Startups

As one of Google AdWords' best customers, of course Priceline knows what it's talking about when it cautions potential competitors about the limited effectiveness of SEO, SEM, or any other search- or advertising-dependent ways travel booking sites get their traffic

Oyster has great content, but will potential buyers, such as media companies or hotel sites, really be brave enough to accommodate a business that bills itself as "The Hotel Tell-All?" Many will shy away from this candor because they don't want to offend hotel partners. That being said, critics said from day one that the Oyster's premise of professional reviews was unsustainable, and so far that is turning out to be true.

When HomeAway says Airbnb isn't a direct competitor, we think HomeAway doth protest too much. These markets will undoubtedly converge over the long term.

BusBud intends to use the funding to expand its number of employees, and its breadth of bus-schedule coverage. "Your worldwide bus travel companion" can now get a bit more global.

HotelTonight blazed a trail in the U.S. as a first-mover in same-day, mobile hotel bookings. Although it has strong financial backing, achieving the same rate of success abroad may be a lot more problematic.

Travel metasearch in the U.S. is already a crowded field with Kayak, Room 77, and Hipmunk vying for eyeballs, and recently TripAdvisor got into the game, too. Don't be surprised if there are mergers/consolidation over the next few years, although nothing appears imminent.

Funded, lean and focused, Hipmunk can take its sweet, little time honing its product to get ready for a larger profile. Whether it ever emerges from beautiful product to major player is a very open question. There is plenty of money to be made even as a relatively small company, but Hipmunk's ambitions are huge.

The fate of the pilot program will be decided on by Monday, but we are certain that this will not be the end of legislative confusion, no matter what that “final” decision is.