🚫 OTAs Suck ✅ Building a Book Direct, Decentralized, Open-OTA ➜ 🚀 Operators Get Direct Bookings ✈️ Travelers Get Rewards for Booking Direct 💰 Anyone Who Refers Travelers Owns Them & the Revenue Stream They Generate.

🐥 I'm a startup founder, launching a direct booking travel platform for the AI agent era.

Why? Today, Online Travel Agent (OTA) commissions are draining 10's of billions of dollars out of the travel ecosystem. They enrich "Big Tech" and "Big Travel", at the expense of everyone else. I know because I helped them do it. For years I was a super-affiliate of Expedia and other big OTAs. I fed $100m+ in hotel bookings to the OTAs, generating $10m in commissions, but adding little of value to the ecosystem.

Now, I'm building a new travel distribution platform and protocol that enables travelers and their AI agents to bypass the OTA middlemen and book direct.

👇 Want to be notified when we launch? Leave a comment in the featured post below titled "AI-powered community", or reach out and connect! 

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Previously...

🐣 I co-founded a venture studio. We launched 3 notable ventures:
 
1️⃣ 3Genius International. Network of travel booking websites. $100M+ in bookings and $10M+ in gross profit.

2️⃣ Moola.com. Multiplayer game. Grew virally to 450k community members, $7.6M economy. PCWorld's “Best Places to Waste Time on the Web”.
 
3️⃣ Locationary. Local data and community platform. Rewarded users for crowdsourcing local business data (eg. like for Apple Maps). $4.5M in funding. Acquired by Apple.

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🧠 Current Interests: AI, community, machine learning, travel, fintech, loyalty rewards, web3 / tokens / blockchain, creator & influencer economy, social commerce, marketplaces, network effects.

Arlen Ritchie

Podding

Join Podding and open the door to a world where every podcast appearance becomes a catalyst for influence, connection, and brand storytelling.

Founder

Independent

Independent Consultant and Builder

Howard

Scaled a venture-backed 400 room hotel and short-term rental portfolio across the NY and Phoenix area with contracts for two new hotels in NYC, Portland, and San Francisco.

President

Columbia Business School

Entrepreneur in Residence

Kairos Society

I get to meet, mentor, and collaborate with the most brilliant young entrepreneurs in the world.

Mentor

LG Fairmont

sold to Compass (Nasdaq: $COMP) in 2022

LG Fairmont is a re-engineering of the real estate brokerage model.  We combine highly-talented people with software, unique process, and data-driven insights to deliver a superior product.  The platform has processed well over $1B in transactions to date.

Co-Founder - now LGF Compass (Nasdaq: $COMP)

Columbia University

I am the lead co-advisor on the Columbia Entrepreneurs Lab, an on-campus start-up incubator at Columbia University.  I am also lead co-advisor on the New Venture Track through Columbia Business School.  For the 2013 summer session we are advising 30+ teams in various stages of development.  Our focus is on product development, customer acquisition, and business models.

Lead Co-Advisor CEL Incubator

Shepherd Funds

The Shepherd Large Cap Growth Fund (DOIGX, formerly the Dominion Insight Growth Fund) is a mutual fund whose only investment objective is growth of capital.

Board Member

Endpoint Group Late Stage Fund

Business Advisory Board

21Causes.org

21Causes is a philanthropic fundraising platform that utilizes principles of internet commerce to raise money for worthy causes such as CARES Foundation, Children's Cancer and Blood Foundation, ART for Refugees, and Youth Services California.

Principal

I'm a serial entrepreneur (both venture-backed and bootstrapped) who's learned that the best growth comes from solving real problems with smart systems.

At @Podding, we don't make content, we build video-powered GTM systems that help B2B businesses grow faster.

Here's what we do differently: We design video as infrastructure, not campaigns. Every video has a job to do: build trust, clarify value, or move deals forward. Our modular approach creates reusable assets that compound across your entire growth motion.

The results? Founders who can pitch with confidence. Sales teams that close faster. Marketing that actually converts.

From async pitches that land meetings to explainer libraries that eliminate objections, we engineer video systems that turn complexity into clarity and prospects into customers.

My background: Built teams, scaled companies, and learned that growth isn't about doing more, it's about doing what works, better.

Visit podding.co or send me a DM. Let's build your video growth system.

taplio

The Battle

Arlen Ritchie

Derek Lee

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