What Muse needs to take on Booking and Airbnb
The author argues that Muse's travel booking push is limited because exclusive prices and listings remain locked inside Booking and Airbnb, making affiliate marketing the most likely outcome.
For Meta Muse to displace $BKNG and $ABNB, it would need to: (1) Access special unadvertised prices only available via Booking app and logged-in users. (2) Yes, an agentic AI agent can easily login and do that, but that doesn't mean they can find that $6 rental car deal elsewhere. (3) So they still have to book through Booking, or in the case of Airbnb, where most properties are exclusively listed. This friend and wife travel all the time, super creative with finding best deals, and they often find the best only in Booking app. Not website. Most likely scenario? $META does affiliate marketing arrangements with travel aggregators.