2018.8.2 The backslash against Airbnb

图片发自App

The backlash against Airbnb

失宠的爱彼迎

If Uber was the terrible toddler of the sharing economy, Airbnb, which celebrates its tenth anniversary next month, behaved as the quieter older sibling. Uber preached (and practised) disruption and chaos, and generally lost its scraps with regulators in Europe. But Airbnb spun a gentler tale of tourists swapping the anonymity of hotels for the authenticity of districts. 

如果说优步是共享经济下诞生的幼儿，还在蹒跚学步的话，那下个月就要迎来十周岁生日的爱彼迎，言行举止看上去像是文静的姐姐。优步像它自己宣传的那样，妨碍着公共秩序并制造着混乱，和欧洲监管者的斗智斗勇也基本以失败告终。但爱彼迎编织了一段更温馨的故事：游客们放弃了原本毫无个性特征的酒店，转而去感受原汁原味的地方特色。

But tourists packing for this year's holiday season might brace themselves for an awkward welcome. From Amsterdam to Berlin to Madrid, city officials are tightening the screws, limiting the number of days for which an apartment may be rented and slapping fines on violators.

但是，为了今年的度假时光而收拾行李的旅客们，可能要撞上尴尬的欢迎了。从阿姆斯特丹到柏林再到马德里，市政官员正在加强管制，限制租用公寓的天数，并对违规者罚款。

Yet the platform can hardly be blamed for every woe of the mass-tourism age. In contrast to the cruise-ship hordes that have made the centres of Venice and Dubrovnik unbearable, Airbnbers by definition stay in a city. There is some evidence that Airbnb encourages new trips or at least lengthens existing ones, which suggests tourists are spending cash that would otherwise have stayed at home. 

然而，这个旅游平台并不应该为大众旅游时代的每一个祸患承担罪责。 相比乘船游览的人们把威尼斯和杜布罗夫尼克的市中心弄得不堪重负，使用爱彼迎的人们本质上仍然停留在一座城市。有一些迹象表明，爱彼迎的确能鼓励更多的人走出家门看看世界，或者至少让旅客们多在外游玩一些时日。这意味着那些原本存在家里的钱，都会被旅客们用来买买买。

“Great hotels have always been…mirrors to the particular societies they serve,” wrote Joan Didion, a Californian author. Airbnb highlights a quirk of our own age, in which the thirst for the authentic can come at the expense of the locals who are supposed to provide it. Your columnist is among those who have found themselves turning away from Airbnb’s ersatz authenticity in favour of hotels that do not aspire to be anything other than what they are.

“一直以来，优质的酒店就像一面镜子，映照出它们服务的群体。”加州作家琼·迪迪恩写道。爱彼迎反映了我们时代的一桩怪事，要表达对真实体验的渴求，就要将当地人作为牺牲品，可这些人原本是能够为旅客提供这种体验的。 笔者为伍的则是这样一群人，我们抛弃了爱彼迎虚假的真实感，转而投向酒店的怀抱，酒店不打着什么旗号，只是安安静静地做个酒店而已。

—————  文章来源 / 经济学人

重点词汇

backlash/ˈbæklæʃ/

n. 强烈抵制

sibling/ˈsɪblɪŋ/

n. 兄弟姐妹

preach/priːtʃ/

v. 鼓吹

scrap/skræp/

n. 斗争

anonymity/ˌænəˈnɪməti/

n. 毫无个性特征

brace/breɪs/

v. 为...做准备

screw/skruː/

n. 螺丝

woe/woʊ/

n. 祸患

horde/hɔːrd/

n. 一大群人

Dubrovnik/dʊ'brɔ:vnik/

n. 杜布罗夫尼克（克罗地亚东南部港口城市）

quirk/kwɜːrk/

n. 怪癖

ersatz/ˈersɑːts/

adj. 虚假的；刻意的

aspire/əˈspaɪər/

v. 希望；渴望

e.g.

We aspire to become full-service providers to our clients.

拓展内容

国外媒体 Vocativ 关于欧洲城市抵制过度旅游业的报道

文中比较特殊的抽象名词作主语/宾语的情况：

practice and preach disruption and chaos

swap the anonymity for the authenticity

encourage new trips or lengthen existing ones

the thirst for the authentic can come at the cost of...

讲解例句：

Mexico has descended into corruption, poverty and chaos.