Sounding Off: Not all tech fads have a place in travel

Each Friday, PhocusWire dissects and debates an industry trend or new development covered by PhocusWire that week.

NFTs are perhaps the least useful thing right now for the travel industry to be concerned with - some might argue. 

In a period when the vast majority of the sector is simply trying to get their operations back to some degree of normality, circa 2019, thinking about "non-fungible tokens" (flippant explanation in a tweet via Tiktok below) is not going to be agenda item number one.

Excellent explanation of an NFT. pic.twitter.com/yri7QdWiDO

— TikTok Investors (@TikTokInvestors) June 2, 2021

It's easy to mock something like NFTs, not least as many of the champions of the concept often appear to be those with more money than sense or forgetting that they responsbility for other, arguably more important things.

But to dismiss how a new trend might have an impact on any sector is also to sneer, somewhat snobbily, at any kind of innovation.

Yes, travel has often been urged to embrace new forms of technology or processes that leave many to scratch their heads.

Who can forget Google Glass - one of the first high-profile form of wearables.

It was a prime example of something that will inevitably have heaps of potential in the travel industry, when the time is right.

That didn't stop the likes of Virgin Atlantic - never one to miss an opportunity to make some branding capital out of something - from giving the concept some backing and a test for a short period at its London Heathrow Airport executive lounge. 

NFTs are probably at the very thinnest end of a useful wedge right now but, again, travel brands need at the very least to be keeping one eye on the bigger trends in the tech space.

Far too often has the industry suddenly found itself behind the zeitgeist and found itself disrupted by those who saw a movement far earlier than the naysayers.