Fly the Unfriendly Skies
Next time you get dragged off an airliner or punched by a pilot or are just overwhelmed by the feeling that air travel is more soul-sucking than sitting alone at a Barry Manilow concert, blame the internet.
But there is hope. New technology like artificial intelligence might help fix what the internet broke. And no, we’re not talking about robot flight attendants that can dispense wine out of their wrists like Spider-Man shooting a web, though that would be awesome.
The trouble began around 20 years ago, when many of us started jumping on Expedia or Travelocity as our first step in booking travel. Before that, most people called, a reservation system invented by American Airlines and IBM in the 1950s. Those systems primarily ranked flights based on flight duration—how long it would take you to get to your destination. Price figured into our travel decisions, but it was just a part of the mix, along with flight time, the agent’s recommendation and brand loyalty.
