
American Airlines: one day of lounge access to anyone with Klout score over 55 - muratmutlu
http://corp.klout.com/blog/2013/05/american-airlines-klout/
======
untog
I removed myself from Klout over a year ago. This is the first time I've come
close to regretting that choice- but then I remembered that I never fly with
American Airlines.

But I can see how this could be an interesting win-win for both companies- you
care about your Klout score more, and you're more inclined to fly with
American Airlines.

That said, most people I know that _are_ on Klout joke about how they've been
identified as experts in topics they know nothing about. Klout is either
genius, or it's waiting for someone to reveal how inaccurate their entire
model is. I removed myself after I realised I would never get past x points
until I linked my Facebook account. It is a personal account that has no
bearing on my professional life- why would I do that?

~~~
mef
Even if you're not flying AA, you can still use this pass to gain entry to the
lounge. From the post: "You do not have to be an American Airlines passenger
to be eligible for this Perk."

~~~
untog
Even still, I fly out of JFK most of the time, and the sheer number of
terminals means their lounge is unlikely to be in the same place as my
departure gate.

------
arn
For those who are jealous... it looks like this just gives you a one day
Admiral Pass that you must use before July 31st. It's not like you get
continued access to their lounges.

screenshot: <http://i.imgur.com/4iflZt0.jpg>

And it enters you into a contest to win a one year pass. So this is a one time
freebie + contest promo, not an ongoing perk.

~~~
hkmurakami
Thanks, this gives me peace of mind in having killed my klout account a few
years ago.

------
knowtheory
Embarrassingly i'll admit to having a klout >55.

Having just logged into the AA/Klout thing, you'll note that they're actually
just giving away a 1 day pass with a chance to win a free year in their
Admirals Club

check it: <http://cl.ly/image/3g1f2h04002J>

~~~
GigabyteCoin
Wow, that's very unimpressive after reading the title.

If you use that yearly pass too much during that year, watch out:
[http://articles.latimes.com/2012/may/05/business/la-
fi-0506-...](http://articles.latimes.com/2012/may/05/business/la-
fi-0506-golden-ticket-20120506) /s

~~~
jrockway
The article you link to has nothing to do with one-year Admiral's Club
memberships. It's about unlimited AAirpasses, something AA stopped selling
decades ago.

(With the Admiral's Club membership, you have to assign a name to the
membership, and you can only show up there if you look like the person on a
photo id with that name. So there is very little abuse and you can go as much
as you want.)

~~~
GigabyteCoin
Notice the /s at the end of my second statement.

~~~
jrockway
Adding a /s to a non-sarcastic comment doesn't make it sarcastic. If that were
true, people would add a /G to signify that their comment was a great work of
literary art. For something to be great, it has to be great. For something to
be sarcastic, it needs, at the very least, some snark.

Also, this isn't Reddit. Just write what you mean.

~~~
yaok
His comment was perfectly clear, enjoyable, valuable, relevant, and came with
a link to a great article.

The fact that you're insulting him for his valuable and interesting
contribution is an outrage. Why don't you go pick on someone else, someone who
doesn't contribute, who doesn't post great links, who doesn't have an
entertaining style.

Not everyone has to be a robotic autistic technical writer on this casual
internet forum.

Posts should be judged by their content and style. Your nerdy hatred toward
the colloquial /s tag comes off as dry, dweebish, vindictive pedantry.

I'm aware that you represent the HN Zeitgeist to some extent but that pretty
much just exemplifies the problem here. You're engaging in the "automatic
middle brow dismissal" that pg has identified as majorly obnoxious.

You think sarcasm tags are "too urban" for HN. How fucking classy of you. /s

~~~
jrockway
I really appreciate the critique from someone who's had an account for two
days. The personal attacks were an added plus. And, I like how you didn't
actually read any of the thread you're replying to.

Nice work. A+, would read again!

(See how I wrote a sarcastic post without needing a "/s" tag? The written word
is pretty cool!)

------
beedogs
What a truly horrifying partnership. Let's fill up our departure lounge with a
bunch of big-headed bloggers. Brilliant!

~~~
dsl
...or people who can set a breakpoint in Burp Suite.

    
    
       t.reward = "http://fly.aa.com/klout/api/reward/ + t.id;
       var n = t.score >= 55 ? c("free-pass") : c("50-off");
          store.set("StoredUser", {
          id: t.id,
          score: t.score,
          nick: t.nick,
          reward: t.reward
       })

~~~
drstewart
Even better:

<http://fly.aa.com/klout/api/reward/>

A JSON dump of all the rewards codes.

