Yahoo!'s Trip Planner Enables Travelers to Create and Share Their Travel Experiences with Other Online Users

Business Wire, July 10, 2006

SUNNYVALE, Calif. -- Yahoo! Inc. today announced the general availability of Trip Planner (http://travel.yahoo.com/trip), an online travel research resource within Yahoo! Travel that helps users plan their trip, create their own customized printable travel guide, as well as share their travel experiences with friends, family, and if desired, other Yahoo! Travel users. The shared Trip Plans have also been organized by Yahoo! Travel to create a growing interactive archive of personal travel experiences that can be used by others to plan their trips.

Trip Planner includes a range of features that allow travelers to document their personal travel experiences. These features provide users the ability to create photograph-rich travel journals, to plot their trip on an interactive map, as well as include notes, ratings and reviews regarding the destinations, hotels and points of interest they have visited. Together, these features allow travelers to create a comprehensive record of their travel experience that can be saved for personal archives or shared with others. Additionally, with more than 20,000 publicly viewable Trip Plans from around the world organized on an interactive map, Yahoo! Travel allows other users to research travel by learning from the trips of fellow travelers.

"The launch of Trip Planner further demonstrates Yahoo!'s overall commitment to innovation in the field of social search and social media," said Jasper Malcolmson, director of Yahoo! Travel. "Just as other Yahoo! social search products like Flickr, Yahoo! Answers, del.icio.us, and MyWeb have created a platform for sharing information between users, Trip Planner is about offering a way for travelers to benefit from sharing their travel experiences."

New product features include:

A[micro]   --  Trip Journals - A new tool for travelers to use post-trip to
        share their travel experiences and for people to use while
        researching travel experiences. Key features include:

A[micro]       --  The ability to add journal entries and photos in a
            personalized format

A[micro]       --  Simple search function that assists other users in finding
            the most useful journal entries to help plan their travel

A[micro]   --  Interactive Map to Search for Trip Plans
        (http://travel.yahoo.com/trip?action=explore) - a new tool for
        travel inspiration, allowing users to visually explore Trip
        Plans across the globe on an interactive map. Key features
        include:

A[micro]       --  Top Trip Plans, as selected by the Yahoo! community,
            plotted on an easy-to-use interactive map

A[micro]       --  Dynamic pan and zoom map technology, enabling users to
            focus on and discover the Trip Plans most relevant to them

A[micro]   --  Yahoo! Network Integration - Trip Planner is integrated with
        several Yahoo! offerings across the network, including:

A[micro]       --  Yahoo! Search integration - Users can search for Trip
            Plans by entering the name of a destination and the word
            "trips" (e.g., "Las Vegas trips") into the Yahoo! Search
            bar

A[micro]       --  Yahoo! Travel Guides

A[micro]       --  Yahoo! FareChase

A[micro]   --  Other features include:

A[micro]       --  Web clipping and tagging functionality

A[micro]       --  Recommendation engine from Yahoo! Travel Guides

A[micro]       --  Variety of printing options for take-along travel guides

A[micro]       --  Community feedback and comment system

A[micro]       --  Collaborative editing capabilities

In conjunction with the launch of Trip Planner, Yahoo! Travel has partnered with MasterCard to give users the opportunity to showcase their Trip Plans through its Great Trip Planner Ticket Giveaway promotion. MasterCard will be providing two free airline tickets a day(1) in a sweepstakes for qualified entrants through the end of August.

About Yahoo!

Yahoo! Inc. is the No. 1 Internet brand globally and the most trafficked Internet destination worldwide. Yahoo! provides online products and services essential to consumers' lives, and offers a full range of tools and marketing solutions for businesses to connect with Internet users around the world. Yahoo! is headquartered in Sunnyvale, Calif.

Yahoo! and the Yahoo! logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Yahoo! Inc. All other names are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of their respective owners.

(1) NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. Legal residents of the 50 United States (D.C.) 21 years or older. Ends 8/30/06. To play and for Official Rules, including odds, and prize descriptions visit http://travel.yahoo.com/trip. Void where prohibited.

Trip Planner screenshots / B-roll available upon request