Forget the Front Desk: Hotels Go High Tech

There's nothing like a bit of luxury when staying at a nice hotel. Be it in-room dining or the staff waiting on your every need, feeling like a king for a day is a matter of taking advantage of the hotel's services. Unfortunately, the systems in place for requesting such things are years behind, teetering on the edge of archaic. You can stare at the minuscule writing on the phone handset in hopes that dialing the listed numbers won't throw you into an infinite loop of forwards and "accidental" hang ups or, at some hotels, you can click your way through a sluggish and ancient feeling TV interface. They may as well be using pneumatic tubes. Runtriz, a software firm out of Hollywood, CA, is aiming to bring hotels up to speed. Following a series of quiet test runs at other LA hotels, they've debuted a product called "Hotel Evolution" at the Malibu Beach Inn in Malibu, CA, which puts all of the hotel's offerings in the palm of your hand.