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Tripadvisor

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TripAdvisor
Company typePublic
Nasdaq: TRIP
ISINUS8969452015 Edit this on Wikidata
IndustryTravel services
FoundedFebruary 2000
FounderStephen Kaufer
Headquarters
Newton, Massachusetts
,
United States
Area served
America, Africa, Middle East, Europe, Asia Pacific
Key people
 • Stephen Kaufer, Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer
 • Christine Petersen, President – TripAdvisor for Business
ProductsHotel and flights booking, Vacation rentals, Restaurant finding, Travel guides
Revenue$486 million in 2010[1]
Number of employees
1,300 people as of May 2012 Q1 Report
WebsiteTripAdvisor.com
Footnotes / references
more than 50m monthly UV, 20m members and over 50m reviews

TripAdvisor.com is a travel website that assists customers in gathering travel information, posting reviews and opinions of travel-related content and engaging in interactive travel forums. TripAdvisor was an early adopter of user-generated content. The website services are free to users, who provide most of the content, and the website is supported by an advertising business model.[2]

Description

TripAdvisor Media Group operates seventeen travel brands including TripAdvisor, Airfarewatchdog, BookingBuddy, Cruise Critic, Family Vacation Critic, FlipKey, Holiday Lettings, Holiday Watchdog, Independent Traveler, OneTime, SeatGuru, SmarterTravel, Tingo, SniqueAway, Travel Library, TravelPod, VirtualTourist and Kuxun.cn. TripAdvisor operates websites internationally, including in the U.S., the U.K., France, Ireland, Germany, Italy, Spain, India, Japan, Portugal, Brazil, Sweden, The Netherlands, Canada, Denmark, Turkey, Mexico, Norway, Poland, Australia, Singapore, Thailand, Russia, Greece, Indonesia, and in China under the brand daodao.com and kuxun.cn. TripAdvisor is headquartered in Newton, Massachusetts.[1]. According to its website[3], Tripadvisor claims to be the most popular and largest travel community in the world, with more than 32 million members and over 75 million reviews and opinions of hotels, restaurants, attractions and other travel-related businesses.

History

TripAdvisor was founded in February 2000 by Stephen Kaufer. Original financing was obtained from Flagship Ventures, the Bollard Group and private investors.[4] The company was purchased by InterActive Corporation in 2004.[5] IAC spun off its travel group of businesses under the Expedia, Inc. name in August 2005.[6] In May 2007 TripAdvisor acquired Smarter Travel Media operator of SmarterTravel.com and BookingBuddy.com; SeatGuru.com; TravelPod.com; and Travel-Library.com[7] Also in May 2007, TripAdvisor acquired The Independent Traveler, Inc., publisher of Cruise Critic.com and IndependentTraveler.com[8]

In February 2008, TripAdvisor acquired Holiday Watchdog, a user-generated travel site in the U.K.[9] In July 2008, TripAdvisor acquired Virtualtourist, a travel website with reportedly over 1 million registered members and OneTime.com, a travel comparison site.[10]

In July 2008 TripAdvisor acquired a majority stake in FlipKey.com, a vacation-rental website.[11] In October 2009, TripAdvisor purchased Kuxun.cn, China’s second-largest consumer travel site and hotel and flight search engine.[12]

In April 2009 TripAdvisor launched its official site in China daodao. Since then it has indexed more than 20,000 hotels and restaurants information and customer reviews, and made all kinds of top lists, becoming one of the biggest travel websites as of now.[13]

In June 2010, TripAdvisor acquired the United Kingdom's largest independent vacation rental website, holidaylettings.co.uk. In September 2010, SmarterTravel, part of TripAdvisor Media Group, launched SniqueAway, the first members-only site where each travel deal is endorsed by the people.

