Future Around & Find Out

Travel is one of the most demo-friendly use cases for AI — and one of the hardest industries to actually disrupt.

Every AI launch seems to promise the same thing: “Tell me where you want to go, and I’ll plan everything.” But behind the slick demos sits a deeply consolidated industry dominated by platforms, hotel chains, and airlines that optimize for upsell and extraction.

Rafat Ali is the founder and CEO of Skift, which bills itself as “the daily homepage for the global travel industry.” We discuss whether AI is likely to have a traveler-friendly effect — or whether the big platforms will just use these new tools of hyper-personalization to extract even more from us. 

We cover: 
  • Whether AI creates new intermediaries—or just strengthens existing giants
  • Why no breakout consumer AI travel startup has emerged (yet)
  • Where AI does work in travel today: ops, logistics, and B2B automation
  • Why travel is a graveyard for “great UX, bad business” startups (RIP Hipmunk
  • Rafat’s dad hacks for traveling with three kids
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What is Future Around & Find Out?

You know what would be awesome? If we could build the future we want — before we muck it up.

Future Around & Find Out helps builders think clearly about AI and emerging technologies, grapple with the implications, and decide what to build next.

Independent technologist and former NPR journalist Dan Blumberg speaks with founders, makers, and you to celebrate breakthroughs, call BS on the hype, explore how things might go sideways — and how we can steer the future in the right direction.

The Webby Awards have honored the show (formerly known as CRAFTED.) as a top tech podcast three years in a row!

On Tuesdays, we feature interviews with the builders changing how we work, live, and play.

On FAFO Fridays, futurist Kwaku Aning joins Dan for a playful recap of the week in tech, including the amazing, the scary, and the strange.

You’ll also hear about innovations that too often get overshadowed by AI, including in deep tech, biotech, fintech, quantum computing, robotics, blockchain, and more.

Across it all, you’ll hear sharp takes on what comes next and what builders need to know now.

So let’s Future Around & Find Out together!

https://www.FutureAround.com