Emily Castor

What a feast for the brain! Big thanks to Airbnb and my great panelists for making this cutting-edge conversation happen.

collaborativechats:

Watch the action from last week’s packed Collaborative Chats event at Airbnb HQ, “Sharing Technology and Hyperlocal Economies.” The panelists and audience generated a fascinating dialogue on the economic impacts of collaborative consumption.

Special thanks to Alexandra Liss, sharing evangelist and filmmaker of “One Couch at a Time.” 

Excited for the March Collaborative Chats!

Sold out in 24 hours… B-A-N-A-N-A-S.

collaborativechats:

On the heels of last month’s inspiring launch, Collaborative Chats will be back for our second monthly event on Wednesday, March 21 at Airbnb’s swingin’ SoMa HQ. 

The topic: economic impact. The economic effects of new online collaborative consumption marketplaces are uncharted. Sharing of idle assets redirects consumer spending on goods and services from traditional providers to individual microentrepreneurs and small businesses in local communities. As participation in collaborative marketplaces grows, what will the impacts be within urban economies? What is collaborative consumption’s potential as an economic development tool, and how may such effects vary in different geographic areas and across industries?

Panelists: 

Lauren Anderson, Innovation Director, Collaborative Labs
Egon Terplan, Regional Planning Director, SPUR
Molly Turner, Director of Public Policy, Airbnb

NOTE: The event is now sold out (thanks everyone!), but watch this space for full video after the fact and join in the continuing conversation.

Thanks to our wonderful panelists. It was a pleasure to participate in this stimulating discussion with all of you.

collaborativechats:

Full video of this week’s Collaborative Chats launch event - “Building Community in the Sharing Economy” - is now posted! Check it out here and join the conversation.

Special thanks to Matt McDonald

The panel at the Collaborative Chats launch event on Wednesday night at the Hub engaged in a fascinating talk on the role of community in collaborative consumption. I had a great time moderating the discussion! 

For Shareable’s recap of the conversation, click here.

Also check out these cool data visualizations showing the evolution of social ties within the CouchSurfing community by panelist Bogdan State.

(Left to right: Stanford sociology doctoral student Bogdan State, Airbnb’s Elizabeth Mueller, RelayRides founder Shelby Clark, CouchSurfing founder Casey Fenton, and Stanford sociology professor Paolo Parigi.)

On the front page of the L.A. Times this week, reporter Lee Romney took on the topic of peer-to-peer carsharing, using my experience with one of my regular Getaround renters as an example.  

I met with Lee in my San Francisco neighborhood as I handed the Civic over to renter Brendan Lin. As I explained to her, personal carsharing is “not a sanitized corporate experience.” 

I can’t wait to hear what this amazing panel has to say. If you’re in SF, I hope you’ll be there.

collaborativechats:

Join us for a conversation on Building Community in the Sharing Economy with an outstanding panel of entrepreneurs, sociologists, and users including:

Shelby Clark, Founder + Chief Community Officer, RelayRides
Casey Fenton, Founder + Chief Inspiration Officer, CouchSurfing
Paolo Parigi + Bogdan State, Department of Sociology, Stanford University
Elizabeth Mueller, Host + Community Organizer, Airbnb

Registration is now open! Spaces are limited - RSVP now to make sure you’re on the list. 

When: Wednesday, February 22, 6:30 - 9:00 PM
Where: Hub SoMa, 901 Mission Street, Suite 105 (5th & Mission), SF
Format:  Reception with light food and drink followed by moderated panel discussion and Q&A. 

This week, I chatted with John Blackstone of the CBS Evening News about my experience using Zimride and how Facebook has become a foundational layer of the social web, making peer-to-peer sharing business models like Zimride’s possible.

Read the transcript here. 

I had a blast writing this piece for Shareable on my recent experience using Zimride to travel from San Francisco to LA. That trip and the friendships I made by taking it provided great examples of collaborative consumption’s power to build community.

I enjoyed connecting with the team at Zaarly at the opening event for their new San Francisco HQ last week.  Ernie was right - everything’s better with rubber duckies!  

I am looking forward to seeing how they build robust trust and reputation protocols into the new version of their product rolling out in March.  Their broad-based peer-to-peer goods and services marketplace has a lot of potential.

Image: Magnetism II by Ahmed Mater

I am fortunate: I love technology, value social entrepreneurship, and believe in the power of collaborative consumption to change the world in ways I think matter.  These passions propel my consistent engagement with local and online communities and create opportunities for me.

Recently, a friend of a friend asked me for help in her job search.  She listed a general set of skills and four or five different fields in which she would be “quite happy” working.  No specific organizations.  No burning desire to work in any specific capacity for any specific purpose.  I love to help driven people advance their career goals, but I wasn’t sure how to help her. 

This was my advice: 

In my experience, by far the most effective way to find a job is to find organizations for which you would be passionate about working and network relentlessly to get to know the people there.  In doing so, you position yourself well when they have an opening.  I suggest you focus on what you would LOVE to do and hustle ceaselessly, attending related events, volunteering, connecting with people on social media, writing about your area of interest, staking out an identity for yourself in the field so your target organizations get to know you.  That approach has always been successful for me.  Employers can smell a mile away whether you are excited about working for them and their field or not, and if you are, they want your energy as part of their team.  Passion and drive are magnetic.

If you don’t know what you love or why you want to do it, no one will know how to help you.  Instead of looking for job postings, immerse yourself in the communities related to the activities you enjoy and the topics or organizations you care about.  Start doing what you love for free, get to know as many people as you can, contribute to the conversation.  Soon, the players in these spaces will begin to know who you are and seek you out - and eventually offer to pay you.  

Bonus: this approach will probably lead you to a job you actually like.