Twitter Takes Flight

I will admit that I'm new to Twitter, but I like to think that I've embraced the technology wholeheartedly. I ended up joining because (a) even my bank is on Twitter, and (b) I'm a sucker for peer pressure, even from a bank.

There are lots of great ways the service can be used for travel. I've heard of one mother getting her travelling college-age daughter to tweet every four hours so she knew she was OK. The girl got back home and realized her timeline served as a great "diary" of her trip.

But following specific tourism industry suppliers is probably the most obvious way. Visitor bureaus in a lot of city's now tweet, giving you up-to-date deals and ideas for things to do in their destination. Hotels have also taken up the Twitter challenge.

WorldHum reports that a number of airlines have also taken up Twittering - some successfully, some not so much. United Airlines have been advertising "twares", which are short term seat sales, through the medium. So it makes sense that if you're planning on heading to a particular destination sometime soon, it could be worth following specific airlines and hotels to see if you can catch a break. Me, I need to wait for Air Canada to get on-board. Sigh.