• Banyan Group founder Kwon Ping Ho has spent over 30 years in the hospitality industry.
• Ho's luxury hotel chain launched its first resort in 1994 and now operates over 90 hotels globally.
• Ho told BI that tourists today have vastly different expectations from their parents' generation.

Kwon Ping Ho has come a long way since he opened his first resort in Phuket in 1994.

Ho's luxury hotel chain, Banyan Group, now operates over 90 hotels worldwide, including in countries like Cuba and Saudi Arabia. The 72-year-old told Business Insider that it's not just his company that's changed. His customers look much different than they did three decades ago, and they want different things out of travel.

"When you talk about the people of my generation, when international travel just started, people were happy to go on group tours. They just go to a hotel and they eat in a hotel," Ho said on the sidelines of the International Conference on Cohesive Societies held in Singapore last month.

"But young people today have long become jaded about international travel. They've been traveling with their parents," he added. "Today, when they're traveling on their own, they are looking much more for things that are out of the way."

Ho said today's more seasoned travelers are a vastly different breed from yesterday's checklist sightseers.

"They are much more into experiences, and not just to see something beautiful because they've probably seen that, done that with their parents already. They are looking at experiences which are deeper and allow them to interact with the local community," he continued.

Ho isn't the only one who has noticed the generational shift taking place.

Last year, McKinsey surveyed 5,000 travelers from China, Germany, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and the US. The consultancy said that 52% of Gen Zers surveyed said they are willing to splurge on travel experiences compared to 29% of baby boomers surveyed.

"One-size-fits-all tourism offerings of the past have grown outdated" as travelers seek "creative experiences that are tailored to their priorities and personal narratives," McKinsey wrote.

Another change Ho said he noticed was in the countries from which tourists tended to hail and the places that they chose to visit.

"When I first started in hospitality 30 years ago, the nature of tourism was one direction and one color," Ho said. "It was basically white people from Europe, traveling in one direction, from west to east."

"Over the years, what I call 'rainbow tourism' has come up because of increasing wealth in other developing countries," he added.

Ho said this has led to a "multicolored, multifaceted, exciting tourism of people from all over the world traveling to all over the world."

"You've got Indians, you've got Africans, you've got Arabs, you've got Chinese, and Japanese, and so on, and then of course you've got young people from within the region," he continued. "That to me has been the biggest change."

In January, UN Tourism's World Tourism Barometer said an estimated 1.4 billion tourists traveled internationally in 2024, an 11% increase over 2023. UN Tourism said it expected international tourism arrival numbers to grow by 3% to 5% in 2025.

• Elon Musk started a new political party after conducting a poll on his social media platform X.
• But this is not the first time Musk has outsourced his decision-making to social media.
• Musk had run polls on whether he should sell his Tesla stock or step down as X's CEO.

Elon Musk announced the formation of his new political party a day after conducting a poll on his social media platform, X.

But this isn't the first time Musk has outsourced his decision-making to social media.

The Tesla and SpaceX CEO has conducted several polls on X over the years. Musk has asked users whether he should sell his Tesla stock or if he should reinstate President Donald Trump to the platform.

Here's a list of some of the polls Musk has done, and what happened after.

Selling 10% of his Tesla stock

On November 6, 2021, Musk posted a poll on X asking his followers if he should sell 10% of his Tesla stock.

"I will abide by the results of this poll, whichever way it goes," Musk added.

Musk's poll received over 3.5 million votes, with over 57% of them supporting the sale of his stock. Then, on November 10, 2021, Tesla said in an SEC filing that Musk sold about $1.1 billion in Tesla stock.

In its filing, Tesla said the sale of Musk's shares was "automatically effected" as part of a trading plan that was adopted on September 14, 2021. It added that the trading plan was in relation to Musk exercising stock options that were set to expire in 2022.

Musk had talked about the planned sale during an interview he gave at the Code Conference in September 2021.

"I have a bunch of options that are expiring early next year, so a huge block of options will sell in Q4. Because I have to or they'll expire," he said.

Buying Twitter

Months before buying Twitter in late 2022, Musk conducted several polls on the platform, asking his followers about their views on it. These polls took place while Musk had been quietly purchasing the company's stock since the start of the year.

On March 25, 2022, Musk asked his followers if Twitter "rigorously adheres" to the principle of free speech.

