TRAVEL
Field notes from a conservation biologist in Antarctica. By Matador Network. Amazing pics!
The Road to Karakol. By the Adventure Blog. This is a 25 minute adventure movie traveling through Kyrgyzstan (the “Switzerland” of Central Asia) narrated by this crazy Kyle guy who starts the movie with “Hello, my name is Kyle. It is 7 o clock in the morning and I am naked in Kyrgyzstan!”
27 Awesome Moments from the 2013 Paris Air Show
MILES/POINTS
Miles Nerd once in a while goes on a rant and is always quite entertaining to watch. His latest rant is on “Trustworthy people“. Excerpt: “Now, is it a crime to want to get paid? Of course not. Hating people for making money is just as twisted as being someone who cares for money above anything else. The real issue is when people sell out. They sell out their voice (and sometimes their honesty) for a few bucks. Not good.” I have been struggling with this issue. I have friends and family (seriously!) asking me to add affiliate links for all the help I have given them over the years and still do! From day one I never said it is wrong to make some money in this space . But I always felt it is very important to do it the right way, you know, offer something valuable, don’t do harm, provide full disclosures and, for crying out loud, don’t just sell sell sell. As a fellow blogger said to me recently I am on a catch 22 situation. Don’t jump in the game and you will have people begging you to do it because they want to reward someone for what they have done in the past and all the value the blog brings to them. Jump in the game and the tough crowd (let’s face it, the FlyertTalk crowd IS tough) jumps all over you and denounces you as a sellout and insist to spend all your time doing everything for free. And the saga continues…
One day I will figure it out.
Hack My Trip continues the series on comparison of hotel status among hotel chains. He now attacks the lower tier status. Very useful charts! Come on bloggers, add something useful, earn your clicks!
Mommy Points has come a long way from the early days of cashing in miles/points to get to Kansas City to see grandparents. The evolution of MP has been remarkable to watch. And the ultimate step of the transformation, drumroll, is now complete: getting to the Maldives. Nice use of miles for a place I do not care for. Enjoy and tell your hubby after 40 it is all downhill from here, just kidding!
Top 10 Airline Errors That Can Ruin Your Trip and How To Avoid Them. By Jason Steele at The Points Guy. Excellent post that could help some readers!
View from the Wing wrote “How bad an airline is United? Just ask its CEO“. What I value the most from this blog is the commentary from someone who has been around for so long. I don’t care much for the top 10 or 5 posts (once a month I can tolerate), the over the top luxurious trip reports (the pancakes always get me) and the anti TSA and pro Libertarians rants:-) Aside my patented incendiary commentary (please laugh) I found two things in this piece worthy of singling out. One was the the response on how much United saved from “adjusting” the nuts on board offering: “He doesn’t even value United’s hot nuts.” I was at the gym when I read this and started laughing hysterically! The second one was the nightmarish realization of what is ahead when United’s CEO comes out and says that he admires Delta!!! The response: “Be afraid, be very afraid”. Lol, well played Gary:-)
Barclay’s Bank added an online shopping portal. (HT to Travel Summary)
Starwood finally reduced the ratio of SPG point transfers to LAN Kilometers from 1:2 to 1:1.5. I can not believe how long this lasted, I always thought it was an anomaly!
BLOG BUZZ
The comments in yesterday’s blog got quite heated. I suggest getting some popcorn and enjoy the back and forth drama:-)
Frequent Miler had a post about all his credit cards with an annual fee and all I could think of was the horrific reaction of several bloggers for not getting the opportunity to go on a cc link fest!
Milevalue made a sorry attempt to convince his readers that Lufthansa miles can be more valuable than United miles. Brings to my mind the saying that goes something like this “When you only have xyz to sell, you sell xyz”. You know what I mean.
Extra Pack of Peanuts has another podcast with a person I never heard of. This one talks about housesitting. If you are interested in the subject, google it.
ON MY MIND
Expect a bit toning down of the blog in the next week ahead. Got some major work issues coming up and I was just contacted by that other blog with a new set of short posts they want me to do. I know I say this often and I am still here blogging away… I need to find time to actually just move to Feedly from Google Reader (ends on July 1st) and I STILL haven’t done it!
ODDZ & ENDZ
30 gorgeous wildlife photos that will transport you to the African Safari.