~~~
Vivtek
That's the kind of thing that'll get the US Attorneys on you these days.

------
auctiontheory
In order to connect to this company that lives by social media, I have to give
them permission "to access [my] public profile, friend list, email address and
News Feed."

What could possibly go wrong?

~~~
rhizome
Why hasn't anybody whistleblown the value of that kind of information? I'm
sure it has a monthly or annual price and it may even be written down
somewhere.

~~~
neilk
Rapleaf charges pennies for it, in bulk.

[http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/05/14/personal-data-
adver...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/05/14/personal-data-
advertisers_n_861829.html)

I don't know what it would be worth it if you were targeting a specific
person.

~~~
rhizome
I think you misunderstand their pricing structure (as portrayed in the story).
It's a penny or more per attribute, per person. How many items would the
abovementioned FB profile access garner per Rapleaf? From my experience in
market research and by looking at the linked price sheet, it doesn't appear
that Rapleaf supplies PII.

------
md224
I'm ambivalent at best. Is creating a new class of privileged "influential"
people a good idea? I'm not sure, but I think people should be rewarded based
on the quality of their influence, not on the strength of it alone. At least,
that seems like a more "free market" approach.

------
ngoel36
My Klout score is a literally a 53.95. And I fly from SFO > Istanbul > Bangkok
in two days. On American.

This is the first and only time in my life I'll ever be pissed that my Klout
score's not high enough...

Edit: In all seriousness though, does anybody know how I can raise it just one
point?

~~~
daeken
I was at 61, now 53. Flying in 10 hours; could've used this on my layover.
Wonder why it dropped...

Edit: As an aside, if anyone wants to get coffee in the Seattle area sometime
in the next couple weeks, shoot me an email (it's in my profile).

~~~
ngoel36
Something tells me there might be a magical barrier at 55 now...I was at 57
last week...

~~~
waterlesscloud
It seems to me the decay rate over 51 or 52 is pretty high. I can hang on to
50 forever, but over that and I slip back down fast.

Getting a couple tweets widely re-tweeted seems to have the biggest impact for
me.

Now, if only we could use HN karma for something useful...

~~~
sliverstorm
Hah, agreed, if _only_ karma was useful! We can dream, I suppose.

------
rhizome
Klout scores between 45 and 55 get lounge access to _United_ Airlines.

~~~
encoderer
I know you're joking, but FWIW United lounges are by and large better than AA
lounges. Free beer and wine, for one.

~~~
rhizome
Like the AA lounges, I'm gonna predict that free stuff will be going away once
they start letting the social media rabble in.

------
electic
Who cares. American Airlines lounges are not that great.

~~~
seanmccann
Free beer at LAX and most airports. It's better than nothing.

------
rsingel
So high Klout users get one one-day pass and you hand over your e-mail address
to AA. The promotion makes sense - AA.com gets publicity and likely some
tweets from popular Tweeters, etc. And they get a chance to upsell people to a
club membership.

------
fixxer
Let me know when Emirates offers the same.

------
tnuc
How long until people game the system?

How many dollars does it cost to get a bunch of twitter followers? facebook,
linked in? It would probably cost the same as paying to use AA lounges for a
yer.

~~~
MartinCron
What does it even mean to "game the system"? The whole Klout nonsense _is_ a
game.

------
aaron695
Could someone tell me what a person with a Klout score over 55 would be like
please? Just how influential is that -ish?

~~~
ngoel36
You can log on to your Klout account and see the scores of all your FB/Twitter
friends. That would probably give you the best idea.

------
nikunjk
Site is down. 404 error

~~~
kintamanimatt
_American Airlines’ Admirals Club Welcomes Klout Users in Nearly 40 Locations_

At Klout, we know that understanding your influence through the Klout Score,
Moments and analysis is just one step toward being recognized for your
influence. We launched our Klout Perks program to recognize influencers with
amazing products and experiences, and have partnered with major brands like
Sony, Nike, Microsoft, Disney, Audi, Gilt and many others in an attempt to
keep upping ourselves. Influencers clearly like this recognition – we
delivered our one millionth Perk last week!

We think we’ve found another way to top ourselves…

Today we’re announcing a partnership with American Airlines that gives Klout
users access to nearly 40 worldwide lounge locations including San Francisco,
Dallas, Los Angeles, New York, Tokyo, London and many more. Starting today, if
you have a Klout Score of 55 or higher, you can gain access to the Admirals
Club by going to aa.com/klout. You do not have to be an American Airlines
passenger to be eligible for this Perk.

[Picture of an airport lounge with upholstery from the 70s]

This is only the beginning of the momentum we’re seeing with businesses and
brands who recognize the power of Klout to further reward their best
customers, and introduce themselves to a great breed of new customers.

Go to aa.com/klout to get your Klout treatment!

