Fairly short blog post, it was a slow quality content day.
TRAVEL
House of Sun. INCREDIBLY STUNNING Vimeo video “House of the Sun”. It is a timelapse video of Haleakala volcano in Maui. Found at the Adventure Blog.
Well, this is unusual. Have you ever seen pics from a Cairo slum? Me neither. When the writer calls it one of the “most desperate slums”, you will see why.
Hack My Trip wrote “Travel Industry Adopts Biometrics, But Will Customers?“. Very thoughtful post about how travel companies are adopting more techie ways of “enhancing” experiences. What I found totally absurd was this:
There is the example of the Ushuaia Ibiza Beach Hotel that links RFID wristbands to a guest’s Facebook account so they can scan them at signposts throughout the property to send automatic updates to their friends.
Say whaaaaaat? Are these guys serious to do this? Actually, they are. “The hotel’s director of marketing says: “We can’t disconnect from social media even when we’re on a beach in the Mediterranean.””
What a photo!
MILES/POINTS
According to this article, looks like Google Wallet is a flop that has already burned $300 million! The answer is: lose some more, let us earn more miles:-)
Just Another Points Traveler shows us how to fly one way to London from JFK for just 13,000 Virgin Atlantic miles and $98 in taxes/fees.
Cranky Flier asked Korean Airlines for a statement (in the comments) about the demeaning move by Delta and they replied with this mega corporate speak statement below. I am wondering if they are working behind the scenes to stick it to Delta.
Korean Air has an incredibly strong, loyal customer base and premium service offerings that will continue to attract new customers to our airline. So we’re optimistic about this change.
Our relationship with Delta spans more than a dozen years, and relationships change over time. Korean Air is now the largest Asian airline in the Americas and largest transpacific carrier, rankings we did not enjoy when we started our relationship with Delta.
Korean Air has a very long-term point-of-view and, in the long-term, we know all relationships evolve. That’s why, over the past decade, we have grown our own strong presence and network in the Americas: 11 gateways, over 200 flights each week between the Americas and Seoul (if you count each way.
BLOG BUZZ
Well, Million Mile Secrets is back with the boring Friday interviews. And only four comments, come on, let them hear the feedback:-)
Going through over one thousand blog posts per day (quickly)… I am at a loss for words with what my eyes see. Do some bloggers really have no pride at all what “product” they are putting out there? They are so eager in reviewing a new flat bed product or telling us how to get the new card product or whatever filler stuff they can come up with to push more credit cards! Yeah, I know, it is capitalism, choose not to read it. I can’t damnit, I review blogs, it is my professional (huh?) duty to review them so I do not miss anything worthy to feature here. As you can see, not much is featured:-) That was a mini rant, you missed those from the early days?
ON MY MIND
I took another nap today and it was super awesome. Maybe I am making this a habit? Or simply am getting too old? It would really help a lot if I did not stay up so late every night to work on the blog! Hope you like what you read here. Let me know and especially let me know what you do not like and why! If you like the short time you spend here please forward my blog’s link to others who you think may find it useful. Thank you.
Will be a busy weekend, bunch of end of year related functions to attend! USA beat Jamaica in World Cup Qualifying after a wild finish, hooray!
ODDZ & ENDZ
30 Perfectly Captured Bird Photography. By Francesco Mugnai.Must Click!
Amazing Finger Paintings by Iris Scott. By Bored Panda
The epic shot of Tony Parker in the first game of the NBA Finals with five seconds left to beat the Miami Heat…in slow motion
I was thinking of something just now and figured you’d enjoy this thought. I worked briefly at a well-known technology website/blog (in the top 500 US sites on Alexa). The site covers all sorts of technology events, including Apple. I noticed that anything I posted on Apple always had the most number of readers because anything Apple does is “cool” and the “it thing,” but it also had the most number of detracting comments like, “this site just cares about Apple” and “you talk about this $1400 Mac but don’t care about this $300 PC that’s 2x better than it” (obviously not true).
I think it’s the same way with all these credit card posts people do. Earning easy points is what people want to do and it’s what they’re going to read, but there will always be a vocal faction that thinks that even 1 post on credit cards is too much. It goes on in every corner of the internet.
