WHO WILL DECIDE FOR US WHERE TO GO ON HOLIDAY?

As often happens in our fast-paced world, everything ends up being done at the last minute. The deadline to deliver this blog is Thursday, and usually, the day before, I get a call from Monica (co-founder of BONSOUL), who takes care of social media and multimedia uploads: “Where’s the article?”. Sometimes I’m writing it; other times (alas) I haven’t even started. Her suggestion is almost always the same: “Don’t you want us to use artificial intelligence?”

The answer from a journalist who still uses a pen and notebook, listens to vinyl records, and drives an old Fiat 500 is always the same: “No, thank you.”

Yet, artificial intelligence is an undeniable advantage: it tells us where to go and why, helps us at work, and even assists our children with their homework. It has also become a great tour operator, pointing us toward the most suitable holiday destinations according to our habits and preferences. And who knows what hyper-advanced applications it will be able to achieve tomorrow.

For now, it has mainly helped those who couldn’t write (and I would add, read) by making them sound like Oscar Wilde, and it has also improved the skills of those who already had good writing abilities.

There are many AI tools that allow you to customise your holidays based on your budget, travel companion, or preferred activities. They offer personalised suggestions for places to visit, things to do, and an optimised daily schedule according to your interests, all with the aim of saving time and money.

Most travel platforms currently available are based on OpenAI’s ChatGPT software and feature an easy-to-use web interface, making travel planning more interactive with maps, predefined itineraries, and other features.

Roamaround (“Your Personal Travel Planner”) suggests off-the-beaten-path options; Tripnotes organises and optimises your travel plans, also based on user feedback, and stores content for future trips; Hopper is a mobile app that helps you book flights and hotels at the right time to save money; Skoot, on the other hand, is designed for planning family-friendly trips and activities, helping you organise the perfect “family day” in any chosen destination.

Lybra Tech is an Italian company capable of predicting tourist flows by collecting data from hotel management software, portals, and tour operators. Thanks to its algorithms, we can even know the percentage of Americans who will visit Rome next year (encouraged by the election of an “American” Pope).

On the Skyscanner portal, travellers rely on the “anywhere” feature, letting the platform suggest where to go. But how much will these new tools influence our way of travelling?

We are still at a stage where it is difficult to make predictions. It is still unclear how these new technologies will affect the travel and tourism sector in the long term. However, we can say one thing in the face of so much robotic, generative planning: there is no better holiday than the relaxation of getting lost in the narrow streets of a new city and rediscovering a lovely place where we once felt happy.

At Bonsol, we hope that virtual experiences will never surpass real ones. That’s why we work to ensure that the living history of the hotel survives and adapts to any change, just as it has done for the past 73 years—always looking to the future but keeping our gaze fixed on our glorious past.

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