Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="6bac2a77ddc1e1e1ef4639f3ff99c6c9fbad178502598e423f2255b1765e" Subject: Travel Tech Essentialist #199: The Optimist's Edge From: Mauricio | Travel Tech Essentialist To: Hidden Recipient Date: Fri, 27 Mar 2026 17:04:28 +0000 X-Hiring: We are hiring, reach out at header-hacker@emailshot.io X-EmailShot-Signature: 6Z_CRb_5N7G_kmO_pI2pBayL4I1qh-BLsi3RRV31n2RXbGY9-DJbBLBWR-S53PPy4wFIsuxNQUD_Gea9guOKtQ== --6bac2a77ddc1e1e1ef4639f3ff99c6c9fbad178502598e423f2255b1765e Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable View this post on the web at https://traveltechessentialist.substack.com/p/= travel-tech-essentialist-199-the The world is more interesting than the headlines suggest, and the people wh= o see that don=E2=80=99t wait for consensus. The pessimists have been wrong= about every transformative technology in history. They were wrong about th= e camera, the bicycle, books, manned flight, music, radio, the internet, an= d they=E2=80=99re wrong about AI. New technologies expand the world, and th= e gap between the catastrophist and the early mover is where opportunity ha= s always lived. Seeing the gap requires a trained disposition. That=E2=80= =99s the optimist=E2=80=99s edge. And it=E2=80=99s learnable. Special thanks to Propellic [ https://substack.com/redirect/334c8511-0947-4= 3d6-b6b5-2b3bac98d938?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN48_jCfg= M3m0rbAsF0l24U ] for sponsoring this edition of the newsletter: Propellic [ https://substack.com/redirect/334c8511-0947-43d6-b6b5-2b3bac98d= 938?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN48_jCfgM3m0rbAsF0l24U ] i= s the leading travel marketing agency built for how people discover travel = today. We help travel brands thrive through SEO, paid media, and AI-driven = visibility across platforms like ChatGPT. Our recent work helped G Adventur= es achieve double-digit organic growth and improved rankings for high-inten= t search terms by aligning organic and paid strategies. Ready to turn click= s into bookings?=20 Book a meeting [ https://substack.com/redirect/ee75f622-9e40-4525-82d9-54bd= 828b9602?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN48_jCfgM3m0rbAsF0l24= U ] to start your journey. Let=E2=80=99s grow. 1. After craft, what? Pete Flint at NFX uses photography to explain the possible impact of AI. Wh= en the camera arrived in 1839, painters panicked. Painting didn=E2=80=99t d= ie. It exploded into Impressionism, Cubism, photojournalism, amateur photog= raphy, street photography, instant prints, and each disruption added layers= =2E The game got bigger. The same pattern is forming now. Flint maps out a hierarchy worth internali= zing. Execution is getting automated. Craft is getting commoditized. Even t= aste (knowing what has worked before) will eventually be a learnable signal= for AI. What survives is expression: a genuine point of view on what could= be. He gives the example of Picasso. He mastered realism first, then discarded = it for something nobody wanted, until it became one of the most important p= aintings in history. He was using =E2=80=9Cskill=E2=80=9D as a floor, then = pushing toward something only he could make. The founders who pull ahead wi= ll do the same: treat commoditized execution as table stakes, and compete o= n what only they can see. Read + NFX [ https://substack.com/redirect/40ecca= 5c-935c-4208-819b-3bb60d43ecf5?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-j= nN48_jCfgM3m0rbAsF0l24U ] 2. The jobs that don't exist yet The fear of AI taking jobs is real, but it=E2=80=99s also misdirected. US census data shows roughly 60% of the jobs people do today didn=E2=80=99t= exist in 1940 as distinct occupations. New technologies created whole new = categories of work. The numbers looking forward are just as striking. The World Economic Forum'= s Future of Jobs Report 2025 [ https://substack.com/redirect/e0cc81f9-1a5f-= 48ca-846d-7d9fcd138d2b?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN48_jCf= gM3m0rbAsF0l24U ] projects 170 million new roles created and 92 million dis= placed by 2030, a net gain of 78 million roles. They also estimate that aro= und 65% of today=E2=80=99s primary school students will end up working in j= obs that don=E2=80=99t yet exist. What we call =E2=80=9Cfear of AI job loss=E2=80=9D is mostly fear of curren= t job loss, which is understandable. But the historical pattern is consiste= nt: automation reshapes and expands work, retiring old roles while creating= new ones at scale. AI looks like a continuation of that pattern; faster, b= ut not different in kind. The disruption is real, but the ending isn=E2=80=99t. 3. The panic and the pattern Every new technology triggers a moral panic. Marc Andreessen traces it back= to Socrates, who thought written language was a mistake. The bicycle got i= ts own version in the 