More photos from the National Geographic Traveler Contest
Sorry I don’t have anything (well what I would say wouldn’t be very nice to certain people) to say, so good evening!
You are automatic;-)
See now, I must be waiting up just to see your post when it is fresh and new! Loved this one! I laughed too when I read the ‘hot nuts’ comment – reminded me of an old high school song by Doug Clark and the Hot Nuts – yep, their signature song!
Anyhow, when you get the Feedly thing figured out, please post a how to for beginners on setting up a news feed. I never quite sorted that one out and it looks as though it is something I need. Therefore, no Google Feed for me to import – and no directions on Feedly’s landing page.
Anyhow, thanks for a good read. At some point, I’ll chime in on the affiliate thing.
Not sure why nuts are so popular in this hobby:-)
I think I need a tutorial myself on Feedly! Will wait until the very last day to move to it.
If anyone wants to know why people are frustrated with the commercialization of mile and points blog, the milevalue post is exhibit A. Talk about a great blog that went down hill fast.
Also Exhibit A for how not to redesign your banner. 🙂
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/20457086-post2024.html
When I ever jump in and proclaim that I will never do harm (promote inferior offers) I hope I do not pull a MV move,hehe
Good evening, Jeff! Looks like you’re the first again!
Haha thank you. It is not my fault that George and Jamison have turned it into some notable. :p
One of these days I will comment first to mess you up:-)
Hope there won’t be censorship 😉 i’m sure i’m okay haha
I wanna go on safari. After I go to Santorini. Loved the photos today!
Been to Santorini twice. No safaris yet! Thanks
agree with the mile nerd point. it’s not about making money. it’s fine if you can still say the things you would say if you weren’t making money.
I guess I want to make sure I can still say whatever I want to say…full editorial control is very important to me…we shall see
“Jump in the game and the tough crowd … denounces you as a sellout and insist to spend all your time doing everything for free.”
How about jump into the game but make it very difficult for us to FIND your affliate links? {wink} We can then reward you if (when) we REALLY want to — but we have to work for it? It adds a burden to you if you wish to post/list the best deals (not really your mission here) — but give us SOME way to show our appreciation (Heck, even a ‘donate’ button — WE can choose to send you some appreciation, and YOU aren’t selling out!)
Make it *possible* for us!
Looking into it VERY slowly. Many other things are always in priority. Like coming up with stuff for the next blog post:-)
I am not sold on this Donate thing…I look like Chris Elliott lol.
Last month VFTW ran a long piece analyzing the pluses and minuses of travel insurance. I’m surprised it took so long but this morning TPG is now talking travel insurance. The big difference between the two? TPG promises that he will be analyzing the travel insurance benefits that come with different…. credit cards! (Ka-ching!)
Yep, you are sharp;-)
TPG tends to cover things one month after other people already do. And it’s always one big coincidence
Sure he realized that you can get better Chase offers at the bank….. he didn’t see the dozens of posts the Miles Professor wrote about that and has been H/T’ed to her many times over by other major bloggers
With the staff he has there is no excuse for that site NOT breaking the news instead of consistently lagging them!
p.s. — I’ve found Newsblur to be a superb replacement — all my grousing about stupid-*#@&%)& Google dumping a perfectly fine Reader that I’ve used for years went completely away! (Yes, $24 — but WELL worth it!) (Not affiliated in any way — just was desperate for a good replacement, and this is it!
I sense that Feedly is a bigger company and therefore should be around for much longer than Newsblur. I once got burned by a startup software company in my real career. The founder sold out to a giant that immediately killed the product and left some of us hanging. Since then I am VERY wary of putting all eggs in a small company. So I am leaning towards Feedly…Did you try Feedly at all and preferred Newsblur between the two?
Mommy Points has another attack on the eye sockets
And what’s the first link to be found in the link-fest?
The Club Carlson card, of course
(but only the affiliate one. Not the other ones that don’t yet provide affiliate $$$)
This is how most blogs operate now…
Mommy Points has lost her groove. She was great when she blogged about traveling with kids, but now her blog reads like everyone elses. Case in point mentioned above–her upcoming trip to the Maldives.
