Steve Barnhart, CEO President Orbitz: Economics of the Long Tail

As a technologist primarily interested in the effects of systems on the trailing end of the long tail, I found Mr. Barnhart’s presentation at PhoCusWright Orlando 2007, one of the more relevant. Although Orbitz is a huge player in the in the travel distribution game, it is relatively small compared to the other big two, Expedia and Travelocity. The following is a summary of Mr. Barnhart’s presentation and a some points that I feel are of particular interest to SME operators. First of all, there are three big trends happening with travel product creation and distribution on the Internet: There... Read more »

Michelle Peluso - CEO of Travelocity - Evolving the user interface

Michelle Peluso, CEO of Travelocity focused her talk on improving the user interface for consumers of travel products. The presentation was the first of an excellent series of presentations by top brand executives. Here is a summary of her presentation and my commentary from the PhoCusWright Conference 2007 in Orlando. Ms. Peluso’s opening comment was that the collective travel user interface needs be bigger and bolder, but that I believe she was referring to the need to provide more overall experience for the end consumer, rather than simply providing an interface to purchase travel products.... Read more »