"The consequences of this poll will be important. Please vote carefully," Musk added.

Musk's poll received over 2 million votes. Over 70% of them said the platform did not adhere to the principle.

"Given that Twitter serves as the de facto public town square, failing to adhere to free speech principles fundamentally undermines democracy. What should be done?" Musk wrote in a follow-up post on March 26, 2022.

"Is a new platform needed?" Musk added.

Earlier, Musk had conducted a separate poll asking his followers if Twitter's algorithm should be open source. That poll received over 1.1 million votes, and nearly 83% of them voted "Yes."

Then, on April 4, 2022, Musk asked his followers if they wanted an "edit button" on Twitter. The poll obtained over 4.4 million votes and nearly 74% of them voted "Yes."

Musk eventually acquired Twitter for $44 billion in October 2022 and renamed it X in July 2023.

Reinstating Trump's Twitter account

Shortly after buying Twitter, Musk polled his followers on whether Trump should be reinstated to the platform. Trump had been an avid user of the platform but was banned in January 2021 after the Capitol riot.

Musk's poll drew over 15 million votes, with nearly 52% supporting Trump's reinstatement.

"The people have spoken. Trump will be reinstated," Musk wrote on November 19, 2022, a day after he had conducted the poll.

"Vox Populi, Vox Dei," Musk continued, using a Latin phrase that translates to "the voice of the people is the voice of God."

Musk had talked about reinstating Trump even before his acquisition of Twitter was complete. In May 2022, Musk said in an interview with the Financial Times that he would "reverse the permaban" on Trump, calling it a "morally bad decision" that was "foolish in the extreme."

Stepping down as Twitter's CEO

A month later, Musk conducted another poll, this time he asked his followers if he should step down as Twitter's CEO.

"I will abide by the results of this poll," Musk wrote on December 18, 2022.

Shortly after acquiring the platform, Musk laid off more than half of the company's employees. Musk's takeover also saw several celebrities such as Elton John opting to quit the platform over misinformation concerns.

Musk's poll received over 17.5 million votes, and nearly 58% voted "Yes."

"I will resign as CEO as soon as I find someone foolish enough to take the job! After that, I will just run the software & servers teams," Musk wrote in a follow-up post on December 20, 2022.

In May 2023, Musk announced that he had hired Linda Yaccarino, an executive at NBCUniversal as X's new CEO. Musk said Yaccarino would "focus primarily on business operations" while he dealt with "product design and new technology."

Starting a new political party

Musk's most recent poll took place on July 4, when he asked his followers if they wanted him to start a new political party. Musk had floated the idea of starting the America Party after criticizing Trump and the GOP for the "One Big Beautiful Bill."

The poll received over 1.2 million votes, and over 65% of them voted "Yes."

"By a factor of 2 to 1, you want a new political party and you shall have it!" Musk wrote on X a day later.

"When it comes to bankrupting our country with waste & graft, we live in a one-party system, not a democracy. Today, the America Party is formed to give you back your freedom," he added.

Musk did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

• Elon Musk announced the formation of his new political party, the America Party.
• But President Donald Trump said Musk's party won't succeed.
• Trump said third parties "have never succeeded in the United States."

President Donald Trump said on Sunday that it is unlikely Elon Musk's new political party, the America Party will succeed.

"I am saddened to watch Elon Musk go completely 'off the rails,' essentially becoming a TRAIN WRECK over the past five weeks," Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social.

"He even wants to start a Third Political Party, despite the fact that they have never succeeded in the United States - The System seems not designed for them," Trump continued.

Trump said having a third political party would create "Complete and Total DISRUPTION & CHAOS." He added that the GOP, in contrast, is a "smooth running 'machine'" that passed his "One Big Beautiful Bill" last week.

Musk announced the formation of the America Party on Saturday, a day after Trump signed his signature tax bill on July 4. The Tesla and SpaceX CEO had publicly criticized Trump's bill and floated the idea of starting his own party last month.

"It is obvious with the insane spending of this bill, which increases the debt ceiling by a record FIVE TRILLION DOLLARS that we live in a one-party country — the PORKY PIG PARTY!!" Musk said in an X post on June 30.

"Time for a new political party that actually cares about the people," he added.

