A weekly newsletter with four quick bites, edited by Tim Leffel, author of A Better Life for Half the Price and The World’s Cheapest Destinations. See past editions here, where your like-minded friends can subscribe and join you.

A Plea for More Honest Airbnb Reviews

I found that I rented apartments through Booking more often than Airbnb when traveling around Europe this year and that’s partly because I didn’t have to spend so much time reading between the lines of the reviews to find the negatives. With ratings going both ways on Airbnb, the system (like Uber’s) encourages guests to be nicer than they probably should be sometimes. So far, 216 comments mostly agree with this frustrated rant on Reddit begging people to be more honest when an apartment is not what is advertised or is just plain crappy.

Longer Walks in Airports

It’s not your imagination: you can easily get those 10,000 steps in on flight days just trying to get to your gate. This article confirms that airport walks are getting much longer, especially in new terminals. One reason is related to flying—larger average plane sizes—but the other is not: airports are devoting more space to shopping outlets (and making you walk by them instead of coasting past on a people mover).

Slack Wants You to Buy a New Phone

It’s bad enough that hardware companies push “forced obsolescence” to make us upgrade to their newer versions more often than we need to, but now some software apps remote workers use are getting into the game too. Slack sent e-mail announcements out this week that their app may stop working if your Apple or Android phone is using an OS that was released before 2021. That’s ancient history for their engineers apparently…

Most Popular Backpacks

If you want to see what Amazon’s buyers are slinging across their shoulders, here’s a rundown on the most popular backpacks there. Most of them are daypacks, laptop bags, and slings of some kind, but there is one traveler backpack on there that I’ve spotted on long-term travelers in many countries: the Osprey Farpoint (available in 40, 55, and 70L sizes). It has a lifetime guarantee and all sizes are on sale. There are also some great packable daypacks that squeeze into a little pouch.

09/7/23