1880s, when the press warned that young women who rod= e them would develop =E2=80=9Cbicycle face,=E2=80=9D a permanent grimace fr= om exertion that would make them unmarriageable. Jazz was going to corrupt = youth. And so was rock and roll, hip-hop, the internet=E2=80=A6each one was= going to ruin everything. The technologies change, but the panic is identical. What repeats is the re= action to disruption, and that reaction drives clicks and headlines. AI is no different. But what makes this moment harder to read is that even = the people closest to a technology often misunderstand where it=E2=80=99s g= oing. Edison invented the phonograph and was certain its primary use would = be religious sermons, envisioning families gathered around the device at ni= ght listening to preachers. The world had other ideas: music. The inventor = of the technology that would reshape global culture and spawn entire indust= ries had completely misread where it was going. Even Wozniak (Apple co-foun= der) publicly doubted the usefulness of computers. In 1839, when the daguerreotype (the first publicly adopted photographic pr= ocess) debuted in Paris, most portrait painters concluded their craft was f= inished. Samuel Morse, himself a painter and inventor of the telegraph, saw= it differently. In a speech to the National Academy of Design, he called i= t =E2=80=9Cundoubtedly destined to produce a great revolution in art=E2=80= =9D and urged artists to understand its influence rather than fear it. Most saw the end and Morse saw the beginning. The gap between the catastrophist and the early mover tends to be where opp= ortunity lives. 4 We've been here before When you see these types of headlines=E2=80=A6 Remember that history rhymes. 5. Air travel didn=E2=80=99t escape the trend In 1903, the New York Times predicted manned flight would take between 1 an= d 10 million years. 9 weeks later, the Wright Brothers flew at Kitty Hawk. = Once flight was proven possible, critics called it a rich man=E2=80=99s toy= =2E When Kennedy announced the moonshot, opponents coined =E2=80=9Cmoondoggle= =E2=80=9D (a wasteful government vanity project, in American slang). Even = Eisenhower (who created NASA) called anyone spending $40 billion to reach t= he moon =E2=80=9Cnuts.=E2=80=9D When the moon landing finally came, a teach= er=E2=80=99s union organizer went to bed early, calling it =E2=80=9Ca trivi= al prestige exercise.=E2=80=9D The full arc of every transformative technology: impossible =E2=86=92 waste= ful =E2=86=92 obvious The Pessimist Archive [ https://substack.com/redirect/4cbef411-7b61-47ed-9b= 85-492cb60841b4?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN48_jCfgM3m0rb= AsF0l24U ] has the receipts.=20 6. The acceleration trap The historical pattern has been that transformative technologies expand, no= t contract, the world of work. The pessimists have been wrong in the long r= un. But the short run is more complicated. A new HBR study [ https://substa= ck.com/redirect/ff57fbfa-42aa-45ec-aa42-62cc452294f9?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn= 0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN48_jCfgM3m0rbAsF0l24U ] tracked AI adoption at a 20= 0-person tech company over eight months. AI didn=E2=80=99t reduce work. It = intensified it. Workers moved faster, took on broader scope, and voluntaril= y extended work into hours that used to be off. Many participants felt busi= er than before they used AI. The mechanism is that speed raises expectation= s =E2=86=92 higher expectations increase AI reliance =E2=86=92 more relianc= e widens scope =E2=86=92 wider scope creates more work. The arc of AI adoption may end well, but the path there has a burnout risk = that most companies are not yet anticipating. 7. You see what you believe Nir Eyal on the Modern Wisdom podcast [ https://substack.com/redirect/ff3d1= c7a-c3f2-40b5-b0a7-a1b17c4bb3fc?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-= jnN48_jCfgM3m0rbAsF0l24U ] talks about how your beliefs shape your interpre= tation of the world, and they also predetermine what you see in it. Two groups were asked to count photos in a specially designed newspaper. Se= lf-identified pessimists averaged 2.5 minutes. Self-identified optimists av= eraged 11 seconds. On page two, a caption read =E2=80=9Cthere are 48 photos= in this newspaper.