

An AirBnB for travel - rafaelc
http://blog.rafaelcorrales.com/2010/03/airbnb-for-travel.html

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cschneid
There are social problems here. It's awkward sitting next to a stranger for
any amount of time. Even if the stranger has headphones on and is tuned out.
It might just not be worth the 20 bucks in gas compared with the awkwardness.

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mseebach
There's also the scheduling problem: One of the reasons going by car is
attractive, is the flexibility of leaving exactly when you're ready, not a
second sooner or later. If you're picking someone up, you have a certain
pressure to do it somewhat close to the agreed time. Also, there's the risk of
your passenger running late. Very few people will be ruthless enough to just
take off without waiting for a while.

Finally, there's insurance and taxi boards. The first can be handled (e.g. as
a part of the booking process you buy a second policy covering the passenger
or something like that), the second can't, and will kill this idea dead.

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jrockway
_Finally, there's insurance and taxi boards. The first can be handled (e.g. as
a part of the booking process you buy a second policy covering the passenger
or something like that), the second can't, and will kill this idea dead._

Why not just run the site outside of the US? Who are the insurance companies
and taxi boards going to come after? (A disclaimer like, "you may not use this
site if you live in the US" could also be helpful for handling any lawsuits.
Very much like Youtube is not liable if someone uploads child porn; their
policy said not to do that, and it's your fault for doing it, not Google's.)

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mseebach
Insurance, no, because that's going to happen to the users, not the operator.
When someone crashed and the driver is sued for everything by his insurance
company because they found out it was a for-profit-ride, it doesn't matter
where the service is run from.

Taxi boards, sure, formally. Although, I've heard that the primary deterrent
for running a pirate-taxi-service in Copenhagen Saturday night (that's
ridiculously under-served by taxis, thanks to the taxi-board) is getting
beaten up. The problem would be less for such a pre-arranged service, you'll
look like you're picking up a friend, not soliciting, but it's still a bit of
a risk to take, IMHO.

Don't get me wrong, I like the idea very much, I'm just a bit pessimistic on
the systemic challenges.

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callmeed
First off, I think AirBnB already falls under "travel". This is just a
rideshare idea. Craigslist has this already–if their rideshare section was as
big as, say, their dating section then I'd say "great idea. make a site for
it." ... but it isn't.

For most people, I'm guessing the free gas does not outweigh the inconvenience
of coordinating the pickup and/or going even slightly out of one's way.

Great business ideas save people time and/or money. This is saving people a
little money at the expense of their time.

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stevenbedrick
I wonder what the insurance implications of this would be... I'm pretty sure
my auto insurance policy forbids me from using my car for business purposes,
and this sounds uncomfortably close to that.

On the other hand, I know that there's nothing wrong (insurance-wise) with
accepting gas money from a friend... and, to push it further, if a friend of a
friend needed a lift somewhere that I was already going, my insurance would
probably be fine with that, and I'd definitely accept gas money in that
situation...

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rafaelc
Oh, that's a great point about the insurance implications. There are also
coordination issues, if you read the first comment on the blog post...

And what if the person you're riding with is too chatty and you just wanted to
nap the whole ride? :)

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jasonlbaptiste
Supply and Demand has to meet up especially in the early days. You'd also have
to focus on a specific geography. Girls are going to be harder to attract to.
I think it would be a useful service. Possibly tie it to events (like AirBnB
did for the inauguration). My honest thought? Start it out as an email list
like HARO. Emails queries of those looking for rides to people everyday.

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edna_piranha
My friend Catharine has a concept that is basically this idea at
<http://zerobaggage.com>

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agentq
Is it really? Perhaps I'm missing something, but this service appears to have
nothing to do with the blog author's post.

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bemmu
Somehow this seems to be an idea that comes up from time to time, I wonder if
anyone has pulled off a successful service based on this yet. Just a few
months ago I was talking to someone entering a business plan contest with this
very idea.

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rwhitman
Yea I feel like I've seen at least a dozen sites that attempt to do this.
Problem is none of them ever really took off

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willbmoss
Is this what you are looking for? <http://goloco.org/>

