There has been quiet a bit of discussion about delta.com vs. nwa.com here.
Richard Anderson hosted an employee chat recently and was asked about this issue. I thought this may be interesting to some. Here is what he had to say:


Bryan (Jan 12, 2010 10:15:41 AM)
Hi Richard, thanks for taking time to “meet” with us.
At NW we were accustomed to the best IT systems in the industry. Our NWA.COM web site won multiple awards, and the systems that we use as crews was excellent. Feels like we have taken a step backwards with the merger – can’t print boarding passes on Delta.com, crew systems seem to have a lot of limitations (can’t book jumpseats on-line is one example). Customer facing systems have to come first, but is there money and resources being allocated to raise Delta systems up to the best they can be? Thanks.


Richard Anderson (Jan 12, 2010 10:15:41 AM)
We needed to take an adopt-and-go strategy on IT systems. As we complete the inventory integration, we will continue to make significant investments in IT. The crew systems were actually the same technology but later releases so it should be something we can fix in relatively short order. As to nwa.com and delta.com, they are actually very close in terms of functionality and customer acceptance. In neither case are we really winning against all consumer web sites. Consequently, we will undertake significant investment in delta.com after inventory cutover.