=E2=80=9D Optimists saw it and collected their prize. Pe= ssimists counted the photos one by one, never seeing the answer staring the= m in the face. The same mechanism runs in reverse. In the Dartmouth Scar Study, women had = a realistic fake scar applied to their faces. Before entering a room, resea= rchers secretly removed it without them knowing. They reported being stared= at, discriminated against, and made uncomfortable=E2=80=A6for a scar that = no longer existed. They expected a response and found it everywhere. Hans Rosling gave university professors an exam on the actual state of the = world (education, health, democracy, female empowerment, etc=E2=80=A6). The= y scored worse than monkeys. Their existing beliefs made the evidence invis= ible. Successful entrepreneurs see opportunities that others walk past. Not becau= se they are smarter, but because they expect to find them. If you are looki= ng for $100 bills on the floor, you will find them. If you are looking for = reasons it won=E2=80=99t work, you will find those too. 8. The end of the middleman One way to train your eye toward opportunity is to choose your sources deli= berately. For most of history, if you wanted to understand what a founder w= as building and why, you had to trust a journalist to translate it for you,= with all their biases, deadlines, and narratives intact. That era is over. =E2=80=9CEvery company is a media company now. You should be publishing you= r own content, direct to your own blog, social media... I really don=E2=80= =99t like this idea of putting information out through a traditional journa= list who=E2=80=99s going to bring their own bias and filter to it.=E2=80=9D= =E2=80=94 Brian Armstrong, founder of Coinbase, on the David Senra podcast= [ https://substack.com/redirect/f27cd5fe-93d6-40cb-9b08-6097d0568308?j=3De= yJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN48_jCfgM3m0rbAsF0l24U ] We are living through a golden age of primary sources. Founders and entrepr= eneurs talk directly to millions. No filters, less spin, and no headline wr= itten before the reporting begins. Read the books, listen to the builders and skip the intermediaries.=20 9. The screen fatigue dividend Social media usage appears to have peaked around 2022 and has been declinin= g since. Young people are leading the pullback; they grew up online, saw th= e full cycle, and concluded that endless scroll doesn=E2=80=99t make you ha= ppier or smarter. Greg Isenberg calls it the anti-trend [ https://substack.= com/redirect/53767f6a-3e62-409d-98e9-3487b2f35e13?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.x= u76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN48_jCfgM3m0rbAsF0l24U ]: attention shifting back to th= ings that feel real, slow, and intentional. His list of where the opportunity lives includes slow media formats, privat= e communities, paid memberships that deliver depth, and IRL anything=E2=80= =A6dinners, meetups, shared experiences. The internet=E2=80=99s oldest assumption, that more engagement equals more = value, is breaking. What replaces it are spaces that make people feel groun= ded, informed, and connected. Note: The data is self-reported, so treat the direction rather than the pre= cise numbers as the signal. 10. The farm is the story Agritourism, an $8 billion market today, is one form of what Isenberg's ant= i-trend looks like in the travel industry. By 2033, it will reach $21 billi= on, growing at nearly 12% annually. Ben Wolff explains [ https://substack.= com/redirect/bb055a70-9860-47b4-b0d2-b1b87ad3ddde?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.x= u76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN48_jCfgM3m0rbAsF0l24U ] why. 99% of consumers want tra= nsparency in fresh food sourcing. Farm hotels skip the certifications and t= he supply chain documentation because guests walk into the field and see it= themselves. Visual verification builds trust instantly, and trust justifie= s premium pricing in a way that a sustainability claim on a menu never coul= d. The properties leading this category have figured out what Wolff calls the = =E2=80=9Cseed-to-soul=E2=80=9D continuum. The farm dictates the menu, the s= pa treatments, the educational experiences. Blackberry Farm in Tennessee, B= abylonstoren in South Africa, The Newt in Somerset. High-margin F&B from hy= per-local ingredients, beekeeping workshops, on-site retail, large-format e= vents. The model is also bleeding into residential real estate. Agrihoods (master-= planned communities built around working farms) are one of the fastest-grow= ing ideas in residential development, with 200 already operating across 28 = states in the US. The common thread across all of it is transparency, wellness, community, co= nnection to the land. Guests can feel the difference between treating this = as core product or using it as a sustainability marketing claim. PS. Adding a second brain for fundraising I=E2=80=99ve added a new mode to the Travel Tech Essentialist Copilot [ htt= ps://substack.com/redirect/06f0d920-1b22-4958-8dee-9a1df075e1ce?j=3DeyJ1Ijo= iM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN48_jCfgM3m0rbAsF0l24U ]: pitch-deck revi= ew. It=E2=80=99s the same thinking partner for product and growth, but now = it can also pressure-test your fundraising story. When you share a deck or have a fundraising question, it switches gears and= reviews it through the frameworks