Transform iCloud into a Travel Hub?

Intriguing idea from Jon Stokes Apple Needs a Cloud Strategy, So It Should Buy Hipmunk and Tripit:

The WSJ reports that Apple is looking to hire high-level cloud experts to help guide the company’s cloud strategy. This is an encouraging move, because a fresh vision is exactly what Apple needs if it’s going to pivot from offering device-centric user experiences to network-centric user experiences. The very best way to get that vision, and to turn iCloud from a “me too” version of Google Apps into something uniquely compelling in its own right, would be for Apple to buy fistfuls of great startups that could super-charge iCloud with one or both of the following characteristics:

1. iCloud should give users the ability to do something they already do in a better, more fun, or more convenient way.
2. iCloud needs a network effect, such that iCloud users will routinely say to non-users, “Hey, even though you don’t own an Apple product, you still need to sign up for iCloud so that we can do this particular thing together.”

To that end, I’d like to suggest that if Apple is serious about developing a cloud strategy that isn’t doomed to failure, it should “think different(ly)” about its approach to product innovation and buy both Hipmunk and Tripit.