Swiss-owned VIVA Cruises recently debuted an AI Travel Advisor, a tool that’s available on the cruise line’s website to help potential guests explore cruises through a “conversational experience,” with personalization tied to budget, travel preferences and other information.
While the official press release says the AI Travel Advisor “complements” the sales and customer service teams, the biggest question left unanswered is this: doesn’t the AI Travel Advisor replace human travel advisors?
Many booking sites and OTAs are offering their own AI-powered chatbots and support systems, this is the first one we know of that calls itself a travel advisor, which I think is a dangerous precedent for the future of AI usage in the future.
Some believe AI is inevitable, while others are concerned about its environmental impact and potential dangers, from teaching children information that isn’t true when used in an educational setting to the serious security risks the technology poses.
No matter what camp you’ve joined, it’s important to understand that we as humans have power over how we choose to use this technology. We can just as easily reject it as implement it in as many ways as it is.
The most important way we should reject it?
When it directly goes after people’s jobs.
VIVA Cruises wasn’t likely thinking of the travel advisors who support its brands by helping travelers find their perfect itinerary for their budget and travel dates.
They likely weren’t considering the important and human work they do, communicating from a perspective of experience and knowledge that AI could only ever hope to achieve by stealing copyrighted information and scrubbing thousands of websites.
VIVA Cruises likely wasn’t thinking of directly competing against travel advisors with a new AI-powered technology.
But in calling it what it is—an AI Travel Advisor—something threatening has begun in the travel industry. Something that could, if we allow it to, replace so many people with a technology that only pretends to know us.
So let’s not let it replace us. Let us fight to stay relevant—not by letting AI do most of our jobs for us, but by fighting against it, knowing that human experience, compassion, understanding and knowledge are immeasurably more profitable than an intelligence that thinks only in code.
AI’s intelligence is just that: artificial. In an era where everything seems to be crafted out of something that isn't quite as real as it seems, let’s take this opportunity to choose our values. Do we value emerging technology over human jobs? Do we value artificial intelligence over human intelligence? Would we rather talk with a robot than with a human?
Whether you’re an advisor, a writer, a traveler or something else altogether, you have a decision to make.
You can use your brain, and allow others to use theirs, too—or you can allow the world to become reliant upon inhuman intelligence, stealing your opportunity to shine, to connect, to communicate, to be real.
I know what decision I’m making.
Humanity > AI
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