Jury awards American Airline $9.4M from website behind 'skiplagging' hack
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Re: Jury awards American Airline $9.4M from website behind 'skiplagging' hack
#2Seems like this practice in general shows that a true free market doesn't exist in the airline industry. If it did exist then flights like these wouldn't be profitable to sell in the first place.
Re: Jury awards American Airline $9.4M from website behind 'skiplagging' hack
#3Seems like this practice in general shows that a true free market doesn't exist in the airline industry. If it did exist then flights like these wouldn't be profitable to sell in the first place.
I could imagine situations where airlines need to get pilots/crew/planes to some location for the next flight and somehow recoup costs there, and are willing to cut prices on such multileg flights to take business away from their competitors... but I generally agree with your statement.
Re: Jury awards American Airline $9.4M from website behind 'skiplagging' hack
#4I'm surprised that this common enough that it's worthwhile for airlines to fight it. It requires both:
- Flight being meaningfully cheaper using hidden city
and
- Traveller is willing to deal with the restrictions (no carry-on, risk of route changing, no frequent flyer etc).
Re: Jury awards American Airline $9.4M from website behind 'skiplagging' hack
#5I don't understand the airline's argument that they couldn't resell the seat. Of course not, it was already paid for! Can someone make sense of their argument for me, as it seems prima facia illegitimate.
Re: Jury awards American Airline $9.4M from website behind 'skiplagging' hack
#6Important note: "skiplagging" while frowned upon and grounds for an airline banning individuals from using them; is not why skiplagged is paying AA $9.4M.
From the article:
Paul Yetter, an attorney for American with Yetter Coleman in Houston, told jurors during opening statements that Skiplagged is not an authorized agent of the airline yet "dresses up" its website with American's trademarks to look legitimate and fool consumers into thinking they are buying from the airline.
Re: Jury awards American Airline $9.4M from website behind 'skiplagging' hack
#7> Skiplagging is not illegal, but airlines view it as a policy violation that is grounds for termination of a traveler’s entire itinerary since the airline can't sell the empty seat in the onward flight.
The poor airline, unable to sell an empty seat because ... checks notes ... the seat is already sold to someone, and that person decided not to show up. Truly the horror. Just think of all the revenue the airline lost because they couldn't charge more for a shorter flight and now have to fly the last leg with less weight
But it seems like the entire court case was mostly centered around the legality of the branding of the website. I guess overall the guy behind skiplagged will be happy to have gotten away with what amounts to 10% of revenue in exchange for a lot of publicity.
Re: Jury awards American Airline $9.4M from website behind 'skiplagging' hack
#8Well, Skiplagged is still in business and this probably just drives more traffic to their website as this raises awareness. Apparently they have had more than $100M in ticket sales, if not much more.
Re: Jury awards American Airline $9.4M from website behind 'skiplagging' hack
#9Important note: "skiplagging" while frowned upon and grounds for an airline banning individuals from using them; is not why skiplagged is paying AA $9.4M. From the article: Paul Yetter, an attorney for American with Yetter Coleman in Houston, told jurors during opening statements that Skiplagged is not an authorized agent of the airline yet "dresses up" its website with American's trademarks to look legitimate and fo…
> no damages being awarded on the trademark claim
Re: Jury awards American Airline $9.4M from website behind 'skiplagging' hack
#10Seems like this practice in general shows that a true free market doesn't exist in the airline industry. If it did exist then flights like these wouldn't be profitable to sell in the first place.
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