News and notes from around the interweb:
- Last chance my Hyatt top tier elite status giveaway runs through noon Eastern tomorrow
- Uber uses a fake app to trick regulators
Uber uses a tool called “Greyball” to circumvent officials… [it] essentially creates a fake ghost version of Uber. People who are “greyballed” could order cars via Uber’s map and could watch them travel around. But the Uber drivers always canceled when the customer ordered a pickup. The cars were not actually real. They were fabricated by the app to trick the user into wasting time, without the user realizing they had been secretly been banned and maybe starting a new account.
Uber used this tool to operate in Portland, Oregon, as regulators attempted to use sting operations to catch them and shut them down.
- Alitalia and Air France KLM will no longer codeshare hub-to-hub effective March 26
- Points Miles and Moore warns against earning AAdvantage miles borrowing money from Lending Club. I’ve warned off earning United miles this way before, but there is a potentially lucrative opportunity for 100,000 United miles as a lender.
- Department of Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao may visit Canada to explore their more efficient air traffic control system
- Looks like Reno Airport is going to get a lounge
- Residents of 5 countries have just been kicked out of Starwood Preferred Guest
Update: I thought it was interesting to see a terms and conditions update on this, it wasn’t at all meant as a criticism and seemed obvious the reason but wasn’t obvious to all. So as confirmed by SPG, “this is to ensure we are complying with US laws overseen by the Office of Foreign Assets Control within the Treasury Department.”
So if we the government are or want to destabilize you, please don’t stay with the company Starwood?
Is this for legal purposes, or because we want to combine corporation and state?
I think you need to provide more facts about what is going on with Starwoods before posting a link like that. In one scenario it could be they are complying with mandatory US law. If they are not required to do this then the company is engaging in bigotry and racism etc. There is a massive difference between the two options and I think it would be prudent to get a comment from them before posting something that is open to interpretation like that. My guess would be the prior.
Crimea River.
I thought the reason for this was obvious I didn’t need to spell it out. And what amuses me doesn’t always translate. So I’ve updated the post.