Airbnb using cloud computing.

As a result, the platform can offer features like real-time availability and pricing, secure payment processing, and customized recommendations that make the experience easy for both guests and hosts.

Air is the new Cloud. Airbnb, Airtable, Airbyte, Airbase, Airkit...
— Dmitriy Ryaboy (@squarecog) March 23, 2022

Uber

Uber uses cloud computing to manage its ride-hailing platform, including real-time location tracking, trip routing and fare calculation. This allows the platform to provide fast and reliable transportation services, with features such as real-time payment processing and personalized ride options. Cloud computing also enables Uber to scale its services to meet demand, provide 24/7 support, and ensure the safety and security of riders and drivers.

GitHub

GitHub is a cloud-based platform that provides hosting for software development and version control using Git. It allows developers to store and collaborate on code with their team members, manage project tasks and track changes to code over time.

Please don't apply for senior dev roles unless your GitHub looks like this pic.twitter.com/6wptzkrMb2
— Nat Miletic (@natmiletic) February 27, 2023

While GitHub itself is not a cloud computing platform per se, it is often used in conjunction with cloud computing services such as AWS, Google Cloud Platform and Microsoft Azure. Developers can use GitHub to host their code and then deploy it to the cloud using services such as AWS Elastic Beanstalk or Microsoft Azure App Service.

Google Cloud Platform

Google Cloud Platform is a cloud computing platform provided by Google that enables users to build, deploy, and scale applications and services using a wide range of computing resources. It is an example of cloud computing because it provides access to a wide range of computing resources on demand, including virtual machines, storage, networking, databases and other services, all delivered through the internet.

One example of how Google Cloud can be used is for building and deploying web applications. Developers can use Google Cloud's compute resources to host their application code and data, and use services such as load balancing, autoscaling and container orchestration to manage the application's performance and availability. They can also use Google Cloud's machine learning services to add intelligent features to their applications, such as image recognition or natural language processing.

Is blockchain a part of cloud computing?

No, blockchain is not a part of cloud computing. While both blockchain and cloud computing are used in the context of modern computing, they are distinct technologies with different characteristics and use cases.

Cloud computing is a delivery model for computing resources such as servers, storage and software applications over the internet. Users who use cloud computing can use these services whenever they need to without having to buy and maintain their own physical IT infrastructure.

Blockchain, on the other hand, is a distributed digital ledger technology that records transactions in a safe, open and unchangeable way. Blockchain is frequently used to build relationships of trust between parties who do not already know or trust one another. In order to prevent any one person or entity from tampering with the data, it accomplishes this by using a decentralized network of computers to verify and record transactions.

While it is possible to use cloud computing to host blockchain-based applications, blockchain is not inherently a part of cloud computing.

FTX Publishes Creditor List, Owes Millions to Well-Known Institutions and Government Agencies

January 26, 2023 Bitcoin.com

Sequoia Capital marks down entire $214M FTX stake to zero

November 10, 2022 Coin Telegraph

Sequoia Capital marks down entire 4M FTX stake to zero

Airbnb

The venture capital firm assured partners it ran a rigorous due diligence assessment when it invested in FTX, finding the exchange to generate $1 billion in revenue and $250 million in operating income.

Venture capital firm Sequoia Capital tweeted out a letter sent to its partners on Nov. 10 revealing the firm had marked its $213.5 million investments in FTX and FTX US down to $0, claiming them as a complete loss.

The letter said that the crisis facing FTX has “created a solvency risk” but claimed its exposure to the exchange is “limited” in its Global Growth Fund III, where its cost basis for the FTX portion of the fund totaled $150 million.

Here is the note we sent to our LPs in GGFIII regarding FTX. pic.twitter.com/Cgp1Yxk1pz
— Sequoia Capital (@sequoia) November 10, 2022

Sequoia also reassured its partners that the writing off of FTX wouldn’t have a detrimental impact on the fund, saying it accounted for less than 3% of the capital committed to it, adding:

“The $150M loss is offset by ~$7.5B in realized and unrealized gains in the same fund, so the fund remains in good shape.”

