A lot of people will be using Everlater to tell their stories: http://blog.everlater.com/2009/08/who-is-flying-on-the-jetblue-all-you-can-jet-pass/

There is some other creative stuff going on out there, like two guys who are only spending 12 hours or less per city, and at least one meetup group. I can see a whole mini-community growing out of this.

The other important thing for those who like frequent flyer miles is that earning for the entire pass is fixed, and is set on the old program (pre changes). Thus the pass is no good as a mileage run.

It is, however, great value if you can use it for more than a couple of trips and don’t need last minute availability.

What concerns me about Jet Blue’s program is the “available” requirement. As I understand the program, it requires a leap of faith that Jet Blue won’t manipulate its “available” inventory on a flight that is proving highly popular.

You really don’t need to take a leap of faith. You can check the availability before you buy the pass and then just make the reservations right there. And by the way, it would be incredibly easy to discover if JetBlue were holding back inventory and there would be lawsuits almost immediately. They aren’t that dumb.

What concerns me about Jet Blue’s program is the “available” requirement. As I understand the program, it requires a leap of faith that Jet Blue won’t manipulate its “available” inventory on a flight that is proving highly popular.

I’m still steaming from an incident with Delta involving my frequent flyer miles and maybe that’s clouding my judgment and sense of trust. I’m just more comfortable paying for seats I know are available at the times — and to the cities I want.

From a promotional standpoint, the unlimited pass is a brilliant idea, no question about that. Reporters are suckers for gimmicks and most don’t have the time or the knowledge to investigate the legitimacy of offers like this. That’s why newspapers are poised to go out of business; Jet Blue has garnered an avalanche of free publicity for a product that hardly constitutes “news.” I applaud your marketing people!

That said, Cranky likes it, and like the character Mickey in the famous cereal commercial, if he likes it, maybe it really is a good deal. I’ve just been burned by the airline industry one time too many to trust any incentive or affinity offers.

Reminds me of Mohawk’s Weekends Unlimited back 40 or so years ago [I think it was around '67 or '68] for the wonderful price of $25, with taxes, $26 plus change.

I seem to remember a column in either Airways or Airliners magazine with a detailed report from someone who take advantage of it. Cool.

The Traveling Optimist wrote:

Sadly, it’s teasing a starving man with a bone. They don’t fly to Dallas.

Yes, but Austin is very close and you can get from there to the Northeast, Florida, and the West Coast nonstop.

eric starkman wrote:

I used to be a Starwood member because they supposedly had no blackout dates for using points. But on one convention weekend in San Francisco I was told there were no rooms available for points, though a top-of-the-line suite was available for purchase. I went on hotels.com and guess what? I got a room below the rack rate. So much for no blackout dates.

This might be a different issue. Hotels.com will buy blocks of hotel rooms that the hotel itself can’t resell. So it’s possible that the hotel had sold out its inventory while Hotels.com still had some available. I’ve never had trouble with Starwood – love the program.

I used to think Jet Blue had more integrity than the legacy airlines, but some public incidents over the years has given me serious pause for concern. . . . So let’s make a deal: if I buy an unlimited pass and can’t use it because no “available” seats are actually available the new time I fly to LA, I get to stay at the Snyder residence to make up for the full price ticket on Virgin America I have to buy. :)

Not sure what they’ve done to question their integrity, but you don’t have to take their word for anything here. You can call them up and make reservations to fly every single day of the pass today if you want. It’s not standby and you book it outside of 3 days prior to departure, so you can put your plans together right now.

The promo is having exactly the desired effects; Free, almost unavoidable media coverage; flights are filling up; and many of the customers who have bought the pass had never flown JetBlue before.

While other airlines are laying people off, JetBlue is offering overtime to our call-center employees so we have enough people on the phones to handle the increased call volume this promotion has generated.