Update: We’ve received some enquiries (both out of shock and curiosity) and we’d like to urge our readers to take a closer look at the date of the post ;) In other words, Happy April Fools Day.

It’s been almost a year since we made the big jump onto Ruby On Rails for our hotels meta-search product on wego.com. To celebrate its one-year anniversary (well, almost one-year anniversary) we are glad to announce that the hotels meta-search product is available as open-source on GitHub!

We are still sorting out a few issues with our development team regarding documentation and such, but we are confident that this move will strengthen our core product offering by utilizing the power of the community. Please fork our GitHub repository at http://www.github.com/wego/hotels and we will gladly accept patches. We are opening a Trac account for bug reports and mailing list for announcements – this will happen very soon.

In the meanwhile, Happy Hacking!

Sydney – 12 December, 2008:

Travel search engine Wego today announced that its travel search box is now accessible on all of News Limited’s metropolitan online mastheads, increasing Wego’s distribution and consumer reach.

Already successfully implemented into news.com.au/travel, the Wego search box is now available on -

- dailytelegraph.com.au/travel

- heraldsun.com.au/travel

- couriermail.com.au/travel

- adelaidenow.com.au/travel

- perthnow.com.au/travel

- theaustralian.news.com.au/travel

The search box, which links straight through to the Wego website, displays the latest flights, hotels and package offers and also allows users to compare prices from multiple providers for these products.

The implementation of Wego’s search boxes across News Limited’s masthead network is an expansion of the Wego affiliates program. This program allows publishers and bloggers to earn extra revenue by placing Wego banners, search boxes and similar tools on their website, providing instant access to global travel deals from over 100 travel websites via Wego’s cutting-edge search technology.

Sam Lindner, Australian marketing manager for Wego.com.au said that the partnership would significantly broaden Wego’s Australian footprint. “Wego has seen excellent growth in Australian traffic since the launch of Wego.com.au in July this year. With over seven million visitors a month*, the News Limited online mastheads will drive significant traffic to Wego, further cementing our presence in Australia. These visitors can quickly and easily compare prices from over 100 global travel.”

Michael Robinson, chief executive officer – media, News Digital Media said that the presence of the Wego search box would enrich the browsing experience of News’ travel readers. “We aim to provide a complete virtual travel experience for our users. Our sites offer inspirational travel destination articles and galleries, helpful travel advice and tips, the latest travel news headlines and now, a tool to help them find the best price for a particular travel package or destination.”

* Cumulative total of UB’s for each of the masthead sites according to Nielsen Online – News and Weather – Domestic for November 2008

For more information, please contact:

Vida Redoblado – Wego.com.au

02 8114 7325

0401 435 309

vida.redoblado@newsdigitalmedia.com.au

Wego has recently collaborated with The Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore and Qais to launch a Singapore-centric meta-search engine that aims to promote travel in and out of the country and market Changi Airport as a world-class hub.

ViaSingapore.com, is being promoted in Australia, China, Indonesia, India and the UK through a digital campaign run on TripAdvisor, Virtual Tourist, Lonely Planet and Google.

ViaSingapore offers tools to compare airfare deals and track flight information from Changi Airport provided through a partnership with us at www.wego.com. It includes information on hotel rates as well as editorial and user-generated content including travel guides and blogs, videos and uploaded images.

Another great reason for travel advertisors to want to work with us

Vist site here www.viasingapore.com

Recent press coverage : http://www.marketing-interactive.com/news/9579

Over the coming weeks the Bezurk team will be posting articles and stories about our startup. We have been working as a team for over 18 months now so we have lots of shared experiences and key learnings to blog about. Our team is a “mash up” of different nationalities from Australia, Britain, South Africa, Korea,Vietnam, USA, Philippines and Singapore, so you can look forward to many points of view and opinions.

You won’t be hearing from me for a week, as I am visiting Railey Bay in Krabi for a short getaway.

Thanks to one of our travel industry partners Asia Web Direct I managed to book myself a super deal.