Northwest Passages by Steve Murch

Escapia -- Record First Quarter, New Online Demo

At Seattle-based Escapia Inc., the world leader in web-based software as a service (SAAS) for the vacation rental industry, we're pleased to report that the first quarter of 2008 was a record in many dimensions -- new properties managed using the software, traffic to our distribution network, and more.   More in our press release.

Also, the team just posted a great online overview of what makes Escapia's solution so unique and powerful.  In a word, it's the only solution that integrates property manager websites, reservation desk, and vacation rental marketing solutions for property managers.   Watch the video here.

We're pretty excited about the opportunity in the $18 billion US vacation rental industry.

Why hasn't Expedia (or any other OTA) published an API?

Here we are, in August 2007, and I can build truly useful web applications using API's from Amazon.com, Google, Facebook, and MSN Live, just to name a few.

But why is there no easy, well-documented REST-based API to do travel searching and booking?

Travel is one of the first, and is still the leading, e-commerce applications on the Internet in terms of dollars spent.  Yet if I want to build a Facebook application to shop for airfares, or an Amazon.com payment-based way to book hotels or gift travel, I cannot do so.   

It amazes me that this is not available yet.  Are you listening, Expedia?  Orbitz?  Travelocity?