Is the sharing economy over already? Yes, if letting companies get their way

Sitting on the lanai (balcony) sipping a beer, the wind gently rustling through the palm trees and my Hawaiian hosts’ adorable puppy licking my toes: life was sweet.

I’d struck gold. I was living the Airbnb dream. David and Doug treated me like one of the family, complete with days out and home-cooked meals. Nothing was too much trouble. When they dropped me off at the airport (no extra charge), we vowed to be friends forever and I cried the whole flight home.

I experienced Airbnb exactly the way it was meant to be – living like a local with the locals.

But back in the UK it’s a different story. Travellers turning up in London are likely to find themselves renting a flat run by a third-party management company totally uninterested in cross-cultural connections and solely concerned with collecting the cash.

Less than a decade after Brian Chesky and Joe Gebbia supplemented their San Francisco rent by renting out an airbed in the living room, the so-called ‘sharing economy’ has, depressingly predictably, been taken over by capitalists.