Valid point imo. And definitely not angry;-)
That shows how selling out pays for all those mileage runs and hotel stays. Very sad to see this “transformation”
Sorry to hear you don’t like the site as much anymore. Our travel patterns are a bit different now that we are planning trips for when our daughter is 4-5 than when the site started and she was one. It is a more varied mix now of family travel and some adult trips that mirror how our own trips have evolved. However, I’m currently in the middle of a trip report on a family trip to Disney and the next two on deck are Hawaii and ski trip, both with the kiddo, so that is still obviously a huge part of how we travel and what I write about. It just isn’t the only way we travel, or the only thing I write about. Hope you like some of the upcoming posts. 😉
Attention all bloggers: this is how to give a positive, classy response to criticism. Simple, no?
You mean address the arguments in a polite manner without going on angry rants/personal attacks and/or yawns?
🙂
Absolutely, very classy.
I still think it is a valid point that most who started reading you did so because of the mommy “angle”. Seeing so many other posts unrelated to that “weakens” the MP brand in some way. Especially when you start throwing in there Maldives and SMD pics on flat beds:-)
Face it MP, to get back on track you are just going to have numero dos…your fans need you to get the mommy groove back. You are still young, you can doeeeeeeeeeeeeeet:-)
MP, traveling as a parent will change too when your little one is in elementary school and the school/sports/dance class/etc. calendar begins to impact your travels. I found it just got more difficult as my kids got older. As the wife of a college professor, I imagined all the sabbatical and summer trips we might take, but found it hard to pull a kid out of school because they’d miss a needed class or lacrosse camp or being in the school play. So you may have some interesting topics for your blog coming up, as you negotiate that part of parenting when you love to travel.
That said, when you can arrange it – for example, we did a month in Costa Rica when my son was in 8th grade – it can be life-changing. We picked Costa Rica because he wanted a beach he could go to in March and a place he could try out his beginning Spanish. And he is now a fluent Spanish speaker who loves Latin America. Traveling as a preteen made him really understand the value of learning a language and I trace the many extended trips he has made since to Central and South America, as well as his general love of traveling, to that trip.
Yes, it absolutely gets progressively difficult as kids get older as school schedules and outside activities and camps get more plentiful! So enjoy these years while they last.
One thing we missed was having grandparents we can unload the kids and escape to…say Maldives:-) Grandparents are thousands of miles away across oceans. We envy parents with grandparents so willing and able to look after grandkids, what a luxury this must be!
MP where did you blog before BA? You started at BA 2 years ago.
Hosted the blog myself for a short time before BA. Daughter was about 17 months old when I started in early 2011. She’s 3.5 now, and we are booking/planning trips roughly 11 months out when she will be 4.5. Time flies!
I’m sure if we have a second my travel patterns will change yet again. I’m sure as my kid or kids get older and are school aged they will change again. When they are teenagers and/or go on to college they will change even more. Change, for better or worse, will be constant when a blog’s content somewhat mirrors an evolving family’s travels.
Adult trips may “weaken the brand” to some, but for others it offers a greater variety of content. Many families do sneak away on adult trips sans kiddos from time to time. 😉
Either way, the blog is an authentic representation of where we travel and how we travel. I have to write about it from that point of view, or else my heart just isn’t in it. So, within one week I post both about Disney and Maldives, because that is our reality. Totally understand if not all posts appeal to not all readers, but all are written from a parent’s perspective. Hope that helps answer some of the questions!
I would love to be Little C and be asked where did your parents go and say Maldives instead of, err,…Cleveland:-)
Variety is good but I think the underlying DNA of a blog should never be a lost focus. For your readers you will forever be Mommy.
Mine is entertainment and a mental escape from daily life as I take you all through an eclectic journey through the blogosphere. I somehow need to lose the tag of anti cc dude as it is so clear by now that I just will never win this battle;-)
Yes I never understood all the “focus on family travel” angle to differentiate herself. It was just a charade to cover up for killing deals by starting out on FT and then copying it for the masses much like her brother from another mother MMS. MommyPoints is just a credit card seller and nowadays doesn’t really attempt to hide it anymore.
Having said that, I agree with harvson et al. That is how you respond to criticism and she has always done that actually.
yeah… not sure what the mommy points blog is all about.. I don’t have kids so maybe I don’t get it. It seems to me that a leisure traveler sharing deals.. useful but not differentiated.
