Family Day 2017 Tickets available to TPG readers, but not FT?
 

Just saw FB posts from TPG - apparently, UA has given 50 tickets to TPG for the upcoming Family Day in October. In previous years, FT was given tickets by UAInsider. But seems like that team ceased to exist and no love to FT this year? TPG's contest is too much work for a ticket :D

It seems that TPG and United have established quite a formal relationship over the past year, ever since the Polaris launch.

Didn‘t JC1120 had done a charity event to benefit the UA retirees as well last year for family day ? Haven‘t seen anything this year neither.

At this point if no news from UA Insider, i am willing to pay just to get in. (If there is a way)

P.S. Yes i agree the one from TPG is too much work to get 1 of 50 chance, not to mentinon TPG has thousands of followers

Marketing posing as journalism.

I don't think anyone mistakes TPG as journalism.

JC1120 JEdward and I run Frequent Flyer Giving. This charity Raises money for the United We Care Employee Relief Fund -- a UA charity whose mission is to assist employees in need. In the past we have had tickets to Family Day. I do not believe we have tickets this year. We are, however, running an event in Denver the day before. The FlyerTalk page f:eek:r that event is here.

I'm sure many undoubtedly mistake the advice as unbiased. Which is what journalism is supposed to be.

To be fair, the reviews posted on TPG are not vetted by the airlines before they are posted, and in that sense are truly unbiased journalism. Some of them, especially recently, have been quite scathing. It's not as if United or anyone else is paying for good reviews.

But of course you're right that United has entered into a marketing relationship with TPG, and that blurs the lines somewhat. It's akin to a newspaper selling ad space to a company while it covers them on the front page. Even when the sales and news departments are wholly disconnected from each other, some percentage of the readership refuses to believe it.

A bit of a disappointment that FT'ers, the very community that gave greater awareness to the airlines and social media, has not been given consideration.

Though to be fair, there's still time, as well as the fact the UA FT community is certainly more dedicated than the average TPG reader whose main focus is on points earning/spending than anything specific to UA. So it would be likely a much larger number of people would wind up trying to attend.

Well, I can only hope that we'll be invited... and if not, I will still have my upcoming SFO-PVG flight in 1K the weekend before to bid my private farewell.

I don't have a twitter :( I wonder if they would even select me if I get a twitter account and don't have any followers.

Didn't TPG post a goofy disparaging article about Polaris relatively soon after its roll-out?

Rule #1 . If, before every article, there is a disclaimer about credit cards, points, and general schilling, it isn't journalism.

https://skift.com/2014/12/01/the-blu...ravel-writers/

Could Bankrate and UA have some type of relationship?

As I mentioned in post 8, TPG's reviews of Polaris have been both good and bad, as you would expect from an organization with a genuine editorial mission. Of course they also exist to make money, hence the tension that has existed in every for-profit content enterprise ever conceived.

But again, some of their UA reviews in 2017 have been critical in the extreme. Here's another:

https://thepointsguy.com/2017/05/uni...tomer-service/

And yet just a few months earlier, they ran the puff piece to end all puff pieces:

https://thepointsguy.com/2017/02/first-polaris-biz-77w/

But even long-established media companies run both types of articles. In other words, it's complicated.

If you're a true journalist, you don't write puff pieces. It isn't complicated at all.

I have noticed a significant lessening of TPGs anti-UA rants of late.... ;)

With all due respect, TPG is not the work of one "true journalist" but a team of professional writers assigned articles by an editor-in-chief. Had you looked at the links I provided, you would have noticed that, for example, the puff piece was written by a different person than the critical review that followed it.

I understand that everyone wants review sites to be as objective and dispassionate as Consumer Reports; the problem is everyone also expects online content to be free. Those two aims are rarely compatible. The solution is to provide clear indication when something is a review, a piece of reporting, an interview, etc.

What rankles most is that TPG is going out of their way to provide critical -- at times even hypercritical -- reviews, but some readers refuse to accept it.

I had to sign up for twitter just to make an account to enter. I'm getting really anxious about some 747 farewell activity. This seems like my best chance to make sure I can be part of something 747 related, since it's still unknown if ICN-SFO will be the last 747 flight (which is already sold out in biz and first).

