Wegolo.com: My new favorite low cost flight-booking engine

by Abha Malpani on

From next week, my traveling schedule is exciting but ridiculously hectic. Madrid-Seville-Madrid; then Madrid-Dubai-Muscat-Dubai-Madrid, then Bristol-Darlington-London-Madrid, all within the month of June. I’m short on time at each destination so want to fly where ever I can to save time but don’t want to break my bank either.

Madrid is not a very well connected city for cheap flights, the only budget airline here is Vueling, but the places it flies to is limited. Also, trying to go to individual budget-airline websites and booking on multiple sites is just a pain in the neck, so after a few hours of being depressed looking at my possible flight bills, I was thrilled when I found Wegolo.com.

It’s awesome because it searches 75 airlines that are ONLY budget airlines, to your destination. It gives you all flight options, you can search dates before and after your selected dates, and it completely omits traditional airlines — so all the options it shows are the cheapest possible. Because of the number of airlines it searches through, it’s easy to book multiple flights from multiple destinations without having to get off the site — it just makes things so much easier!

All information is updated in real-time, there are no hidden costs, all airlines they search have: e-ticketing facilities, you can buy with Visa, MasterCard and American Express, and booking confirmations in English. I’m quite relieved to find this site! Do check it out.

Robbed tourists in Barcelona to get justice via webcam

by Abha Malpani on

I generally find Spain very laid back and relatively lagging in the world of technology — it’s what I often enjoy about being here.

It’s somehow possible to stay away from the high-tech hysteria everywhere else, be it use of technology in your personal life (I don’t know anyone here who cares about the iPhone), or in the professional sector (when I went to pick up my resident card in Madrid, my appointment had been noted on 3 different hand-written(!) lists.

So when I read that a group of tourists who were robbed in Barcelona about a year ago are finally going to get justice by testifying via webcam(!) from their respective country, I almost fell off my chair!

According to the Guardian, 24 British, Belgian, German, Danish, Portuguese, American and Australian alleged victims of a Romanian gang who posed as police to rob tourists in Barcelona last year, will see the culprits punished, assuming the case is revolved. Time differences between the countries are being coordinated, webcam identification of the criminals, and stories of the victims, are being heard. Apparently, all this “tech-justice” process was devised to quicken clearing the backlog of nearly 270,000 such pending cases in the country.

Tourists often get robbed when traveling and can never do much about it because they are leaving the country shortly, this webcam justice initiative by Barcelona has taken things to a new level — I would never have expected such a thing to come out of Spain. Bravo!

Our world in a single moment: 100 pictures, 100 words

by Abha Malpani on

I discovered Ten by Ten about 4 years ago in Benetton’s “Colors” magazine and ever since I’ve logged onto it countless times.

The website gives you an hourly update on what’s happening in the world through 100 pictures and 100 words, all scouted by a program that scans through RSS feeds from BBC, Reuters and NY Times.

The pictures you see appear in order of importance (left to right, top to bottom). The word corresponding to the image tells you something about the photo; click on the image and you can see the top headlines this hour alongside the picture.

So in a nutshell: the website automatically captures an hourly updated image of the world. Benetton’s Fabrica artist — Jonathan Harris — who came up with the idea, calls it Internet Art.

What’s also cool is that from November 2004 till date, you can get the “image of the world” for any year, any day, and any hour.

It beats all the “day in photos”/ “best of week photo” sections on any news-site. Simple, creative, brilliant.

There’s more to the world than “.com”

by Aaron Hotfelder on

I find this map (click to enlarge) interesting in that it not only features a bunch of domain codes I’ve never heard of, but it also manages to look surprisingly similar to an actual world map– without a single line being drawn.

Want to display your worldliness and nerdiness all at once by hanging this piece of girl-repellent on your wall? Thirty dollars a piece while supplies last.

[via Chris Blattman]

Lonelyplanet.tv paying $500 for amateur videos

by Iva Skoch on

It has taken Lonely Planet a while to jump on the video band wagon. Finally, they are starting to push video.

LonelyPlanet.tv provides a good opportunity for anyone traveling with a video camera and a good story to tell. According to today’s NY Times, LP uses the Web site to promote its own short films and scout for interesting videos sent in by amateurs, paying $500 for videos it would like to showcase as one of its “picks.”

If picked, you might also be featured an amateur video on its new YouTube channel: Youtube.com/lonelyplanet. Earlier this month, the channel was started with 20 selected Lonely Planet videos, and new clips are to be added every week. Current videos include “The Top Three Places for Bohemian Rhapsody,” “Amsterdam Anime” and “Polar Plunge.”

Also: read our coverage on LonelyPlanet.tv from last year here.