I'm surprised they didn't even mention openstreetmap. I know airbnb is a for profit company but most likely neighborhoods and oceans are already mapped. (Europe is particularly well mapped)
Love it. I hope they're able to publish the data. If only parts of it are generated using Google Maps data (see the 'create' feature in the screenshots) then they wouldn't because it's derived work.<p>Here is Flickr equivalent <a href="http://code.flickr.net/2008/10/30/the-shape-of-alpha/" rel="nofollow">http://code.flickr.net/2008/10/30/the-shape-of-alpha/</a> (downloadable). Foursquare also does similar work.<p>[edit: sorry, I thought Airbnb was analyzing listing data to find the extends of neighborhoods. They don't seem to do that.]
Nothing particularly special, every travel startup has some internal DB/toolset to (re)create proper geoschema.<p>Front-end tooling is pretty nice, though; I believe content editors' productivity using AT-AT is much higher than using some of the tools I've written :)
>When you’re exploring new places to experience, Airbnb Neighborhoods combines local editorial content with the handy, need-to-know information alongside professional photos to explore a place without having to leave your chair.<p>I see a conflict here. How can you explore a place without leaving your chair? (pun-intended)
How about before all this NLP mumbo jumbo they do something useful like simply let users sort by price, like every other hotel site. Or, you know, fix the rampant bugs.