Musk revisited the idea on Friday morning, when he conducted a poll on X. The poll obtained over 1.2 million votes, with over 65% of them supporting the creation of the America Party.

"By a factor of 2 to 1, you want a new political party and you shall have it!" Musk wrote in an X post on Saturday.

Musk previously said on Friday that he envisioned having the America Party "serve as the deciding vote on contentious laws" given the "razor-thin legislative margins" in Congress.

"One way to execute on this would be to laser-focus on just 2 or 3 Senate seats and 8 to 10 House districts," Musk wrote on X on Friday.

Trump's dismissal of Musk's America Party is not without basis. Past attempts at developing a third political party have faltered.

Billionaire Ross Perot ran as an independent presidential candidate for the 1992 election. While Perot did get nearly 19% of the popular vote, he was unable to obtain any electoral college votes.

Perot made a second attempt in 1996, when he ran under the Reform Party ticket, a party he founded in 1995. This time, Perot's share of the popular vote fell to about 8% and he did not receive any electoral college votes.

Perot's party didn't manage to win any House or Senate seats in subsequent elections, though its candidate, Jesse Ventura managed to win the 1998 Minnesota gubernatorial election. Ventura, however, left the party just a year after taking office.

Musk and the White House did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

• Unwanted subscriptions were about to get easier to cancel with the FTC's new click-to-cancel rule.
• But the commission just delayed its enforcement deadline by two more months.
• Ex-FTC commissioner Lina Khan says the move lets firms "keep trapping people" in pesky subscriptions.

It was about to get easier to get rid of that pesky subscription you've been stuck paying for until the Federal Trade Commission delayed enforcement of its new click-to-cancel rule.

Former FTC chair Lina Khan, in a Thursday post on X, said that the enforcement delay will give firms more time "to keep trapping people in subscriptions."

Most consumers are familiar with the unwanted subscription rigamarole: It's painlessly simple to sign up online for a streaming service, gym, or other subscription, but when the time comes to stop monthly payments and unsubscribe, there's no way to do it digitally, and you're forced into the dreaded routine of navigating call center chatbots that only seem to operate during the middle of your workday.

The FTC's click-to-cancel rule was supposed to go into effect in its entirety this week, ending the nightmarish cycle and making it just as easy for consumers to cancel their subscriptions as it was to start them. But on Friday, the commission's leaders voted to extend its enforcement deadline by two more months.

"Having conducted a fresh assessment of the burdens that forcing compliance by this date would impose, the Commission has determined that the original deferral period insufficiently accounted for the complexity of compliance," read a statement from Chairman Andrew Ferguson, co-signed by commissioners Melissa Holyoak and Mark Meador, about the decision.

After the FTC approved the click-to-cancel rule, also known as the Negative Option Rule, in November 2024, businesses had more than six months to comply before enforcement was scheduled to begin.

The rule's requirement to remove statements that misrepresent the nature of a subscription took effect on January 14. Its enforcement provisions — requiring clear disclosures, user consent, and easy cancellation policies —  were set to take effect on May 14. However, the FTC's latest decision pushes the enforcement deadline back by 60 days, to July 14.

"We object to the delay," former FTC commissioners Alvaro Bedoya and Rebecca Slaughter said in a joint statement posted to social media on Tuesday. "And were we allowed to exercise our duties as commissioners, we would have voted 'no.'"

Bedoya and Slaughter were the only two Democrats serving as FTC commissioners until March 18, when President Donald Trump fired them. The pair, whose terminations indicated their service at the FTC was "inconsistent" with Trump's policy priorities, have filed suit against the administration, alleging their firings violate a 1935 Supreme Court precedent that the president cannot fire FTC commissioners without cause, CNN reported.

Even if Bedoya and Slaughter had remained at the FTC, the conservative majority at the commission would be able to pass rules via a 3-2 vote. The decision to delay the click-to-cancel enforcement received a 3-0 vote, with all three Republican commissioners voting in favor of the deadline extension.

"The companies create these traps," Bedoya and Slaughter's statement continued. "They're the ones who made it so hard to get out. They didn't have to wait to make it easier to unsubscribe. But they did — they waited until the FTC told them to stop. Then, they still got six months to get their houses in order. Why do they get another two months to comply?"

Representatives for the FTC did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.