Kevin has just saved $500 on his hotel bill for the Yokohama Worldcon by booking direct with the hotel. We both hate doing this sort of thing, because conventions need to make their room blocks, but Kevin did inform the Nippon 2007 committee about this and give them a chance to do something. What appears to be happening is that the travel agent the convention is using is convinced that Worldcon members won’t be smart enough to book direct and therefore they can charge above the hotel’s rates. I guess they’ll be proved wrong, then. For details of how Kevin made his booking, see here.