The demise of the Genesis Travel Distribution System, the so-called travel-agent-owned GDS, conjures reflections on the expression: "If a tree fell in the woods and nobody was around, did it make a sound?"
Despite the noble intentions of Genesis evangelist Bruce Bishins, his pet project, which was characterized by an excruciatingly slow birth that had its origins in the mid-1990s, was irrelevant to the marketplace.
In my eight years covering the travel distribution marketplace, in hundreds of interviews with officials from airlines, GDSs and travel agencies, never once did an official raise the subject of the Genesis Travel Distribution System as a factor in anything.
A Genesis official last week cited airlines moving content outside of the GDSs and onto the Web as a prime factor in the decision to cease operations.
With airlines beginning to hone their Web strategies at least five years before Genesis ever processed its first air booking, the fact that Genesis did not calculate airlines' Web push into the equation is mind-boggling. Then again, if a tree fell in the woods...