Sorry to be multi-commenting here today, but interesting discussion. While content does vary some certainly from site to site, it is 100% true that there is also often a fair amount of over-lap. To some degree I think the “family travel angle” is as much about just reading about a piece of miles and points news or deals from the perspective of someone who is a busy parent, as opposed to a single person who may have a greater ability to hop on great award availability 24 hours out, or make multiple trips to CVS stores, or whatever.
While bloggers are not journalists in my view, it is sort of similar to picking the newscaster you like for your evening news. They all basically share the same stories, but not necessarily in the same way. When I started blogging there weren’t many parent voices (or female voices for that matter) in the miles and points world, and I thought it might fill gap that was there. More have joined in since then, and obviously there is no shortage of blogs and bloggers to choose from….thus we now have TBB. 😉
It is amazing to me how some bloggers totally MISS the opportunity to engage readers in a constructive and classy manner (like you have here MP). Instead they take everything personally and go off and look like _____ (PG 13 lol)
TBB mostly aspires to be Comedy Central…you know, it’s like the Daily Show here of the travel blogosphere. Call me Jon:-)
Hey George, Just wanted to get back to Harvson3 and let him know the FTG blog is going to set up a new email address for his and others constructive criticism.
BTW, the numbers are coming in for the Ink Bold promo. You really missed out on that one buddy. Who knew there were so many new businesses starting up. And early metrics seems to suggest that my standing up to bullies is actually paying off at the linkfest. Don’t tell the other bloggers or they will copy my moves.
So Good News George. I’ll continue to drop in when I’m bored. And BTW, when are you going to finish that “about me” page on your website. You know: Full name, occupation and other blogs and companies you work for, that kind of stuff.
Talk to ya soon.
Remember, your most important asset is your credibility. 🙂 But it’s good to hear you were well compensated for it.
You bet. Best offer at the time
And pass the buck to IB when it isn’t.
Wow…
>>>>>>>>>BTW, the numbers are coming in for the Ink Bold promo.
Just so everyone knows what your blog always stood for.
>>>>>>>>>>You really missed out on that one buddy
Oh yeah, I am so bummed about it I may not able to eat and sleep like a baby tonight!
>>>>>>>>>>>Who knew there were so many new businesses starting up.
You are so proud getting so many new businesses selling on ebay we see!
>>>>>>>>>>>And early metrics seems to suggest that my standing up to bullies is actually paying off at the linkfest.
Again, so all of you know what you stand for.
>>>>>>>>>>>Don’t tell the other bloggers or they will copy my moves.
I am sure other bloggers with no credibility left may copy your moves but I am not sure they can match your classiness!
>>>>>>>>>> I’ll continue to drop in when I’m bored.
Please do, its’ a free country, especially my blog, unlike yours. Oh excuse me, you have no control over it anymore:-) I will continue to read your blog and I thank you for your inspiration ever since I started for all the material you have provided my blog!
>>>>>>>>>>And BTW, when are you going to finish that “about me” page on your website. You know: Full name, occupation and other blogs and companies you work for, that kind of stuff.
Classy…again.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gyrrg6ikmII
Buzzing it up on YouTube is our main main Ingy Pop discussing benefits of CSP
I’m gonna have so much fun with you. Note the new handle?
Trollin’
Trollin’
Trollin’ on the river
Your new handle does not include a backlink to FTG!!!! You can make those numbers you are so fond of even higher!!!
Take some lessons from Mommy Points how to handle criticism, it is never too late.
Isn’t it peculiar we are all discussing this in my tiny blog?
SMH
@Ingy Pop
Looking forward to it. Bring DeltaPoints, MileValue et al with you.
All are welcome!
Mommy Points – if you go back and read some of your older posts, you’ll find statements like this that contradict your new outlook on travel.
“However, I don’t usually fly first class, I don’t usually have the time or money on trips to build in several free stopovers, and I am not usually traveling to far away locations. I hope to do more of all of those things in 10-15 years, but that just isn’t my traveling reality these days. It also is not the traveling reality of most young families.”
Or this one.