of the most influential Silicon Valley V= Cs, flags common mistakes, scores the strength of the pitch, and suggests r= ewrites and structural improvements. But more importantly, it diagnoses wha= t=E2=80=99s underneath: unclear positioning, weak traction, or a story that= doesn=E2=80=99t hold together. Go ahead, share your deck and ask it to rate it, identify what=E2=80=99s we= ak, and how to improve it. Travel Tech Essentialist Job Board=20 New companies on the job board: Navan and Stay22. Navan is hiring across sales, revenue operations, strategy, product, and da= ta roles in the US and Europe, with a strong focus on go-to-market and comm= ercial teams. See all open roles here [ https://substack.com/redirect/9442c= 944-ccf0-485b-a7e1-b56525e7aa08?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-= jnN48_jCfgM3m0rbAsF0l24U ]. Stay22 is building out its Montreal team across product, engineering, data,= operations, and business roles. See all open roles here [ https://substack= =2Ecom/redirect/28e5871f-34a8-47d0-bb9= 0-a1b68422ad2e?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.= xu76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN48_jCfgM3m0rbAsF0l24U ]. =E2=86=92 Explore all 2030 open roles [ https://substack.com/redirect/a6e01= 465-f0f6-4de1-911c-63ab7ffc9ed7?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-= jnN48_jCfgM3m0rbAsF0l24U ] on the Travel Tech Essentialist Job Board.=20 Navan [ https://substack.com/redirect/9442c944-ccf0-485b-a7e1-b56525e7aa08?= j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN48_jCfgM3m0rbAsF0l24U ] | Vic= e President, Solutions Consulting [ https://substack.com/redirect/c904f35f-= 266d-467d-92ba-cf6b8b5d3fc3?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN4= 8_jCfgM3m0rbAsF0l24U ] | New York City | $244k - $325k=20 Airalo [ https://substack.com/redirect/a0e3383c-e469-4842-8e17-ea5570ef5f0c= ?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN48_jCfgM3m0rbAsF0l24U ] | Qu= ality Assurance Engineer, Roaming [ https://substack.com/redirect/312d810d-= b05e-492f-b62b-0cfc7a3f65bc?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN4= 8_jCfgM3m0rbAsF0l24U ] | Europe; Africa; Middle East; Brazil The Hotels Network [ https://substack.com/redirect/6fec5208-128f-4028-ab97-= 62dfe1dfb4cf?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN48_jCfgM3m0rbAsF= 0l24U ] | Partnerships Manager [ https://substack.com/redirect/a647a394-de3= 7-404a-94f8-e4152bc6dcc9?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN48_j= CfgM3m0rbAsF0l24U ] | Fort Worth, TX; Dallas, TX | $81k - $100k Plug and Play [ https://substack.com/redirect/1d5a2893-9b2b-4f83-80d7-09b0b= 1fb82ba?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN48_jCfgM3m0rbAsF0l24U= ] | Venture Associate [ https://substack.com/redirect/0b3fd77f-de07-4532-b= 41b-df2594dd347a?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0.xu76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN48_jCfgM3m0r= bAsF0l24U ] | Sunnyvale, CA =F0=9F=93=A9 Subscribe to the Travel Tech Jobs newsletter [ https://substac= k.com/redirect/8e3f05c6-e9e2-4559-90b3-99edf00c7ec6?j=3DeyJ1IjoiM2dmeXZtIn0= =2Exu76uFObqArDfP822j-jnN48_jCfgM3m0rbAsF0l24U ]. If you like Travel Tech Essentialist, please consider sharing it with your = friends or colleagues. If you=E2=80=99re not yet subscribed, join us here: And, as always, thanks for trusting me with your inbox. Mauricio Prieto Unsubscribe https://substack.com/redirect/2/eyJlIjoiaHR0cHM6Ly90cmF2ZWx0ZWN= oZXNzZW50aWFsaXN0LnN1YnN0YWNrLmNvbS9hY3Rpb24vZGlzYWJsZV9lbWFpbD90b2tlbj1leU= oxYzJWeVgybGtJam95TURrd01UYzBNallzSW5CdmMzUmZhV1FpT2pFNU1qQXlPVFV4TXl3aWFXR= jBJam94TnpjME5qTXhNRGd4TENKbGVIQWlPakU0TURZeE5qY3dPREVzSW1semN5STZJbkIxWWkw= Mk1qTXhNU0lzSW5OMVlpSTZJbVJwYzJGaWJHVmZaVzFoYVd3aWZRLkJjMFN5eE90dXQ4em0xZDV= GUUtvc2t0enFTSkd0WlplSkdCV0ItNXNkejQiLCJwIjoxOTIwMjk1MTMsInMiOjYyMzExLCJmIj= p0cnVlLCJ1IjoyMDkwMTc0MjYsImlhdCI6MTc3NDYzMTA4MSwiZXhwIjoyMDkwMjA3MDgxLCJpc= 3MiOiJwdWItMCIsInN1YiI6ImxpbmstcmVkaXJlY3QifQ.oXPwB-bIouhaNkrayfq8veNMt32W-= kucIL0qmJ6p-XE? --6bac2a77ddc1e1e1ef4639f3ff99c6c9fbad178502598e423f2255b1765e Content-Type: text/html; charset="utf-8" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Travel Tech Essentialist= #199: The Optimist's Edge3D""
The world is more interesting than the headlines suggest, and the peo= ple who see that don't wait for consensus. The pessimists have been wrong a= bout every transformative technology in history. They were wrong about the = camera, the bicycle, books, manned flight, music, radio, the internet, and = they’re wrong about AI. New technologies expand the world, and the ga= p between the catastrophist and the early mover is where opportunity has al= ways lived. Seeing the gap requires a trained disposition. That’s the= optimist’s edge. And it’s learnable.
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Forwarded t= his email?