In April 2011, it was announced that Expedia would split into two publicly traded companies by spinning off the TripAdvisor brand of travel sites. According to Expedia CEO Dara Khosrowshahi, the move, "allows the two businesses to be pure plays and to operate with the proper amount of focus to grow respectively."[14]

In December 2011, TripAdvisor was spun off from Expedia in a public offering.[15]

TripAdvisor claims it is the world’s largest social travel network with over 100 million travellers having used it.[16]

In April 2012 the company launched a connection to Facebook that lets users select reviews from people in their social graph.[17]

According to a July 2011 PhoCusWright survey of 3,641 respondents, solicited at random through a pop-up invitation link on TripAdvisor.com and commissioned by Trip Advisor, “98% of participants found that TripAdvisor’s hotel reviews … accurately reflect the experience.”[18]

Advertising Standards Authority Investigation

In September 2011, the UK Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) launched a formal investigation into TripAdvisor after receiving complaints that its claims to provide trustworthy and honest reviews from travellers are false.[19]

The ASA found that TripAdvisor '[should not] not claim or imply that all its reviews were from real travellers, or were honest, real or trusted' [20], and as a result of the investigation, TripAdvisor was ordered to remove the slogan "reviews you can trust" from its UK web site.[21] It changed its hotel review section slogan to 'reviews from our community.'

TripAdvisor claimed that the branding change had been planned for some time and that changes began in June 2011, prior to the ASA investigation.[22][23] ASA commented that "it was concerned that consumers might be fooled by fraudulent posts since the entries could be made without any form of verification," but recognised that TripAdvisor used "advanced and highly effective fraud systems" in an attempt to identify and remove fake content.

TripAdvisor has been criticized for allowing unsubstantiated anonymous reviews to be posted about any hotel, B&B, inn or restaurant.[24]

In September 2010 a group of over 420 hospitality operators considered taking TripAdvisor to court over unfounded and unedited reviews posted by the website’s visitors.[25]

Around 30 hotels have been blacklisted by TripAdvisor for suspicious reviews, including a Cornwall hotel that bribed guests to leave positive reviews of the hotel.[26]

TripAdvisor has stated that reviews are not posted to the website instantly, but are subject to a verification process which considers the IP address and email address of the author, and tries to detect any suspicious patterns or obscene or abusive language. [27] The website also allows the community of users to report suspicious content, which is then assessed by a team of quality assurance specialists. TripAdvisor also alerts the owner or manager of a TripAdvisor listed establishment whenever a negative review is posted about them on their listing.[28]

In June 2010 a Detroit hotel brought a libel and negligence action against TripAdvisor [29]. This action was not brought to a conclusion, owing to the plaintif's concern that the US's federal Communications Decency Act of 1996 provided an immunity to the defendant.

In July 2011, an Aberdeenshire restaurant threatened to sue Tripadvisor following an alegedly slanderous review [30].

The followig year, in August 2012, an action was brought in the Scotish Sheriff Courts [31], claiming damages for malicious statements. Trip Advisor aserted that the Scotish courts lacked jurisdiction.

Also in August 2012 the Italian regional newspaper 'Il Tirreno ' reported that Aldo Cursano, of the Federazione italiana pubblici esercizi, had began promoting an internaltional class action against TripAdvisor [32].

Fair trading violation

In July 2012, TripAdvisor was fined $80,000 by the U.S. Department of Transportation for violating fair trading regulations in respect of prices quoted for air fairs[33].

Competition law concerns

Concerns about the integrity of TripAdvisor's 'best' hotel rates button also surfaced in August 2012 [34], with the UK Office of Fair Trading having become concerned about possible violations of fair trading legislation by a number of online booking agencies and price comparison sites earlier in the same year[35].

Hacking Scam via TripAdvisor's FlipKey Service

In August 2012 a scam targeting users booking accommodation through TripAdvisor came to light: the scam operated by hackers posing as property owners over the site's Flip key service [36]. TripAdvisor's FlipKey service declined to assist those affected, maintaining that '[the] scam happened through a hack on the property owner’s email account', though it did state that it 'care[d] deeply about the experience of all travelers using FlipKey to plan their trip'.

