Twenty years ago, booking a flight required a visit to a travel agent. Today, the decision to go on a vacation can happen minutes before the flights departure. Arriving at the hotel looks different as well. You used to ask the concierge for restaurant, entertainment, and route recommendations. Now you consult the same smartphone you purchased your plane ticket with. Standing in the rain trying to fetch a taxi? The app, Uber, lets you hire a private driver with the press of a button. While in the car, you make a reservation at your favorite restaurant on Opentable. Hotel reservations, taxi rides, and restaurants are not the only services to change as technology progresses, but the way service is provided is changing as well. In the early age
…show more content…
Suddenly people had a way to upload their garage sales, and sell to a global market, on eBay. Soon after, someone could hire a chauffeur to drive himself or herself home after a late night at the bar, from their smartphone using Uber. And if you had a spare room or back house, now you could rent it out on Airbnb. The last few years, peer-to-peer business has seen an incredible rise. Rachel Botsman, in her book, What’s Mine is Yours, says the consumer peer-to-peer rental market alone is worth $26 billion. As peer-to-peer businesses continue to broaden into new markets, such as lending and energy, technology is enabling a new “sharing economy.” Ride-sharing company, Uber, is currently valued at $18.2 billion — approximately one-third the market cap of General Motors (Rusli) — and just hired David Plouffe, one of Barack Obama’s chief political strategists, as a senior vice president of policy and strategy (Badger). The sharing economy is here to stay, and while some rejoice, arguing its efficiency, innovation, and profitability, there are others who stand apposed; namely the taxi and hotel industries, and those in charge of regulating the taxi and hotel …show more content…
Some believe the Great Recession may have helped Airbnb gain traction. During the recessions there were a number of people who were both looking for secondary (and/or tertiary) means of income, and who couldn 't afford to stay in their homes. And while this may have provided some rise in the market, there is, perhaps, another reason. By the early 2000s, the Internet had been around long enough by now that most people – enough people, at least – were willing to trust a stranger on the other end of the
Suddenly people had a way to upload their garage sales, and sell to a global market, on eBay. Soon after, someone could hire a chauffeur to drive himself or herself home after a late night at the bar, from their smartphone using Uber. And if you had a spare room or back house, now you could rent it out on Airbnb. The last few years, peer-to-peer business has seen an incredible rise. Rachel Botsman, in her book, What’s Mine is Yours, says the consumer peer-to-peer rental market alone is worth $26 billion. As peer-to-peer businesses continue to broaden into new markets, such as lending and energy, technology is enabling a new “sharing economy.” Ride-sharing company, Uber, is currently valued at $18.2 billion — approximately one-third the market cap of General Motors (Rusli) — and just hired David Plouffe, one of Barack Obama’s chief political strategists, as a senior vice president of policy and strategy (Badger). The sharing economy is here to stay, and while some rejoice, arguing its efficiency, innovation, and profitability, there are others who stand apposed; namely the taxi and hotel industries, and those in charge of regulating the taxi and hotel …show more content…
Some believe the Great Recession may have helped Airbnb gain traction. During the recessions there were a number of people who were both looking for secondary (and/or tertiary) means of income, and who couldn 't afford to stay in their homes. And while this may have provided some rise in the market, there is, perhaps, another reason. By the early 2000s, the Internet had been around long enough by now that most people – enough people, at least – were willing to trust a stranger on the other end of the