29 JUN 2017: It has always been one of the wonders of nature how a barn full of bats can fly around at frenetic speed without ever crashing into each other. I used to be equally amazed at how New Yorkers – who move at a significantly faster pace than most city dwellers – could so effortlessly negotiate the city’s crowded sidewalks without ever bumping into each other.
No more.
In the last few years, getting around on foot in what is arguably one of the world’s greatest cities has gone from a contact-free experience to a hazardous head-on collision avoidance nightmare. Why? Well, while people used to look where they were going, now a good 50 percent of them have their eyes locked on their smartphone screens. In the space of five minutes last week I witnessed a woman walk smack into a parking meter then saw what must the ultimate insanity – a bicycle messenger riding down Park Avenue with both hands off the handlebars as he instead thumbed away at his smartphone. Talk about a death wish!
While it may seem like they’ve been around forever, it is only ten years ago this week that Steve Jobs introduced the iPhone to an unsuspecting world – a world that has never been the same since. It was a year later before Apple introduced the first apps: At the time there were 500, today there are an estimated 2.1 million.
How has the iPhone, its imitators and those apps changed the world of travel? The only answer would be, “beyond recognition.” And the fact is we are still probably only seeing the tip of the Appberg.
Apart from bumping – quite literally – into complete strangers on sidewalks and airport concourses, airline passengers and hotel guests have almost overnight glommed onto the advances their smartphones have brought to travel. A recent SITA study found that 76 percent of passengers use airline apps and 43 percent of them say that the travel experience has been significantly improved by the ability to tap an app.
Consider how dramatically a typical trip has changed over the last decade. Where once you had to pre-arrange airport transportation, millions every day now simply tap on their Uber, Lyft or other ride sharing apps to summon up a car. No more paper airline tickets (and ticket jackets – remember those?) to be presented to a check-in agent who’d then issue your boarding pass. Now within 24 hours of departure most fliers check in online and electronically stash their boarding pass in their smartphone. At the airport a swipe of the phone at security and again at the gate gets you through – no more pesky, “Where the bleep did I put that (paper) boarding pass?” rummaging. Precisely what happens when one’s phone runs out of juice en route to the airport, I really don’t know!
On arrival at the destination airport it’s possibly back to Uber and at the hotel – the lodging business having been a tad slower than airlines with technology – things are also changing quickly. Of course travellers have been using a variety of OTA’s to book hotels for a long time but now it extends to what happens on arrival at the property.
At most Marriotts you can now check in online and just pick up your key at the desk – Hilton is following right behind. Starwood Hotels and Resorts (now owned by Marriott) has upstaged the new owners by allowing SPG members to check via the app and receive their room number. Then, on arrival, guests avoid the front desk altogether and go straight to the room where – no more returning to the front desk because the plastic keycard doesn’t work – their smartphone (via Bluetooth) becomes their room key. Pretty cool stuff!
Needless to say, while among those two million plus apps, thousands probably make the travel experience better, there are also a few weird ones. One of these would be ‘Wakie’ which bills itself as, “A community of people waking people.”
Users just enter the time they want to be awakened and will be called at the designated hour by a complete stranger. The app claims that, “Your brain wakes up faster when you have someone to talk to. Especially someone who tells you a joke or sings you a song!” You are then expected to “pay it forward” by starting someone else’s day off with a ‘Knock-Knock’ joke or perhaps a blood-curdling scream. What fun – alarm clocks never sounded like such a good idea!
Another major impact the smartphone has had on travel is of course the fact that everyone now has a very good compact camera in their pockets. The camera industry – where sales are down 80 percent in the last 10 years – might not sing the praises of Steve Jobs’ handiwork any more than manufacturers of picture postcards.
Rather like the wake up call situation however, I must confess to looking back with some sadness to the long-lost days of the, “Weather is beautiful, wish you were here” postcard that often arrived after the sender had been home for a couple of days. The immediacy of the typical, “Here’s me a minute ago in front of the Leaning Tower” selfie, somehow takes all the romance and excitement out of travel.
Anyway gotta go – haven’t checked my Instagram for 20 minutes.