The venture capital firm also reported to have invested $63.5 million into FTX and FTX US from its Sequoia Capital Global Equities Fund, however, the holdings represented less than 1% of the entire portfolio.

Sequoia’s investments into the now cash-strapped cryptocurrency exchange came as part of FTX’s $900 million Series B investment round in July 2021 — which was the largest crypto investment ever recorded at the time.

As for the investment decision, Sequoia reassured its partners that it extensively researches each and every investment with thorough diligence, and FTX was no different:

“At the time of our investment in FTX, we ran a rigorous due diligence process. In 2021, the year of our investment, FTX generated approximately $1B in revenue and more than $250M in operating income.”

“We are in the business of taking risk. Some investments will surprise to the upside, and some will surprise to the downside,” the letter explained.

Sequoia added that it would communicate its next movements to its partners when more information becomes available.

Sequoia Capital currently has about $85 billion of assets under management, and has previously made early investments in tech giants Apple and Google and more recently Airbnb.

Polygon taps Airbnb’s director of HR to spearhead its decentralized workforce

June 9, 2022 Coin Telegraph

Airbnb

Cointelegraph spoke to Polygon’s newly appointed global head of HR, Bhumika Srivastava, to learn more about her Web2-to-Web3 transition and philosophy for decentralized cultures, among other things.

Ethereum layer-2 scaling solution Polygon has announced the hiring of Bhumika Srivastava in a bid to consolidate its strategy and cultural ambitions for the company’s 500-employee global workforce.

Serving as the head of human resources and director for employee experience at Airbnb for the past five years, Srivastava arrives with an illustrious portfolio and plethora of experience from her work in Web2, having occupied senior roles at Adobe, Yahoo, Tesco PLC and Snapdeal.

Srivastava’s appointment marks a consistent trend in Polygon’s hiring strategy of prominent figures within the Web2 space, such as the former head of gaming at YouTube, Ryan Wyatt, being hired as CEO of Polygon Studios in January and, more recently, Tyler Sellhorn being brought on to promote Polygon’s decentralized working model as head of remote.

In an interview with Cointelegraph, Srivastava spoke candidly about the necessities of leadership, Polygon’s parabolic employee growth over the past year, and her ambitions to cultivate a thriving decentralized culture that operates with sustainable high-performance.

The weekly stats:

• #Polygon network TVL maintains a solid $2.5Bn.
• The @PolygonStudios & @BoomLandGames collab will bring 33MM users to blockchain gaming.
• Avg gas fees saved using #Polygon: $26.58MM daily ($10 per txn)#PolygonInsights https://t.co/aFOZztq68N
— Polygon Ecosystem Updates (@0xPolygonNews) June 8, 2022

Cointelegraph: Albeit only being in the role for two days, how do you expect your position with Polygon to differ from that of Airbnb? And what are your anticipations in transitioning into the Web3 space?

Bhumika Srivastava: I would say that Web2 to Web3 is very redefining for HR. […] The teams are distributed, remote-first, working in a hybrid space, and everyone is responsible for their own piece of work.

What will be different is creating an employee experience for distributed teams, a sense of engagement belonging to the teams which are working in silos, and also empowering teams to take decisions to work in an agile fashion, and not just, you know, ingrained in a very structured way of processes.

CT: What do you believe are your best qualities as a leader, and what’s your timeline of achievement?

BS: I think short-term results and motivation [are] definitely required, especially in a startup. We have a line of sight for about two to three months. How do you create clarity on the priority-setting for your employees? You pay for their performance — rewarding them in the short term is going to be critical.

As for the long term, how do you engage the workforce to retain [them]? How do they get a sense of purpose in defining and achieving the vision for the organization in the long run?

So, it's going to be a combination of both. How do we achieve both short term in terms of attraction and retention, and long term in terms of belonging and engagement?

