Motherland

Airbnb

Short-Term Rental Marketplace

Description

Airbnb runs a platform where hosts rent flats and other properties to short-term guests. Amanda lists her flat on Airbnb, but guests remain locked out, blocking access and sparking an urgent logistical crisis during childcare arrangements among the group.

Event Involvements

Events with structured involvement data

1 events

S1E1 · MOTHERLAND

Bartering for the Alpha Table

Airbnb appears indirectly as the commercial platform whose use (Amanda renting her flat) precipitates the childcare crisis when guests lock themselves out; the platform's presence highlights tensions between monetised domestic space and parenting responsibilities.

Active Representation

Via Amanda's statement that her flat is an 'air b&b' and the locked-out guests; the organisation is implied rather than physically present.

Power Dynamics

Not an actor in the cafe, but its platform-mediated access to property creates vulnerability for the host and ripples into local childcare networks.

Institutional Impact

Symbolises how gig-economy platforms complicate family life, forcing reliance on community support and exposing hosts to logistical fragility.

Organizational Goals

Enable short-term rental of domestic property Provide a marketplace that monetises home space (implicit within the story)

Influence Mechanisms

Service design and contractual expectations (guests/locks) that create emergent problems Economic incentive encouraging hosts to take bookings that conflict with parenting duties