On May 8th, though leaders in the “Hospitality Exchange” or HospEx communities came together to share their insights about HospEx organizations they have been a part of.
We heard from founders and lead developers to organizations such as Warm Showers, BeWelcome, Trustroots, Couchers and Servas. We heard their histories, how they operate today and their vision for the future.
We discussed the pro’s and con’s of implementing paywalls to membership of HospEx organizations, and what that looked like, and to explore more in depth the contorversial decisions Couchsurfing has made in implementing one as such.
There was a discussion around working to see what resources from existing HospEx networks are available and the idea of collaborating more. There were other in depth talks about tech and community and afterwards, everyone discussed robustly for hours.
In total, the HospEx Summit lasted 3.5 hours with another 4 hours continuing into discussions.
There are plans to host another one. We will keep the conversation going as HospEx networks shift, develop and grow.
Thanks for all who spoke at the summit, our facilitators and our attendees, and our yogi hippie who did breathing exercises for us at the intermission. We all had a great time!
Check out all the videos below to see the talks.
Opening to the HospEx Summit
Introduction to the Platforms – Hospitality Exchange
Paywalls: A Blessing of a Curse?
A HospEx Ecosystem: Would it make sense?
IT Tech Talk – Hospitality Exchange
Facilitating Communities in Difficult Times
HospEx Summit 