Startups

TripAdvisor isn't an online travel agency because it doesn't take flight or hotel bookings. But, given its desire to expand further into a solution for in-destination tours and activities, you can make the argument that it is a more well-rounded one-stop shop for travel than many of the travel booking sites.

Traxo is one of several mileage-tracking sites that have been temporarily banned by airlines from accessing frequent flyers' account information. Agreements have since restarted the service, but Traxo is still competing in a crowded market.

Warren's case is not representative of most Airbnb stays in New York City where people are known to run illegal hotels and entire apartments are one of the most common kind of rentals.

In an era when we see so many copycat startups endlessly doing basically the same thing, Liftopia has blazed a (ski) trail, and brought a unique idea to an industry that sorely needed it.

Airbnbs of this and Ubers of that which promise to disrupt are a dime a dozen. Here's hoping for a mix of startups that solve real travel pain points.

As we have said and covered time and time again here at Skift, the delta between what gets funded and what actually works in travel has been huge over the last decade, and it may finally be catching up as investors are fed up of bad travel startup ideas, and even poorer execution.

We've yet to see the same level of excitement for local tours, activities, and events startups from consumers as we did from investors over the last few years. SideTour's unnamed purchase price is likely low, but it's also likely a sigh of relief for its investors and employees.

Gogo has always done an excellent job making it easier for passengers to pay quickly. It used iTunes account info early on and the Amazon method is a logical next step.