I`d want to know where I was going to stay. In Thailand the star ratings seem to be too liberal in many cases. For example there are many hotels in Bangkok that call themselves four and a half or five star hotels, but I only consider a handful of the hotels to actually be five star hotels by international standards.

I have never used priceline, but friends have told me they have gotten great deals in places like New York. I think that perhaps in a place like NY it would be easier to set the parameters to reduce the possibility of ending up in an undesirable hotel.