CT: Are you planning to interact and engage your employees in the Metaverse space, or will it be solely via video conferencing platforms such as Zoom?

BS: I don’t have to have that experience. It's new for me, and a transition, but I'm really excited to try out new things in the Web3 space.

CT: Polygon has recorded an employee increase of 400% over the past year to 500 team members. Do you believe that’s a sustainable strategy moving forward bearing in mind the current crypto bear market, and increase in layoffs we’re seeing at companies such as Coinbase and Gemini?

BS: We are very conscious of the way we are operating. We want to scale the organization, and not just the number of people that we want to hire, [but] to create high-performing, lean teams. For now, I won't say that we are going to continue with a 400% growth rate, but whatever makes sense for us to create a sustainable Web3 platform, we will definitely do that.

CT: What do you believe will be your biggest challenges in the role, and what are your biggest ambitions?

BS: I would say in terms of the biggest challenge, […] how do we create an ecosystem where we are able to employ people, keeping in mind the legality and regulations of a particular country?

The second one is bringing together all the teams who are based across the world in a remote-first environment and create a sense of teamwork, cohesiveness, engagement and a sense of purpose.

So, these are two top-of-mind things at the moment. And then later on, how do we re-look at HR technology for a Web3 organization, especially given how distributed platforms are working?

Airbnb Explores Crypto Payments — CEO Sees ‘a Revolution Happening in Crypto’

January 5, 2022 Bitcoin.com

Airbnb users want crypto payment options, according to CEO Twitter poll

January 5, 2022 Coin Telegraph

Airbnb

AirBnB's CEO suggested that the platform's possible crypto payment option would not be restricted to one or two digital currencies.

Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky tweeted a poll on Monday asking his roughly 400,000 followers what they wanted from the rental platform in 2022.

Chesky has today revealed that the majority of respondents want to be able to pay with Bitcoin (BTC) or other popular digital currencies when renting their next house or apartment on Airbnb. Other requests included clear pricing displays, a loyalty program for visitors, up-to-date cleaning charges, and enhanced customer service.

Got 4,000 suggestions. Here are the top 6:

1 - Crypto payments (top suggestion)
2 - Clear pricing displays
3 - Guest loyalty program
4 - Updated cleaning fees
5 - More long-term stays & discounts
6 - Better customer service

Already working on most, will look into others now! https://t.co/rxEM4BXZci
— Brian Chesky (@bchesky) January 5, 2022

Chesky also added that he has seen a number of token ideas, implying that Airbnb's potential cryptocurrency payment selection will not be confined to one or two digital assets. Airbnb currently accepts Visa, MasterCard, Apple Pay, Google Pay and PayPal as payment methods. The CEO also noted that the accommodation company has processed $336 billion in transactions since 2013.

Chesky has been vocal regarding the potential of new technologies. In September, he told Fox Business that the company had received a lot of inquiries regarding crypto payments:

"We get a lot of requests, I've been getting it for years, I have nothing to announce on it today."

During a November interview with Nilay Patel of The Verge, he was asked about his thoughts on the future of crypto and metaverse:

"We are definitely looking into it. Absolutely. Like the revolution in travel, there is clearly a revolution happening in crypto. Airbnb and crypto both have interesting relationships with trust."

He went on to note that Brian Armstrong, the CEO of Coinbase, was a former employee of Airbnb. The crypto buzz surrounding Airbnb comes amid a rise in competition from decentralized blockchain-based alternatives like Travala.com's Dtravel, which provides a holiday rental service.

Travala launches decentralized home-sharing service — will it be the next Airbnb?

June 16, 2021 Coin Telegraph

Airbnb

The site claims to repair "the broken relationship between hosts and guests created by existing centralized home-sharing platforms."

Pro-crypto travel booking agency Travala.com is releasing a decentralized property rental service.

