COLLABORATIVE TOURISM ACTIVITIES 237 model of the underlying service provider, at least not as clearly as Uber can, as we will see below. III.1.2.HOSPITALITY CONSUMPTION PLATFORMS (COUCHSURFING, HOMEEXCHANGE, ETC.) If we found it difficult to frame Airbnb as a provider of the underlying service, being a platform that operates similarly to a traditional business model in the booking of accommodation, we will be less likely to qualify as a provider of an accommodation service to consumer hospitality platforms such as Couchsurfing29 and HomeExchange. Such platforms are, in the author’s opinion, perfect examples of the so-called collaborative platforms in their pure form, that is, those with a neutral intervention in the transactions carried out by their users, with a non-economic and non-profit consideration. Both fit perfectly into the paradigm of collaborative consumption, collaborative economy or collaborative tourism30. The first one was born as a non-profit website in 2004, but later, in 2011, it became a for-profit company, with its function still being the same as before – to allow its users to find a place to stay in the destination for free, without any kind of added service, since it was sufficient to let them sleep on the couch at home, without the host assuming any other obligation, nor the traveller any financial consideration, given that the reasons for hosting them go beyond the capacity or ability to exercise a decisive influence on the commercial behaviour of the service providers, whose decision-making autonomy (commercial, competitive and business) is naturally greatly diminished, if not nullified”. 29 Although this is the most widespread and known, within the field of hospitality consumption, there are also other platforms such as Servas, which was born as a pacifist organization that seeks exchanges between people from different countries for a better understanding of the idiosyncrasies of each of them. Servas starts from a simple premise: if people knew each other better, they would never go to war. Apart from the accommodation of no more than two nights, Servas allows other types of services demanded by a tourist eager for knowledge and more real experiences in the destination. This is the case of the day hosts, that is, people who do not have accommodation to give away for free to third parties but can help them by offering information about the destination, acting as tourist guides, offering meals or simply accompanying the tourist while they visit the places, thus helping the traveller to cover their desire to have authentic knowledge of the destination and its people. In addition to those already mentioned, other accommodation platforms are limited to specific profiles or users, such as Gocambio, which allows travellers to obtain their accommodation in exchange for cultural exchanges and to help learn, improve or reinforce a language; Women Welcome Women, as a form of accommodation between women; or Warm Shomers, as a community limited to cyclists, among others. 30 In this same line, PAOLO RUSSO, A. & QUAGLIERI DOMÍNGUEZ, A., “La lógica espacial del intercambio de casas: Una aproximación a las nuevas geografías de lo cotidiano en el turismo contemporáneo”, Revista electrónica de Geografía y Ciencias Sociales, no. 483, 20 June 2014, p. 2.
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTE4NzM5Nw==