eBay started with a core focus on the collector. At the time of its S-1, six or seven percent of its total sales were Beanie Babies.
When we talk about the things at Airbnb that are challenging and that they are going to have to overcome, the parallels with eBay are across the board. It's community management. It's making sure the marketplace is in balance - the right amount of buyers and sellers.
I've been managing Internet businesses since 1999. That's 12 years of being in the tornado, and it's pretty exhausting. I'll be looking at the next challenge, but in terms of operating an Internet business, I've scratched that itch very well.
I had a spectacular four years as OpenTable CEO and remain an active executive chairman. I think, for me, some of the interesting observations there are, you know, global is important, mobile is extremely important. And then, network businesses are very attractive.
I think if you look at the commonalities between eBay, PayPal and OpenTable, all three are businesses that built a network in a vertical. Network effect businesses are very attractive businesses.
Great businesses can be built on scale. I think Amazon has built a phenomenal commerce business largely on scale. Their network effect isn't obvious to me, but boy, have they used scale effectively.
You should always look for opportunities to test innovations on a subset of users if you can.
It's near impossible to always be right when you're innovating. It's easy to get emotionally invested in it, but you need to monitor its impact like a hawk and react if you don't like what you see. And if/when you pull it back, you want to do that communication with transparency and humility.
Airbnb started with 'air bed and breakfast.'
