control. Additional common features found in hotel rooms are a telephone, an alarm clock, a television, and Internet connectivity; snack foods and drinks may be supplied in a mini-bar, and facilities for making hot drinks. Larger hotels may provide a number of additional guest facilities such as a restaurant, a swimming pool or childcare, and have conference and social function ervices.Some hotels offer meals as part of a room and board arrangement. In the United Kingdom, a hotel is required by law to serve food and drinks to all guests within certain stated hours; to avoid this requirement it is not uncommon to come across private hotels which are not subject to this equirement.[citation needed] In Japan, capsule hotels provide a minimized amount of room space and shared facilities.In Australia, Canada and Ireland, the word may also refer to a pub or bar and might not offer accommodation. In India, the word may also refer to a restaurant since the best restaurants were always situated next to a good hotel.[citation needed]EtymologyCorinthia Grand Hotel Royal, Budapest, HungaryThe word hotel is derived from the French hôtel (coming from hôte meaning host), which referred to a French version of a townhouse or any other building seeing frequent visitors, rather than a place offering accommodation. In contemporary French usage, hôtel now has the same meaning as the English term, and hôtel particulier is used for the old meaning. The French spelling, with the circumflex, was also used in English, but is now rare. The circumflex replaces the 's' found in the earlier hostel spelling, which over time took on a new, but closely related meaning. Grammatically, hotels usually take the definite article - hence "The Astoria Hotel" or simply "The Astoria".[edit] ClassificationA budget hotel located in MalaysiaThe cost and quality of hotels are usually indicative of the range and type of services available. Due to the enormous increase in tourism worldwide during the last decades of the 20th century, standards, especially those of smaller establishments, have improved considerably.[citation needed] For the sake of greater comparability, rating systems have been introduced, with the one to five stars classification being most common[citation needed] and with higher star ratings indicating more luxury. Hotels are independently assessed in traditional systems and these rely heavily on the facilities provided.[citation needed] Some consider this disadvantageous to smaller hotels whose quality of accommodation could fall into one class but the lack of an item such as an elevator would prevent it from reaching a higher categorization.[citation needed] In some countries, there is an official body with standard criteria for classifying hotels, but in many others there is none. There have been attempts at unifying the classification system so that it becomes an internationally recognized and reliable standard[citation needed] but large differences exist in the quality of the accommodation and the food within one category of hotel, sometimes even in the same country. The American Automobile Association (AAA) and their affiliated bodies use diamonds instead of stars to express hotel and staurant ratings levels.[edit] Historic hotelsotel Astoria and a statue of Tsar Nicholas I of Russia in front, in Saint PetersburgSome hotels have gained their renown through tradition, by hosting significant events or persons, such as Schloss Cecilienhof in Potsdam, Germany, which derives its fame from the Potsdam Conference of the World War II allies Winston Churchill, Harry Truman and Joseph Stalin in 1945. The Taj Mahal Palace & Tower in Mumbai is one of India's most famous and historic hotels because of its association with the Indian independence movement. Some establishments have given name to a particular meal or beverage, as is the case with the Waldorf Astoria in New York City, United States where the Waldorf Salad was first created or the Hotel Sacher in Vienna, Austria, home of the Sachertorte. Others have achieved fame by association with dishes or cocktails created on their premises, such as the Hotel de Paris where the crêpe Suzette was invented or the Raffles Hotel in Singapore, where the Singapore Sling cocktail was devised.ôtel Ritz in ParisA number of hotels have entered the public consciousness through popular culture, such as the Ritz Hotel in London, UK, through its association with Irving Berlin's song, 'Puttin' on the Ritz'. The Algonquin Hotel in New York City is famed as the meeting place of the literary group, the Algonquin Round Table, and Hotel Chelsea, also in New York City, has been the subject of a number of songs and the scene of the stabbing of Nancy Spungen (allegedly by her boyfriend Sid Vicious). The Waldorf Astoria and Statler hotels in New York City are also immortalized in the names of Muppets Statler and Waldorf.The luxurious Grand Hotel Europe in Saint Petersburg, Russia achieved fame with its inclusion in the James Bond film GoldenEye.