Through the looking glass, still

In September 2025, we published a white paper that was, to put it charitably, unfashionable. While the rest of the technology world was busy announcing that artificial intelligence (AI) would reinvent travel—turning your smartphone into an omniscient personal concierge, eliminating the travel agent, and booking the perfect holiday before you had finished describing your dream—we argued, quietly and with supporting data, that the hype was running well ahead of the reality.

The paper, titled ‘Through the Looking Glass: Some Thoughts on Travel in the Age of AI,’ was built around what the authors called a “Moravec-like paradox.”