Travel Tech Essentialist #199: The Optimist's Edge

 
 
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READ IN APP3D""

The world is more interest= ing than the headlines suggest, and the people who see that don’t wai= t for consensus. The pessimists have been wrong about every transformative = technology in history. They were wrong about the camera, the bicycle, books= , manned flight, music, radio, the internet, and they’re wrong about = AI. New technologies expand the world, and the gap between the catastrophis= t and the early mover is where opportunity has always lived. Seeing the gap= requires a trained disposition. That’s the optimist’s edge. An= d it’s learnable.

Special thanks to Propellic for s= ponsoring this edition of the newsletter:

3D"Propellic

Propellic is the leading travel marketin= g agency built for how people discover travel today. We help travel brands = thrive through SEO, paid media, and AI-driven visibility across platforms l= ike ChatGPT. Our recent work helped G Adventures achieve double-digit organ= ic growth and improved rankings for high-intent search terms by aligning or= ganic and paid strategies. Ready to turn clicks into bookings?

<= p style=3D"margin: 0 0 20px 0;color: rgb(54,55,55);margin-left: 20px;line-h= eight: 26px;font-size: 16px;">Book a meeting to start your journey. Let’s grow.<= /span>

1. After craft, what?=

Pete Flint at NFX uses photography to explain the possibl= e impact of AI. When the camera arrived in 1839, painters panicked. Paintin= g didn’t die. It exploded into Impressionism, Cubism, photojournalism= , amateur photography, street photography, instant prints, and each disrupt= ion added layers. The game got bigger.

The same pattern is = forming now. Flint maps out a hierarchy worth internalizing. Execution is g= etting automated. Craft is getting commoditized. Even taste (knowing what h= as worked before) will eventually be a learnable signal for AI. What surviv= es is expression: a genuine point of view on what could be.

He gives the example of Picasso. He mastered realism first, then dis= carded it for something nobody wanted, until it became one of the most impo= rtant paintings in history. He was using “skill” as a floor, th= en pushing toward something only he could make. The founders who pull ahead= will do the same: treat commoditized execution as table stakes, and compet= e on what only they can see. Read + NFX

2. = The jobs that don't exist yet

The fear of AI taking= jobs is real, but it’s also misdirected.