For what it’s worth, I can’t remember the last time I had a CC link in any of my posts. I’ve done it, I’ll admit, but they’re not required in everything!
i have no CC links in any of my blog posts!
I agree with u Amol. This is why I find it so strange that some bloggers take it so personal and respond to negative comments. There will ALWAYS be people who do this on the internet.I laugh it off. If all I heard about my mother were true I would be so so ashamed lol.
Jamison: The weird thing is that I have nothing against affiliate credit card links that are properly placed, in moderation and fully disclosed AS LONG AS the blogger had something useful to say, maybe even some original thoughts.
Would this miles/points blogosphere be better off without them? HELL YES!
Love all your “art” and photography links. I appreciate your efforts of scouring the internet for the best of the best!
I have become so jaded with the travel blogs. So much the same, credit cards, pictures from first class and airport lounges that all look the same to me. I would much prefer to see pictures from the worst slums in Cairo.
Sorry, Jamison, I meant to post this above your comment.
Yeah, tell me about it. I think I am starting to get allergic to so many clean pics of lounges and flat bed sheets with the darn menus & pics of the food on board. You noticed I have not featured such blog entry in a long time. Saturated market in this stuff?
Give me Cairo slums any day. I would burn some miles to get Gary and Ben spend a day there, see how they can manage without their caviar, Krug champagne and fliet mignons or pancakes with room service. Before someone gets any wrong idea (happened before, you know who you are) a lot of what I write should not be taken seriously and it is meant to be satire/entertainment.
I remember back when Ben was the only one posting pictures of every detail of his first class flights. I thought he was being a little tongue-in-cheek when he posted pictures of his glasses of water and wet towels. But now everyone is doing it! Folks, most bowls of nuts look the same! Same with the lie-flat seats made up into beds! I wonder what Ben thinks of this and if he feels honored by the imitators.
Clearly he was the one who started this. Now so many are doing it that I am beginning to be allergic to these trip reports. And don’t get me going about the wet towels now:-)
Is it just me or are these trip reports all starting to look the same or what? No human element at all, they feel so…sanitized. At least with MMS we can make fun of his bow ties and critique the way Emily holds the Vanilla cards:-)
The most innovative thing in this trip report niche is…waiting to see how Miles (TPG’s dog) and how he feels about the flat bed he will be sleeping on:-)
Nuts on lol.
I am sure it won’t surprise you that I love those bird photographs! And jealous because my photos never look like those!
I am shocked, just shocked you like those bird photographs:-)
I hear ya on the bad blogger posts – in fact, I have deleted bookmarks to all but 4 travel blogs (you made the cut – yeeeaa!!) because their content is 75% lame, stupid, or unnecessary. In the case of View From The Wing, his content is sometimes outright offensive, but it is par for the course and life is too short to get angry at imitation journalists like him.
Nice new blog format and keep up the “best from the web” links, George!!
Wow, my blog made your top 4, I am honored!
I can see why VFTW can rub people the wrong way (caviar, pancakes, the inhumanity of no room service available, going on libertarian rants, etc.) But it has been around and among the sea of people blogging in this space I still find a lot of his posts to be pretty good.So on a curve VFTW is still up there imho.
Anyway, I need to be on top of all of them to get the BUZZ;-)
You also mentioned “journalists”. We are not journalists. I think almost all of us have not had any journalist training and many of us murder the English language. Another commenter insulted my “journalistic integrity”. I was floored (and amused) by such accusation. I have no journalistic integrity whatsoever because I do not have a clue of what it entails. I am just a human being who started a blog and is enjoying the journey. Thanks for coming along for the ride.
I missed the Amtrak choo choo train ride across the US last year….This just came to my head when I said the words “enjoy the ride” just above:-)
Thanks for reading and taking the time to comment.
I think that some bloggers take their roles way too seriously, and that was what I meant by imitation journalists. You tend to keep things light, which is why you made the cut! 😉
Oh, I get it now. Makes sense. I could make a joke here but I think I need to give some bloggers a breathing space for a few days:-)
http://www.mpdailyfix.com/what-is-journalistic-integrity-in-a-social-media-world/
http://www.blogwithintegrity.com/
It will be great if you can disclose your satire level/entertainment level/seriousness level in the posts (Just kidding, thought you will like the satire ;))
That first link was fantastic read, thanks.
