Technology

1. If you’re not travelling, you often don’t have a hotel. You could argue that working from home is also an alternative though. People looking for a WeWork may be trying to separate home and the office though, or escape distractions like children or roommates.
2. I could see doing this in your car for a short period, but not an entire day. It will get hot, cold or hard to breathe. Not to mention street noise.
3. Yes, though most libraries in major cities are full of homeless people, which makes it a hard regular option. It might work fine one day, but another day might be overcrowded. I’m guessing people getting WeWork are looking for some regularity.
4. Sure, again works for a day or two. Not a long term solution. No client will let you work there everyday without eventually charging you rent.
5. Yes, you can certainly do this for a couple hours. After awhile you gotta buy another coffee or lunch. It will start to get expensive. Also, doing this everyday in the same location may start to become weird or get you kicked out.

WeWork isn’t targeted at people who need an occasional office, but people that don’t have a traditional office building and need a regular, stable workspace.

Softbank

You'd think, but in fact that is what it's actually called in the financial world.

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/r/reversesplit.asp

finance is full of that kind of terms that would even be goofy if they weren't that misleading.

when the economy contracts very often is called 'negative growth'.

They are overpriced, and have no real value except in very niece situations. This video explained it pretty well I think: https://youtu.be/IiO9eSd_v4E?si=8jh404sxNtFqLhIk

I agree with you and I've given this a lot of thought over the last year or so. I think the problem is that the need for shared/rental office space isn't in the big cities where WeWork has its locations, it's closer to the suburbs where the people that WFH live. The folks that WFH who either don't have adequate space in their home or prefer to go to an office to work would consider a rental office space but don't want to have to commute into a major metro area to work. The office space would need to be closer to where these people live and offer a shorter commute than going into your company's office.

In my area I see a lot of vacant commercial space in areas like strip malls or "main streets" that would make great co-working spaces. These are likely cheaper to lease and are closer to where people live making the commute manageable. As an added bonus it could have a positive effect on the local economy (coffee shops, lunch spots, etc.).

I don’t know the company’s finances, but my guess is the concept can be successful, but WeWork may have taken on too much debt or over-extended itself in its rapid growth period.

A company that is expanding more strategically and with an eye on the bottom line might end up doing fine.

Competitors such as?