US census d= ata shows roughly 60% of the jobs people do today didn’t exist in 194= 0 as distinct occupations. New technologies created whole new categories of= work.

The numbers looking forward are just as striki= ng. The World Economic Forum's Future of Jobs Report 2025 projects 170 million = new roles created and 92 million displaced by 2030, a net gain of 78 millio= n roles. They also estimate that around 65% of today’s primary school= students will end up working in jobs that don’t yet exist.

What we call “fear of AI job loss” is mostl= y fear of current job loss, which is understandable. = But the historical pattern is consistent: automation reshapes and expands w= ork, retiring old roles while creating new ones at scale. AI looks like a c= ontinuation of that pattern; faster, but not different in kind.

<= p style=3D"margin: 0 0 20px 0;color: rgb(54,55,55);line-height: 26px;font-s= ize: 16px;">The disruption is real, but the ending isn’t.

3. The panic and the pattern

Ever= y new technology triggers a moral panic. Marc Andreessen traces it back to = Socrates, who thought written language was a mistake. The bicycle got its o= wn version in the 1880s, when the press warned that young women who rode th= em would develop “bicycle face,” a permanent grimace from exert= ion that would make them unmarriageable. Jazz was going to corrupt youth. A= nd so was rock and roll, hip-hop, the internet…each one was going to = ruin everything.

The technologies change, but the panic is = identical. What repeats is the reaction to disruption, and that reaction dr= ives clicks and headlines.

AI is no different. But what mak= es this moment harder to read is that even the people closest to a technolo= gy often misunderstand where it’s going. Edison invented the phonogra= ph and was certain its primary use would be religious sermons, envisioning = families gathered around the device at night listening to preachers. The wo= rld had other ideas: music. The inventor of the technology that would resha= pe global culture and spawn entire industries had completely misread where = it was going. Even Wozniak (Apple co-founder) publicly doubted the usefulne= ss of computers.

In 1839, when the daguerreotype (the first= publicly adopted photographic process) debuted in Paris, most portrait pai= nters concluded their craft was finished. Samuel Morse, himself a painter a= nd inventor of the telegraph, saw it differently. In a speech to the Nation= al Academy of Design, he called it “undoubtedly destined to produce a= great revolution in art” and urged artists to understand its influen= ce rather than fear it.

Most saw the end and Morse saw the = beginning.

The gap between the catastrophist and the early = mover tends to be where opportunity lives.

4 We've been here before

When you see the= se types of headlines…

3D""

Rem= ember that history rhymes.

3D""
Collected from the Pessimist Archive
=

5. Air travel didn’t escape th= e trend

In 1903, the New York Times predicted manne= d flight would take between 1 and 10 million years. 9 weeks later, the Wrig= ht Brothers flew at Kitty Hawk. Once flight was proven possible, critics ca= lled it a rich man’s toy.

When Kennedy announce= d the moonshot, opponents coined “moondoggle” (a wasteful gover= nment vanity project, in American slang). Even Eisenhower (who created NAS= A) called anyone spending $40 billion to reach the moon “nuts.”= When the moon landing finally came, a teacher’s union organizer went= to bed early, calling it “a trivial prestige exercise.”=

The full arc of every transformative technology: impossible &= #8594; wasteful → obvious

The Pessimist Archive has the receipts. =

3D"=
<= span>Source: The Pessimi= st Archive

6. The acceleration trap

The historical= pattern has been that transformative technologies expand, not contract, th= e world of work. The pessimists have been wrong in the long run. But the sh= ort run is more complicated. A new HBR study tracked AI adoption at a 200-perso= n tech company over eight months. AI didn’t reduce work. It intensifi= ed it. Workers moved faster, took on broader scope, and voluntarily extende= d work into hours that used to be off. Many participants felt busier than b= efore they used AI. The mechanism is that speed raises expectations →= higher expectations increase AI reliance → more reliance widens scop= e → wider scope creates more work.

The arc of = AI adoption may end well, but the path there has a burnout risk that most c= ompanies are not yet anticipating.

7. <= span>You see what you believe

Nir Eyal on the= Modern Wisdom= podcast talks about how your beliefs shape your interpretation o= f the world, and they also predetermine what you see in it.

Two groups were asked to count photos in a specially designed newsp= aper. Self-identified pessimists averaged 2.5 minutes. Self-identified opti= mists averaged 11 seconds. On page two, a caption read “there are 48 = photos in this newspaper.” Optimists saw it and collected their prize= =2E Pessimists counted the photos one b= y one, never seeing the answer staring= them in the face.