“However, a cent per mile ratio is not the only way to value a redemption opportunity. There are lots of reasons that people travel that are far more valuable than any simple cents per mile equation can account for. I have said this before, but most of the time my family isn’t traveling for the experience of travel itself, or to visit some luxurious destination, we are traveling to see people who don’t live within driving distance to our home. In our case, those people happen to live domestically, so that is where we need to go. Last time I checked, our middle-class budget (unfortunately) doesn’t often have $1200 extra dollars in it to obtain some domestic tickets. True, we could afford that once a year or so, but I have no desire for Little C to just see her family members once a year. We need miles to see family and build valuable memories for our daughter. Miles and points are the only way that can happen on a regular basis.”
http://boardingarea.com/mommypoints/2011/11/17/domestic-mileage-redemptions-yay-or-nay/
http://boardingarea.com/mommypoints/2011/11/16/the-new-british-airways-frequent-flyer-program-avios-is-fantastic-for-some-families/
We all change you know. We evolve as people and as bloggers. Besides, you only turn 40 once!
If them Maldives/Bora Bora like trips become very common then something is majorly wrong with the current Mommy Points brand…If that happens, I fully expect to see the live in nanny come along too? 🙂
Don, you found two of my favorite posts! I still agree 100% with the sentiment of both of those posts, and connecting C with family is still goal numero uno. In fact, in July we will be flying to meet with cousins and extended family on both sides. No more important way to use your travel dollars or points in my view. Never has been, never will be.
I alluded to a hope in those posts to see the far away and exotic locations someday. I did not know it would be just 2-3 years off instead of 10-15 years, but I hoped we would get there. Earning points got easier since late 2011 (thanks 5x among other things), the kid got mature enough to be happy with g’ma in our absence, and viola my crystal ball was a bit off…in a good way.
All of that is still the same, but we are also able to mix in a few other things to add to the mix, not take away from the primary focus. Really great to read those older posts though, so thanks again!
@Ingy Pop ….Stop disrespecting my man Buzz……………..Buzz who is this clown and what is his site. Peace. Love. and Ribs.
Charles: Please forgive me, I had pizza for lunch. Pepperoni. And it was grrreeeeaaat!
Note to Bloggers…………..enough already with the following …. Park Hyatt Vendome, The Maldives ( its 4 days of air travel to sit on the water, and no McDonalds) and Aspirational Travel ……… Enough with those 3 items in every blog. (please be original) …..its like copying someone else’s homework and we the teacher know about it.
There are so many blogs now, so hard to be original.
Sending wife and daughter to Paris and skipping the Vendome:-)
Maldives just does nothing for me. One meal there and we can have McDonalds for a whole year:-)
i owe a lot to Rick and FTG. I got back in the UA game when he virtually set-up his own network to apply for Chase debit cards at a branch in Colorado. And he really was a pioneer blogger in the early days of churn-related blogging. I’m still booking trip with the miles his tips got me and I’m still using some of those tips to earn more.
Times change and blogs either change too or not. Frugal Travel Guy jumped the shark when Rick went on Nightline, risking huge devaluation of the hobby to achieve what he (likely really) thought was a chance to bring its benefits to more people. I read more than a little “Gee, I’m gonna be on TV” into all that too, but I could be wrong and even if I’m not, I’d probably save that recorded show forever too if it was me.
Now FTG is a once a week skim, though when Rick himself writes, he still can convey useful info if he’s focused and if I read between the lines. Chasing George all over the Internet to take classless shots is…..classless. Bragging about money you make from affiliate links-that’s a real point of pride.
What Rick hasn’t figured out is that in George’s game, Rick’s the silly monkey with a hat, and the more he jumps around and yells, the more George says “Look at the silly monkey in the hat making all the noise”.
Sam, thank you for reading and taking the time to make such an excellent comment!
I should, once a week, make a post and call it something like “Weekly Gems in the comments section”. This one will definitely be in it!
Many in that bank branch got fired. I think it is an important fact about that “deal”.
I pretty much agree with everything you stated. I also believe, in my own humble opinion, the Nightline primary motivating factor was, surprise surprise, clicks:-)
Thanks again, all the best!
“I would love to be Little C and be asked where did your parents go and say Maldives instead of, err,…Cleveland:-)”
Hey, there is nothing wrong with visiting Cleveland. 🙂
I was trying to get a reaction from Dan at DansDeals;-)
Ahhhh MMS is gouging my eyes out this morning! How many Chase Affiliate links can he put in one post….my eyes are burning! TBB make it stop! Help! I am meltinggggggggg.