I use my Fuji x-t3 with a viltrox 23mm f1.4 regularly as a webcam at work. During the first week in all the meetings there was always someone asking about how did I get that 'cinematic' look.
I am currently working in an OTA and I am not in a position where I can openly share certain things, so I am sorry that blog post wont see the light soon.
But, I can share some pricing strategies that I've noticed that our competitors are doing, for example:
1) Different prices for different countries, example:
2) Most of the hotels set the price using their local currency, and when the prices are converted to the customer currency, every OTA can decide to be optimistic or pessimistic. They could even decide to use a different conversion rate depending on the booking windows (number of days to checkin).
3) Price parity clause can be avoided if the price is not 'public' (http://www.osborneclarke.com/connected-insights/blog/hotels-...) so now most of the OTAs are trying hard to get the users logged in before booking. Once the user is logged in, the prices are not 'public', so the OTA can lower their commission slice of the price.
4) Some hotels have a specific (cheaper) rate for 'package bookings' i.e. the room is booked together with another service (flight, car rental...). But some OTAs decided that a flight booked earlier was enough to offer a 'package rate' to the customer. See: http://www.tnooz.com/article/expedia-playing-hardball-hotel-...
Thanks for the beer, we may have an opportunity to drink it together in the future.
When a hotel signs a contract with an OTA (Online Travel Agency), it is (was) a common practice to include a 'price parity' clause, i.e. the hotelier cannot send different prices for the same offer to different websites, and the OTA agrees on not modifying the final price specified by the hotelier.
But the reality is that:
- Not all the hoteliers update all the rates simultaneously (through a channel manager, for example)
- Some the hoteliers are not selling the same rooms or rates (breakfast, cancellation options...) in all the OTAs.
- Certain OTAs that are just re-selling inventory from wholesalers and the commission applicable to an offer can be modified by the OTA at its will.
There are more 'shady' tricks that can lead to different prices for the same hotel, but it would be too long to write all of them in a post.