In a Wednesday announcement, Travala said it had partnered with former executives from Airbnb, Expedia, and other companies to launch Dtravel, a decentralized vacation rental platform that may serve as a competitor for sites like Airbnb and Vrbo. The platform is community governed through Dtravel’s Decentralized Autonomous Organization, or DAO, and uses DeFi to facilitate smart contracts between hosts and guests.

Dtravel claims to repair “the broken relationship between hosts and guests created by existing centralized home-sharing platforms.” The platform said that issues stemming from centralized control on competing home-sharing platforms have led to high fees and lack of direct communications between hosts and guests, in addition to many not allowing cryptocurrency as a payment option.

“Traditional home sharing platforms are aligned with their users in the early stages, but over time this changes,” said Travala co-founder and CEO Juan Otero. “With the need to return profits to shareholders, home-sharing platforms are forced to extract as much as possible from transactions on their platforms.”

Many have criticized platforms like Airbnb for higher-ups rarely — if ever — changing policies in response to customer feedback. For example, Airbnb unilaterally decided to issue many refunds to guests for cancellations at the beginning of the pandemic last year, but often did not provide a means for guests who cancelled prior to a certain date to receive compensation. The move led to a public outcry from many Airbnb hosts and guests.

Users on the booking site can use Dtravel’s TRVL token to pay for stays and participate in platform governance. However, the token can also be used for staking to qualify for certain rewards. The site has promised to distribute $35 million worth of the token — on the Binance Smart Chain and the Ethereum Network — to the first 100,000 hosts who register.

The launch of the booking platform comes when vaccinated U.S. residents are able to enter many other countries without a 14-day quarantine. Some countries in Europe have opened up to U.S. travelers, as airlines are reportedly preparing for an air travel spike this summer.

As of May, Travala had more than 183,000 monthly active users. In addition, 72% of all bookings that month were paid for using cryptocurrencies. Dtravel is backed by a $5 million seed round from Kenetic Capital, Future Perfect Ventures, DHVC, Plutus VC, GBV Capital, AU21 Capital, Shima Capital, LD Capital and NGC Ventures, and several angel investors.

COIN recap: Comparing Coinbase’s first day to other major public listings

April 15, 2021 Coin Telegraph

Airbnb

From price volatility to becoming the most valuable U.S. exchange, here is how well Coinbase’s first day of trading tracks with other companies.

American crypto exchange giant Coinbase went public on Wednesday with a direct listing on Nasdaq.

The company’s performance on day one has been hailed as being positive overall, with Coinbase becoming the most valuable exchange in the United States ahead of legacy players such as the Chicago Mercantile Exchange.

Coinbase’s first day of trading was seen by market commentators as a watershed moment for the crypto space, but how does its performance compare with that of other major companies to go public in the last decade?

Trading under the ticker “COIN,” Coinbase stock opened at $381, which. as expected, was significantly higher than the $250 pre-listing reference price.

COIN reached a price high of $429.54 before slipping to $310.44 on a rocky and volatile first day. Coinbase stock closed out on the first day of trading at $328.28.

In terms of valuation, Coinbase is currently sitting on $85.8 billion in diluted market capitalization. This figure puts the company more than $10 billion ahead of the CME — the second-most-valuable exchange in America.

Coinbase’s listing on the Nasdaq was arguably a major win for the stock exchange, much like Facebook almost a decade ago.

Back in May 2012, the social media giant went public via an initial public offering on Nasdaq. Like Coinbase, Facebook’s first trading day saw volatile stock price action as the listing coincided with a downward slide in the U.S. stock market.

An 18% rally in Facebook stock price on the back of initial enthusiasm soon gave way to a massive drop. At closeout on day one, FB was trading only $0.23 above its IPO price.

While Facebook failed to pop, Airbnb, another major Nasdaq listing, got off to a flying start on its first trading day back in December 2020. The holiday rental behemoth saw its stock price surge over 110% at closeout on day one.

Airbnb

Netflix

Slack

Salesforce

Airbnb

Uber

GitHub

Google Cloud Platform

Is blockchain a part of cloud computing?

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