Several major hotel chains have launched what might be described as "Hulu for hotels," a new travel search site called Roomkey. According to Tnooz, the consortium includes Choice Hotels, Hilton, Hyatt, InterContinental, Marriott and Wyndham Hotels. Starwood, operator of Sheraton and W hotels, is not among them. Hotels have been struggling for years to get consumers to come directly to them rather than various OTAs, middlemen and aggregators to whom they pay affiliate booking and lead fees. This is not the first such hotels joint venture effort. There have been several initiatives over t [...]

Related Topics: Google: Maps & Local | Google: Travel Search | Search Engines: Travel Search Engines

You can imagine my surprise when I saw my local airport -- Pasco (PSC) -- showing up in Google's flight search feature. Don't get me wrong; I love this airport … from car to gate in less than 10 minutes just can't be beat. But that's the point: It's a pretty small airport and Google's flight search has been limited to much bigger cities since its launch in September. Not anymore. Google is remaining tightlipped about exact numbers, but a spokesperson did confirm for us via email that "since launch we've more than doubled the number of domestic (i.e., U.S.) routes available in the feat [...]

Related Topics: Google: Flight Search | Search Engines: Travel Search Engines

Bing's not-so-newest push into online travel hasn't begun to roil the industry, the latest example of where if Bing does something, no one cares, but if Google does it, it's time for a Wall Street Journal story examining the potential evilness of the move. In case you missed it, the Wall Street Journal has a story out about how Google's travel results -- added in September, rather than December as the story says, have upset (as you'd expect) rival travel search engines such as Kayak, Expedia and Orbitz. Bing: Pushing Travel Search Against Google Since 2009 You have to get midway down int [...]

Related Topics: Features: Analysis | Google: Antitrust | Google: Critics | Google: Flight Search | Google: Travel Search | Microsoft: Bing Travel | Search Engines: Travel Search Engines | Top News

Seemingly every day, more real-time or near real-time data becomes accessible on the internet. Over the next few weeks, I'll be writing about many different types of real-time resources, but today, I'll be focusing on real-time flight data—virtually addicting tools for frequent flyers and aviation geeks alike. For example, two weeks ago, Wolfram|Alpha launched a new real-time flight tracking feature that displays information about flights flying close to your own location. I'm a major Wolfram|Alpha user and supporter. However, since Wolfram is using GeoIP, which approximates location r [...]

Related Topics: Features: General | Search Engines: Other Search Engines | Search Engines: Travel Search Engines | Top News

In September Google did the first part of its integration with ITA, showing flight schedule information in search results and launching a separate flight search "portal" of sorts (Google.com/flights). Here's what it looked like in Google.com results: The display could be expanded to reveal flight schedule information. However that wasn't very pretty or useful, especially compared with other travel verticals such as Kayak or Orbitz. Today however Google is rolling out an improved display for supported cities that includes schedules and price information. It brings some of the "por [...]

Related Topics: Google: Maps & Local | Google: Web Search | Search Engines: Travel Search Engines