~~~
quomopete
I just threw up a little in my mouth.

~~~
kintamanimatt
Why?

------
Uchikoma
Klout tells me I'm inside the top 1% and I have a score of 52 - so not a lot
of people get this.

------
kintamanimatt
This might be the first time internet points actually count for something in
the real world.

~~~
CaveTech
Far from the truth. Internet "celebrities" have received free goods and perks
for quite some time.

------
sergiotapia
I just created my Klout account and it seems to meassure your popularity in
various social networks. Seems like a win-win for the site and the proverbial
-famous person- if they can get free perks.

How is this sustainable though? Are they selling their data?

~~~
zeckalpha
It looks like the business model is taking money to provide perks to people
with a high score who in turn do free social advertising. Sounds more
sustainable than Facebook or Twitter's model.

------
bborud
Does anyone still use Klout? I had to admit that out of curiosity I tried to
use it, but the site just never worked when I tried it. It was either slow or
non-functional. I thought it had died and slipped into obsolescence.

------
steve19
I know just about nothing about klout. How "high" is 55?

I just signed up hoping I has >55, but I am only 54, maybe adding some other
random accounts social media accounts will nudge my score higher.

------
sneak
Who is savvy enough to have a 55+ klout score who doesn't already have lounge
access via any of a bunch of different avenues (AmEx, PriorityPass, FF
program, etc) already?!

~~~
plorkyeran
People who don't fly enough to bother going out of their way to get lounge
access?

------
philip1209
Did the AA site crash under load? I'm getting a 404 on the promotion page.

<http://aa.com/klout>

~~~
dsl
you need the www

------
muratmutlu
This caused me to check my Klout score, haven't done that for a very long
time. Looks like they may be onto something...

------
unclegene
<http://aa.com/klout> HTTP/1.1 404 Not Found

~~~
daurnimator
Add `www` and it works

------
senthilnayagam
seems they have hit their limits and entries are closed

------
michaelochurch
The real story here is that all of the U.S. airlines are in an embarrassing
state, not only financially, but in terms of cultural standing and morale.

Flying used to be glamorous-- 50, even 30, years ago. Now it's just as
expensive (except on three or four high-traffic routes over which deregulation
actually worked) but it's such a negative experience that no one looks forward
to _a flight_. First class and lounge access are supposed to bring that back,
but those fail as well.

The appeal of flying in the old days was that you were guaranteed to be seated
next to an interesting person doing something that either was exciting, or
seemed it at the time ("international business"). Also, there was serious
investment by the airlines into the quality of the experience: pilots actually
told you when you flew over the Grand Canyon. That all got cheapened along the
way. Also, attempting to create an "interesting people club" out of
transportation is doomed to failure. Uninteresting people have money, too, and
there's literally no way of keeping MWOCs (Money WithOut Culture) out. Plus,
the airlines are constantly going bankrupt and have proletarianized the
experience (baggage fees, uncomfortable chairs) to the point where it doesn't
feel like a premium product, but they've also had to sell off the premium
parts (first-class upgrades) for whatever coin-shavings they can get, to the
point that they no longer feel special.

Airlines are desperately trying to revive that brand and allure, but it's gone
forever. It's old technology put to a mostly uninspiring use. The flight is
something that you learn how to sleep through, not part of the experience.

Before, frequent flyer programs were their attempts to find the interesting
people and create something compelling. That might have worked in 1997; but in
2013, this generation's interesting people are in about 15-20 city centers
(New York and San Francisco come to mind, but also places like Austin,
Seattle, and Chicago) and generally do what they can to be locally self-
sufficient (i.e. they don't fly more than a few times per year).

This Klout partnership is the newest attempt to create an "interesting people
club" out of the flying experience and, like all others, it will fail.

~~~
drill_sarge
>interesting people club

wtf am I reading?

~~~
michaelochurch
I'm not saying that I like or even support this. Obviously, the idea that any
commercial purchase would take someone into an "interesting people club" is
the height of douchery. But appeals to douchery can make highly effective
marketing.

I am saying that there was a time when air travel (yes, commercial flight,
even coach) had an allure. Airlines are desperately trying to revive that
experience-- that's what those "exclusive" airport lounges are about-- but
they're not able to do it and it's probably not possible at this point.

------
OGinparadise
_American Airlines: one day of lounge access to anyone with Klout score over
55_

I tried American Airlines lounge access with Google Glass on and I'm never
letting my Klout score go under 55! Never.

scoble.

;)

