The Away Network, which traces its roots to 1999, has been true all these years to its initial focus on destinations. And, another advertising/media network, the TripAdvisor Media Network, found its footing during the same era with hotels as its core business. It would be simplistic to attribute the relative performance of these two advertising networks to that one key decision for each. But we all know which focus turned out to be the more strategic one as the much-largerTripAdvisor leads parent company Expedia Inc.’s media efforts around the world. So now, the Away Network plans to play a little catch-up with TripAdvisor.... Read More

Founded in 2004, the original name of Farecast in the incubation phase was Hamlet. Five years later, after having sold Farecast to Microsoft for $115 million and successfully integrating it into Bing last summer, Bing Travel General Manager Hugh Crean faced a Hamlet-like question. To stay or not to stay? Word has leaked out that Crean has decided to leave Bing Travel, effective Oct. 23.... Read More

As the tech world clammers for a closed beta invite of Google Wave, it is left to the lucky few to play around and report back. The original Google Wave Developer Preview clip on YouTube [views: 4.5 million and counting] gave a tantalising glimpse to the basics of the product. But now the wider web community is beginning to have a play with some of its features. Here is a quick overview of how the map functionality works. Critical, in GoogleWaveLand, for sharing travel plans.... Read More

The collapse of BlueSky Travel System is turning into a rather intriguing saga, as a number of parties central to the story battle it out as to what really happened in the run up to the company going under earlier this week. The confusion comes as Tnooz learns that a bid for the business was put on the table earlier today. Administrators MCR confirm a bid was received but will not disclose the value and source of the offer. But there now appears to be a major discrepancy between what Thomas Cook Group and the administrators are saying publicly about the contract at what appears to be at the heart of BlueSky's demise.... Read More

A couple of Tnooz posts about Microsoft Surface have me reaching for the reality-check button. The reason? Most travel agents, in the U.S. at least, still prefer to use DOS-like linear commands and time-worn scripts on their green-screen computers (the screen on Sabre’s actually is blue, I believe) as their preferred user interface. GUIs? Nah, too inefficient. So, TravelTainment is constructing a Microsoft Surface application for travel agents, and Sheraton apparently has one of the best Microsoft Surface applications in any vertical. At some of Sheraton’s U.S. locations, including the Sheraton New York Hotel and Towers and the Sheraton Boston Hotel, guests apparently can run their fingertips along those cool-looking Surface tables and book restaurants and map their car routes.... Read More

Twitter being the social-network-of-the-moment that it is has managed to inspire many a company to examine how easy it might be – or not - to monetise its interconnectivity into a viable business. Step forward Inoqo, a Twitter based, late room availability site which has got some of the consumer and tech media excited since it launched last week. This is inevitable - Twitter has this affect on the media. But this isn’t a Twitter story at all - this is what Inoqo hopes will be a canny tale of travel distribution.... Read More

Mr and Mrs Smith, the UK-based luxe hotel guide and reservation brand, has come a long way in the past few years, especially given its latest decision to scrap a technology partnership to start from scratch and build its own booking system. An existing agreement with TravelIntelligence, which saw the review company's Starfish platform plugged into the back end of the Smith system, will come to an end in December 2009 to be replaced with a piece of technology created in-house. The decision to create SAMS - Smith Availability Management System - is one which affects many travel firms which have in the past used third party software to power critical parts of their business.... Read More

Figures from the latest annual SITA report into passenger habits at six major airport hubs around the globe were released today and make interesting reading. The study, SITA-Air Transport World Passenger Self-Service (PSS) Survey, examined a variety of factors which impact on the airport experience including web and self-service check-in, interaction with airlines via mobile and security issues. The standout stats centre on the increased use of self-service check-in at the airports featured in the survey.... Read More

Being a journalist I'm partial to a good headline. And I figured I needed something to grab attention for my first post on Tnooz. I'm delighted to be in such talented company, but I wonder if I've got anywhere near the experience or knowledge of my newly acquired peers. In fact, it's this that has got me thinking. What am I here for?... Read More

Kayak undoubtedly has an unwelcome surprise for TripIt, Dopplr, Traxo and Sabre’s TripCase, among other contenders. That’s because Kayak has quietly introduced in beta Kayak Trips, an itinerary-sharing service, to about half of its registered users. The service also is being tested on Kayak’s UK site and in France. Kayak thus becomes the first metasearch engine to get into the post-reservations management game.... Read More

European - and increasingly global - metasearch engine Skyscanner has hired one of the UK's current dot-com darlings to become a non-executive director of the business. But Jason Stockwood's appointment following his departure as managing director of dating giant match.com probably says a lot about Skyscanner's intentions to push the brand around the globe - or as he puts it: harness the "huge potential to build an explosive global brand over the next couple of years". Perhaps the first dilemma Stockwood, chief executive and co-founder Gareth Williams and co will wrestle with is what to do about Skyscanner's marketing strategy.... Read More

In 2000, Roger Liew became employee No. 5 of Orbitz, the airline-owned website that was to launch the following year. In the seemingly irrational world of travel technology, with its mainframe computers, EDIFACT messaging and incompatible legacy systems, Liew and the 14 other technophiles who became Orbitz’s first employees had a few things going for them in addition to their MIT degrees. “Our advantage was that none of the early people knew anything about travel,” Liew recalls.... Read More

Forget for a moment the toe-curling commentary and soft-lighting in this promotion clip, many still consider this effort from Sheraton Hotels to be the best example of Microsoft Surface in action. The reason? It combines all the concierge facilities that a typical hotel would include offline (at a desk, in other words) into a single interactive application.... Read More

With a week under our belts and almost no official communication or marketing from Tnooz, we would like to briefly welcome you to the site and quickly outline some of the things on offer. The main product at Tnooz, of course, is the constant flow of news, analysis and commentary from our editorial team of nodes around the world.... Read More

Both Tim Hughes and Norm Rose have recently written about the emergence of mobile as an emerging distribution channel for travel (check previous Tnooz post Augmented Reality, mobile, search and (maybe) getting it wrong). I completely agree, but from a very different context. While the big players like Expedia and Air Canada are jumping on and creating iPhone and Blackberry applications to sell last minute hotels and speed up check-ins, I think the real opportunity exists for destinations and local in-market attractions and tours.... Read More