American Airlines, the Alec Baldwin-hating bankrupt plane company, has found a creative way to save some money and the environment. They will be switching from paper airline manuals to Apple iPads.

Alec Baldwin has apologized to his fellow American Airlines passengers, but he refused to apologize to the crew. Baldwin was escorted off of a plane this past Tuesday after refusing to stop playing Words With Friends on his mobile device. “It was never my intention to inconvenience anyone with my ‘issue’ with a certain flight attendant,” wrote Baldwin on a Huffington Post article.

American Airlines has filed a lawsuit against a couple of the companies that sells their tickets. American Airlines is suing Travelport LP and Orbitz Worldwide over damages and anticompetitive practices. American Airlines believes that Orbitz and Travelport charges fees that are too high. American Airlines is also seeking a punitive award.

I received an e-mail from American Airlines’ social media team to let me know about a flashmob video that they created to celebrate 10 new destinations from LAX, which includes a non-stop flight to Shanghai and 9 U.S. cities. On April 4, American Airlines set up forty dancers that descended into the U.S. Bank Plaza in downtown L.A. The song is very catchy and is a good way to start a Friday.

American Airlines has fired an employee that responded to a customer complaint personally. An American Airlines customer named Dustin Curtis complained about using the AA.com website and wrote a complaint on his blog. Curtis even suggested how American Airlines should redesign their website on his blog. And I can honestly say I do like Curtis’ design much better. Below is a screenshot (click to enlarge):

A commenter that replied to the blog post going by “Mr. X” agreed with Curtis but also complained about the internal culture of the company. Mr. X told Curtis that he was improving the website but said it was slow a process. But Mr. X was violating an NDA that he signed with America Airlines. Due to the violation, Mr. X was fired.

America Airlines rejected Curtis’ claims that the company website does not satisfy customers. An American Airlines spokesman said that 90% of customers rate the website as “good” or “excellent.”

American Airlines is seeking damages from Google Inc. for the use of its name in Google Ads. Selling search terms such as “AA.com” and “American Airlines” for other companies advertising using Google AdWords.“We are confident that our trademark policy strikes a proper balance between trademark owners’ interests and consumer choice, and that our position has been validated by decisions in previous trademark cases,” stated Jon Murchinson, a Google spokesman.

When a user searches for terms in the search engine like Aadvantage, American Airlines’ frequent flyer program, then American’s web site would show up at the top, but rivals would sometimes show up under the Sponsored Links section.

Google had a similar case against Geico. The judge ruled that Google’s keyword ads were legal, but Geico and Google settled the case in 2005. The judge ruled that Geico could collect damages for ads featuring Geico’s name in the ad text rather than the trademark used to trigger ads.

Given that this lawsuit is happening and that similar cases have happened in the past, I would not be surprised if Google reconsiders the way their AdWords/AdSense program is structured in terms of keyword usage and appearance. But Google might feel that it is worth it to fight how their keyword advertising model works in court. It comes with the terrority of being a major software company.

Reference:
[1] Statesman.com: Airlines Sues Google Over Keyword Ads