The blogwithintegrity thing is cute. I guess better than nothing. But still weak in my opinion. You can disclose by letting the lawyers write it up, reduce the font size and stick it up somewhere where no one will find to read it. This will qualify….
not buying it. But I guess better than nothing:-)
Interesting that you single out VFTW to hate on and yet your seem to comment there, so it must have made the cut too!!
Just cut that blog from my list and deleted the link this week…it isn’t a static list, though, as things change and I will always give someone a 2nd chance 😉
Too bad, you just missed the “Top 5 credit cards from each Bank”. First up today was…Bank of America. Oy
If you find a travel blog “outright offensive” (and yet continue reading) you need professional help.
It has been stated numerous times and is common knowledge that I do need professional help!
As part of the TBB mission, it is my duty to stay up with blogs and what they publish. This includes “outriight offensive” ones which provide me material for my blog and my readers.
If I go all positive it would be so boring. Taking some (well deserved imho) shots against blogs , always in a constructive manner, may keep them in their toes and challenge them to change and improve their practices. Some bloggers would prefer I go away and stop reminding my readers that they publish, well. “outright offensive” stuff. It has been stated before that I would love to feature blog posts WITH links that I find worthy and they are ALL welcome to do so! But several blogs put their pockets first and NOT their readers. Now THAT is offensive. Verdad?
If you think that those Cairo slums are bad, check out the City of the Dead. Over 1 million Egyptians live in the cemetery that you see when you approach Cairo from the airport… Shawarma
Okay, I will look for them!
god is great:-)
RE: That MMS interview
1. C’mon, Daraius, interview the experts, or people who have something original to say. Are we at the bottom of the barrel already?
2. $70 for dinner in Ubud, Bali, isn’t a bargain. Meh. (Disclaimer: we didn’t care much for Ubud.)
3. Teleflora! Ahahahahaha! ….. note to newbies: those flower delivery services don’t pay 30x points because they’re generous or desperate for business. They pay 30x points because their profit margins are already obscene. Another rule of thumb on the portals: you are BUYING points. (See cashbackholic.com.) It’s sometimes, not always, worth it. Also, use the Google and go take a look at how poor the customer service record for FTD and the like is.
4. Nice photos.
There’s a hotel called Ushuaia in Ibiza? Huh? George, let’s open a hotel in Maui and call it Siberia; I’m sure that’s the image that will bring ’em flooding in. (Then again, Ibiza partiers may not be conscious enough to remember what/where Ushuaia is.)
Yeah, the Teleflora mention had me on the floor trying hard not to flog myself:-)
Have been on a picnic endofschoolyearevents nonstop this weekend. I am so full I am too full to go to the gym. Can’t wait for Monday 🙂
And I thought that interview feature had some hope after the last one…
PICKLEGATE DAY 67………….It has been 67 days since The Picklemeister announced he was going to rock the blogging boat with “SECRETS That Travel Bloggers Don’t Want Me To Tell”. He has not been heard from since. Rumor has it that he was detained at the Canadian Border ( as you know he always travels with an extra empty suitcase to fill for his return trip). Buzz, you are closest, hop in the Benz and go check that out for me…..Rodman says Watzup.
I just want you to know that I love Bill Laimbeer (bad boy 1), and Dennis Rodman (before he went kookoo) and Isiah Thomas and Joe Dumars and John Salley and microwave Vinnie Johnson and Rick Mahorn (bad boy 2) and legendary coach Chuck Daly RIP…Those were the days to be a Detroit Pistons fan.
Mr. PIckles was in Chicago yesterday in some mini DO with other addicts. Have no idea about when we will see the secrets. He has not been detained at the Canadian border, confirmed! Don’t ever buy a stock based on a rumor or a tip..especially from friends lol.
RE: Miles TPG blue french bulldog and his lie flat seat:
He did just “complain” that he was in the old first class on an AA flight – does that count?
http://instagram.com/bluefrenchiemiles#
I do enjoy the updates from Miles. Of course, I really like dogs and I find the Instagram steam cute and funny.
Thanks for the link, the most adorable dog ever! Especially his ears:-)
dogs do look like their owners, case closed
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