The same mechanism runs in reverse. In t= he Dartmouth Scar Study, women had a realistic fake scar applied to their f= aces. Before entering a room, researchers secretly removed it without them = knowing. They reported being stared at, discriminated against, and made unc= omfortable…for a scar that no longer existed. They expected a respons= e and found it everywhere.

Hans Rosling gave university pro= fessors an exam on the actual state of the world (education, health, democr= acy, female empowerment, etc…). They scored worse than monkeys. Their= existing beliefs made the evidence invisible.

Successful e= ntrepreneurs see opportunities that others walk past. Not because they are = smarter, but because they expect to find them. If you are looking for $100 = bills on the floor, you will find them. If you are looking for reasons it w= on’t work, you will find those too.

9. The screen f= atigue dividend

Social media usage appears = to have peaked around 2022 and has been declining since. Young people are l= eading the pullback; they grew up online, saw the full cycle, and concluded= that endless scroll doesn’t make you happier or smarter. Greg Isenberg calls it th= e anti-trend: attention shifting back to things that feel real, s= low, and intentional.

His list of where the opportun= ity lives includes slow media formats, private communities, paid membership= s that deliver depth, and IRL anything…dinners, meetups, shared exper= iences.

The internet’s oldest assumption, that more e= ngagement equals more value, is breaking. What replaces it are spaces that = make people feel grounded, informed, and connected.

Note: T= he data is self-reported, so treat the direction rather than the precise nu= mbers as the signal.

3D"chart,<= /td>

10. The farm is the story

Agritourism, an $8 billion market today, is one form of what Ise= nberg's anti-trend looks like in the travel industry. By 2033, it will reac= h $21 billion, growing at nearly 12% annually. Ben Wolff explains why. 99% of = consumers want transparency in fresh food sourcing. Farm hotels skip the ce= rtifications and the supply chain documentation because guests walk into th= e field and see it themselves. Visual verification builds trust instantly, = and trust justifies premium pricing in a way that a sustainability claim on= a menu never could.

The properties leading this cat= egory have figured out what Wolff calls the “seed-to-soul” cont= inuum. The farm dictates the menu, the spa treatments, the educational expe= riences. Blackberry Farm in Tennessee, Babylonstoren in South Africa, The N= ewt in Somerset. High-margin F&B from hyper-local ingredients, beekeepi= ng workshops, on-site retail, large-format events.

The mode= l is also bleeding into residential real estate. Agrihoods (master-planned = communities built around working farms) are one of the fastest-growing idea= s in residential development, with 200 already operating across 28 states i= n the US.

The common thread across all of it is transparenc= y, wellness, community, connection to the land. Guests can feel the differe= nce between treating this as core product or using it as a sustainability m= arketing claim.

3D"No

PS. Adding a second brai= n for fundraising

I’ve added a new mo= de to the Trav= el Tech Essentialist Copilot: pitch-deck review. It’s the s= ame thinking partner for product and growth, but now it can also pressure-t= est your fundraising story.

When you share a deck or= have a fundraising question, it switches gears and reviews it through the = frameworks of the most influential Silicon Valley VCs, flags common mistake= s, scores the strength of the pitch, and suggests rewrites and structural i= mprovements. But more importantly, it diagnoses what’s underneath: un= clear positioning, weak traction, or a story that doesn’t hold togeth= er.

Go ahead, share your deck and ask it to rate it, identi= fy what’s weak, and how to improve it.

Try the Copilot

Travel Tec= h Essentialist Job Board

New companies on the job board: = Navan and Stay22.

  • Navan is hiring across sales, rev= enue operations, strategy, product, and data roles in the US and Europe, wi= th a strong focus on go-to-market and commercial teams. See all open roles here.

  • S= tay22 is building out its Montreal team across product, engineering, data, = operations, and business roles. See all open roles here.

→ Explore all 2030 open roles on the Travel Tech Essenti= alist Job Board.

📩= Subscribe to the Travel Tech Jobs newsletter.

If you like Travel Tech Essentialist, please consider sharing it with = your friends or colleagues. If you’re not yet subscribed, join us her= e:

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And, as always, thanks for trusting me with your inbox.<= /p>

Mauricio Prieto

 
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