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53% of UK consumers research and buy holidays online, though many could be deterred by unclear pricing, according to a survey commissioned by Econsultancy. The Toluna survey of 2,004 UK consumers found that 29% of respondents don't find travel websites easy to use, and that unclear pricing is the most likely reason for abandoning purchases online.

The past few years have seen some spectacular changes in the technology that embeds itself in our daily lives. The perfect storm of social media, smart phones and location awareness is only beginning to take full effect. We’ve gazed into crystal ball and considered how we think these technologies will combine to become such an established fabric of our lives that in the next few years what we’ve written here won’t be considered amazing at all.

Hundreds of people have been sickened in a salmonella outbreak linked to eggs in three states and possibly more, and health officials on Wednesday dramatically expanded a recall to 380 million eggs. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is working with state health departments to investigate the illnesses. No deaths have been reported, said Dr. Christopher Braden, a CDC epidemiologist involved in the investigation.

With Expedia, Orbitz, and other online travel stocks hovering just above the basement, news of Facebook and Google dancing around the travel niche cannot be thrilling. Online travel, in case you’ve been trapped in a dungeon somewhere, is about to take off like a rocket. For some that is.

acebook is acquiring social travel recommendation site Nextstop, according a blog post on the startup’s site. The startup, which launched in early 2009, mixes social recommendations with search and adds a reputation system and elements of gameplay. It was founded by a couple of ex-Googlers, Carl Sjogreen and Adrian Graham, who helped launch Google Calendar (Sjogreen) and Google Groups, and Picasa. The site grew out of their frustration with finding interesting things to do in unfamiliar places.

However, Americans expect to spend more on transportation and other vacation costs

11 Predictions That Will Affect Marketers and the Way They Do Business

I'd like to advance a hypothesis: Despite all the excitement surrounding social media, the Internet isn't connecting us as much as we think it is. It's largely home to weak, artificial connections, what I call thin relationships.

Social networking has finally become something valuable for brick-and-mortar businesses. Smartphones and location-based social networks allow users to interact, share, meet up, and recommend places based on their physical coordinates. This real-world connection to social media can mean more foot traffic and profits for business owners.

The University of Maryland’s Smith School of Business looked at the relationship between social media and small businesses and found that the technology adoption rates in the U.S. have doubled in the past year from 12% to 24%.