This startup wants to pay you to fly with strangers’ stuff in your luggage

http://qz.com/309185/this-startup-wants-to-pay-you-to-fly-with-strangers-stuff-in-your-luggage/

by prostoalex • 12 years ago

6 5 12 years ago

gvb• 12 years ago

to avoid unintentionally being a drug mule, for starters

...and it gets worse from there! Carrying unknown packages from strangers is an unspeakably bad idea. That was the cause of the Lockerbie disaster. That is what is warned against incessantly in airports. Professionals did not spot the Lockerbie bomb, but "Carry" thinks amateurs are going to be able to identify illegal and dangerous packages???

As someone who flies, I hope this fails fast and fails hard. I do NOT want to fly with anybody that is carrying some stranger's packages.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pan_Am_Flight_103#Investigation

rwallace• 12 years ago

I'm going to have to agree - and this is coming from someone who is in favor of Airbnb and Uber. There is a line beyond which a bold idea becomes a bad idea, and I think this one steps over that line.

chatmasta• 12 years ago

Link to "startup": http://www.gocarry.it/

No personal information of founders on website is definitely a negative signal...

maradori• 12 years ago

As a frequent flyer, this startup idea interests me. But then seeing gvb's comment .... yeah, this might not be such a good idea after all?

Additionally, in many countries in East (and maybe southeast?) Asia, being caught with drugs is punishable by the death penalty...

slackstation• 12 years ago

This is going to make flying more expensive. If this takes off (pardon the pun) and we have more people putting more things in their suitcase for money, then we can see a future where everyone will pack their suitcase to max allowable weight and size for free. This will add weight to the plane which will cost fuel and thus drive up the price of a flight or cause restrictions on carry-ons.

Additionally, I agree with gvb. I do not want someone carrying something they are taking for a stranger on a plane with me. It goes sharply against my interest.

Lastly, seeing how much people are willing to pay for stuff like this, (the article quotes a $350 transport fee for a cellphone) budget travelers would be doing this constantly to lower the price of travel. I could see a college student carrying packages to bring down the cost of seeing the world to a fraction of what they would normally pay. I'm sure there's an informal amount of this already but, someone formalizing it into a business is scary.

tl;dr - I don't want to fly with anyone "GoCarry"ing.

This startup wants to pay you to fly with strangers’ stuff in your luggage

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