Science, technology, politics and dance
The agreement between City of Vancouver and Airbnb requires the platform to make the licence field mandatory for all listings. Airbnb deactivated all unlicensed listings last fall and for a while enforced this rule. But our latest scan of Airbnb data show that Airbnb has quietly dropped this requirement. As a result we have seen […]
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To: Hon. David Eby, Q.C., Attorney General of British Columbia Whereas: Police reports have been uncovered that transnational fentanyl traffickers are laundering billions of dollars every year through Lower Mainland real estate market. BC Coroners Service reports that fentanyl-related overdoses have killed 4,000 people last year alone in BC Statistics Canada data show that the […]
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“Hitler introduced tobacco control measures,” the tobacco industry propagandists would say. “Therefore, anyone who advocates for tobacco control measures is a Nazi.” The use reductio ad Hitlerum — a logical fallacy in the form “Hitler did X, therefore anyone who does X is a Nazi”1)http://researchonline.lshtm.ac.uk/1874/1/How%20the%20growth%20of%20denialism%20undermines%20public%20health%20_%20The%20BMJ.pdf — is a common tactic used by the tobacco industry […]
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Go to any public hearing at Vancouver City Council for a market-rate housing project and you’ll see a group of angry millennial men, dorky in appearance, yuppie in dress and frat boy in behaviour. They will come up to speak at the podium one after another in a well-rehearsed ritual. “More,” each will recite. “Build […]
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It’s incredibly easy for transnational criminals to use Vancouver condo offshore presales to launder their dirty money. It can be accomplished in just three steps: Step 1: Buy a presale contract at an offshore sale using dirty money in the offshore currency and hold on to it for a couple of years Step 2: Flip […]
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More than 1,000 new Airbnb listings have appeared on the platform within a month of new Airbnb rules came into effect in Vancouver. The City of Vancouver claimed that the number of listings on Airbnb had fallen from 6,600 in April to 3,742 on September 1, but the scan of the Airbnb website I ran […]
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After telling people that the backup time for today’s mass rezoning public hearing is tomorrow (Wednesday) at 3PM, Mayor Gregor Robertson decided to suddenly recommence the hearing at 11AM, without any notification to the people who had left home for the night expecting to come back at 3 O’clock tomorrow. Thanks to a little bit […]
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Update 8:30AM: Vision Vancouver is playing dirty again! The online sign ups for public hearings are supposed to end an hour before the hearings open. But they closed the hearings for mass rezoning the night before. If you haven’t already registered, please go to the city hall in person before 2:30PM and register to speak. […]
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Vancouver’s chief licencing officer announced with much fanfare that the number of Airbnb listings in the city have dropped from around 6,600 in April to just 3,742 in September. But in just 10 days since the City of Vancouver’s September 5 announcement, hosts have added 578 news listings, bringing the total to 4,320. Out of […]
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Airbnb hosts seem to be getting around the new City of Vancouver’s licensing requirements by using brazenly fake licences. Some fine examples include “12345678str”, “000000000” and “Exampp”. To meaningfully protect our long term rental market from being decimated by Airbnb and other short term accommodation platforms, we must take the following steps: Introduce licence auto-verification, […]
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