Meanwhile the one way fare in Y is very affordable (ICN-SFO-ORD instead of ICN-SFO)

I think i might do this. I can do DTW-SFO-ICN in biz class for 70k miles, get to experience the UD. two days in ICN then ICN-SFO-ORD (and ORD-DTW separately)

I think you've made a bad assumption re: FT. Any casual visit here in the past 1-3 years by a United exec would see some rather irrational commentary trashing their airline and not a lot of benefit of the doubt (read today's EWR IDB thread as the latest example) in any situation. I'd be reluctant to reward that type of behavior of a community where the threads are typically trending negative.

If that's the case then they definitely shouldn't reward TPG readers as the site as well as their readers frequently bash UA on every possible media.

Many of us who have been long time active members of the community have had a much more productive relationships in the past. I have had brand ambassadors reach out to me on FT or I have reached out to them for questions or issues.

There have always been irrational commentaries on here; it is the nature of the forums. The popularity of FT has certainly brought in more people, it also has increased the noise/complaints of some things. Overall, it was not a UA exec that would be engaged/reading these (at least not publicly identifying/answering posts).

We used to have much better engagements several years ago. And some other forums still do. For example, Starwood Lurker (iterations of) have participated in FT events and gatherings. This is a community that, in general, respects the brand/company that we do business with.

I suspect the disengagement may stem from a focus on other social media platforms like Twitter. Although that is a more recognized platform, the demographics on those users are not comparable in terms of knowledge, quality, or interest. However, it is an easy platform for UA to broadcast their marketing/announcements.

So given a limited amount of resources, I wouldn't be surprised if they disengaged from here and moved over to somewhere else with a greater audience (albeit different audience).

I agree. TPG staff are professional writers, not journalists.

Well, FT's front page seems to like to post clickbait garbage that will name United when the piece is negative, but won't name other airlines if it's negative and about them. I am willing to bet that this is partially to blame. Frugal Travel Guy (which is also owned by Internet Brands and has been putting out grade A garbage, albeit not as much as TPG), which is where the front page of FT cross-posts their articles from, seems to not have "grown up" from the Dr Dao incident and appears to put United down at every opportunity in an attempt at a shock piece. FT itself (not the community) may have burned the bridges for us.

As far as forum content goes, we have always been (on the most part) pro-consumer (although acting within the airline's rules and within the airline's or the industry's established procedures). I'm sure any United reps that are involved here on FT are involved because of the sheer number of top tier elites that participate here, and not because we're doing them any favors.

Even then, the definition of "writer" is quite loose. The excrement that TPG puts out almost makes "writer" a synonym for "shill."

Did anyone from here that entered into the drawing from TPG ever heard anything back ? I didn‘t and was wonder if it is because I am not selected.

Notifications were sent out last week via twitter Direct Message with rsvp and guest details due yesterday (Friday) 9am pst.

I almost missed out all despite being among the 50 they selected.

Apparently they only sent out winning notices to those who had clicked to 'follow' TPG on twitter. I didn't do that, but had instead lowered twitter security to 'accept DMs from all users'.

I guess i should have asked who can guess me into the event instead earlier.

With no luck getting to the family day, not to mention already bought the ticket way ahead (guess i am going to throw away the $250+ ticket from ORD, really no point to go to SFO right now as this is my only reason to go there), missed the last 744 flight on Nov 7th, really in a bad bad mood right now.:(

Doesn't this coincide with Fleet Week and the Blue Angels flying?

I was really looking forward to going this year. Having always been gone when it happens. Hopefully next year.

Fleet week will still be awesome.

P.S. If anyone has 2 extra tickets please don’t hesitate to tell.;)

Have no interest in navy ships or military jets, and if i want to see blue angels, i can see them at the air and water show in chicago where I live every year in August. Hotels are expensive during fleet week anyway, no point to waste money on that

i really want to go this year because they had already said two 744 would be on display, next year would be none

United is scheduled to fly during the airshow portion. Would not be surprised to see the 747 make a final appearance there.

In order to capture that , one need a camera that has at least 300mm lens to capture that which I don‘t have, not to mention i had seen the low flyby preiously in fleet week, or even in youtube, but nothing beat to see them upclose and places that normally are photos forbidden.