See also

References

  1. ^ a b "About TripAdvisor® Media Group". TripAdvisor LLC. Retrieved 2011-11-22.
  2. ^ "Fact sheet". TripAdvisor LLC. Retrieved 2009-12-01.
  3. ^ http://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/PressCenter-c4-Fact_Sheet.html retrieved 2012-07-28
  4. ^ "IAC Acquires TripAdvisor, Inc". Flagship Ventures. 2004-03-16. Retrieved 2009-07-15.
  5. ^ "TRIPADVISOR SHOWS SMALL FIRMS THE WAY TO SUCCESS". The Boston Globe. 2005-01-17. Retrieved 2009-07-16.[dead link]
  6. ^ "IAC Completes Spin-Off of Expedia, Inc". Expedia, Inc. 2005-08-09. Retrieved 2010-01-14.
  7. ^ "TripAdvisor acquires five travel communities". HotelMarketing.com. 2007-05-09. Retrieved 2009-07-15.
  8. ^ "TripAdvisor Acquires Cruise Critic, Leading Cruise Community". PR Wire. 2007-05-23. Retrieved 2009-07-116. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
  9. ^ "TripAdvisor Acquires Holiday Watchdog". Reuters. 2008-02-14. Retrieved 2009-07-15.
  10. ^ "TripAdvisor Acquires VirtualTourist and OneTime". TripAdvisor LLC. 2008-07-01. Retrieved 2008-08-03.
  11. ^ "TripAdvisor Takes FlipKey Majority Stake". Xconomy. 2008-08-21. Retrieved 2009-07-16.
  12. ^ "TripAdvisor Expands to China with Kuxun". bnet. 2009-10-31. Retrieved 2009-12-01.
  13. ^ "about daodao.com". daodao.com. 2011-07-01. Retrieved 2011-11-22.
  14. ^ "Expedia plans to split into two companies". Reuters. 2011-04-08. Retrieved 2011-05-12.
  15. ^ A weak Wall Street welcome for Newton-based TripAdvisor - Business - The Boston Globe
  16. ^ "TripAdvisor is now the world's largest social travel website". Traveltradejournal.com. 2012-03-17. Retrieved 2012-04-24.
  17. ^ "TripAdvisor unveils next phase of Facebook tie-in, friends of friends included in reviews". Tnooz. 2012-04-11. Retrieved 2012-04-24.
  18. ^ Dennis Schaal (November 22, 2011). "Expedia readies TripAdvisor spinoff citing hotel review reliability". Retrieved April 21, 2012.
  19. ^ "ASA to Investigate TripAdvisor". Guardian.co.uk. 2011-09-02.
  20. ^ http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-16823012
  21. ^ "Trip Advisor rebuked over 'trust' claims by ASA". BBC and ASA. 2012-02-01.
  22. ^ "TripAdvisor removes 'reviews you can trust' slogan from its website". Daily Mail.co.uk. 2011-09-13.
  23. ^ Oliver Smith (13 Sep 2011). "TripAdvisor removes 'reviews you can trust' slogan from website". The Telegraph. Retrieved 21 April 2012.
  24. ^ Dodson, Sean (2007-07-21). "Best of the net: Tripadvisor - the great divide". The Guardian. Retrieved 2008-09-22.
  25. ^ "Is TripAdvisor a holiday headache?". The Guardian. 2010-09-14. Retrieved 2010-09-14.
  26. ^ Cornwall hotel bribes guests to write good reviews on TripAdvisor.com - Mirror Online
  27. ^ Caterer and Hotelkeeper interview – Christine Petersen, TripAdvisor. Caterersearch.com. 10 Nov 2011. Last accessed 05 Dec 2011.
  28. ^ Travel: TripAdvisor CMO Barbara Messing. Adweek. 27 Oct 2011. Last accessed 05 Dec 2011.
  29. ^ http://travel.usatoday.com/hotels/post/2010/10/tripadvisor-unsuccessfully-sued-by-detroit-hotel-restaurant/126347/1
  30. ^ http://www.metro.co.uk/tech/868021-restaurant-to-sue-tripadvisor-over-made-up-review
  31. ^ http://news.stv.tv/highlands-islands/113661-guesthouse-owner-sues-travel-website-tripadvisor-over-negative-review/
  32. ^ http://iltirreno.gelocal.it/regione/2012/08/06/news/i-giudizi-sul-web-piatto-indigesto-1.5509031
  33. ^ http://articles.latimes.com/2012/jul/13/business/la-fi-mo-tripadvisor-fined-20120713
  34. ^ http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/blog/2012/aug/24/reservations-tripadvisor-best-hotel-rates?newsfeed=true
  35. ^ http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2012/jul/31/expedia-booking-hotel-deals-investigated-oft
  36. ^ http://www.news.com.au/travel/news/australians-scammed-through-tripadvisors-flipkey-service/story-e6frfq80-1226457144441
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