cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/51259064

Shopping for airfare is clearly a game full of shenanigans. You find a cheap ticket, get a (likely fake) indicator warning how few seats are available with a countdown timer, rush through a lengthy process of being forced to make a shit-ton of decisions like whether you want to buy an neck wrap, selfie stick, a bad travel insurance deal, … lots of shit to get through to slow you down. You finally get to the last screen and it says “price has increased since we first quoted you”. Motherfuckers.

Considering aircraft are quite shitty for climate, why not make the airlines shenanigans backfire against them? We have bots arbitrarily hit the air travel sites, enter bogus orders but never submit the last page. Just give the airlines a false indicator of demand. This games their dynamic pricing to quote prices higher than optimum. Any deviation from optimum prices translates into lower profit, likely a consequence of lower sales.

Perhaps an org like Greenpeace would be interested in this tactic.

  • Trainguyrom@reddthat.comEnglish
    3·
    2 days ago

    Inflated prices for non-existent demand will just lead to price crashes close to boarding as they try to fill seats, or worse partially filled planes flying instead of fully filled planes flying (thereby increasing the carbon cost per passenger)

    • evenwichtOP
      2·
      20 hours ago

      GHG per passenger does not matter. It’s the net GHG that matters. If the plane is mostly empty, they will cancel the flight and shift people onto another flight.

  • ohulancutash@feddit.ukEnglish
    14·
    2 days ago

    Pretty stupid. A slightly more expensive seat isn’t going to deter travel, but it will boost airline profits.

    • evenwichtOP
      11·
      20 hours ago

      Stupid you. That’s not how economics works. If a more expensive seat boosts airline profits, then they would simply already increase prices to begin with. They don’t need our permission. They can charge $1 million for a seat, if they want. But they will have a hard time selling the seat if it’s not going beyond the atmosphere.

      Bit of econ 101 for you: If McDonalds spontaneously doubles the cost of a big mac out of the pure blue, they will more than double their profit on each burger. But they will sell substantially fewer, causing profits to drop. The market determines what price is optimum for profit.