[edit] Unusual hotelsChicago's Magnificent Mile has hosted many skyscraper hotels such as the Allerton Hotel.Many hotels can be considered destinations in themselves, by dint of unusual features of the lodging or its immediate environment:[edit] Treehouse hotelsSome hotels are built with living trees as structural elements, for example the Costa Rica Tree House in the Gandoca-Manzanillo Wildlife Refuge, Costa Rica; the Treetops Hotel in Aberdare National Park, Kenya; the Ariau Towers near Manaus, Brazil, on the Rio Negro in the Amazon; and Bayram's Tree Houses in Olympos, Turkey.[edit] Cave hotelsDesert Cave Hotel in Coober Pedy, South Australia and the Cuevas Pedro Antonio de Alarcón (named after the author) in Guadix, Spain, as well as several hotels in Cappadocia, Turkey, are notable for being built into natural cave formations, some with rooms underground.[edit] Capsule hotelsCapsule hotels are a type of economical hotel that are found in Japan.[edit] Ice and snow hotelsain article: Ice hotelThe Ice Hotel in Jukkasjärvi, Sweden, and the Hotel de Glace in Duschenay, Canada, melt every spring and are rebuilt each winter; the Mammut Snow Hotel in Finland is located within the walls of the Kemi snow castle; and the Lainio Snow Hotel is part of a snow village near Ylläs, Finland.[edit] Garden hotelsGarden hotels, famous for their gardens before they became hotels, include Gravetye Manor, the home of garden designer William Robinson, and Cliveden, designed by Charles Barry with a rose garden by Geoffrey Jellicoe.[edit] Underwater hotelsSome hotels have accommodation underwater, such as Utter Inn in Lake Mälaren, Sweden. Hydropolis, under construction in Dubai, will have suites on the bottom of the Persia Gulf, and Jules Undersea Lodge in Key Largo, Florida requires scuba diving to access its rooms.[edit] Other unusual hotels* The Library Hotel in New York City is unique in that each of its ten floors are assigned one category from the Dewey Decimal System.* The Burj al-Arab hotel in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, built on an artificial island, is structured in the shape of a boat's sail.* The former ocean liner RMS Queen Mary in Long Beach, California uses its first-class staterooms as a hotel.* The Jailhotel Löwengraben in Lucerne, Switzerland is a converted prison now used as a hotel.* The Luxor, a hotel and casino on The Las Vegas Strip in Paradise, Nevada, United States due to its pyramidal structure.* The Liberty Hotel in Boston used to be the Charles Street Jail.[edit] Resort hotelsThe Luxor Hotel in Las Vegas, a resort hotel serving an attached casino.Some hotels are built specifically to create a captive trade, example at casinos and holiday resorts. Though of course hotels have always been built in popular desinations, the defining characteristic of a resort hotel is that it exists purely to serve another attraction, the two having the same owners.n Las Vegas, Nevada there is a tradition of one-upmanship with extravagant themed hotels in a concentrated area known as the Las Vegas Strip. This trend now has extended to other resorts worldwide, but the concentration in Las Vegas is still the world's highest: neteen of the world's twenty-five largest hotels by room count are on the Strip, with a total of over 67,000 rooms.[1]In Europe Center Parcs might be considered a chain of resort hotels, since the sites are largely man-made (though set in natural surroundings such as country parks) with captive trade, whereas holiday camps such as Butlins and Pontin's are probably not considered as resort hotels, since they are set at traditional holiday destinations which existed before the camps.[edit] Railway hotelsFrequently, expanding railway companies built grand hotels
mobile telephone or cell telephone) is a long-range, electronic device used for mobile voice or data communication over a network of specialized base stations known as cell sites. In addition to the standard voice function of a mobile phone, telephone, current mobile phones may support many additional services, and accessories, such as SMS for text messaging, email, packet switching for access to the Internet, gaming, Bluetooth, infrared, camera with video recorder and MMS for sending and eceiving photos and video, MP3 player, radio and GPS. Most current mobile phones connect to a ellular network of base stations (cell sites), which is in turn interconnected to the public switched telephone etwork (PSTN) (the exception is satellite phones).The International Telecommunication Union estimated that mobile cellular subscriptions worldwide would reach approximately 4.1 billion by the end of 008[2] and mobile phones are starting to reach the bottom of the economic pyramid.HistoryMain article: istory of mobile phonesAnalog Motorola DynaTAC 8000X Advanced Mobile Phone System mobile phone as of 1983In 1908, U.S. Patent 887,357 for a wireless telephone was issued in to Nathan B. Stubblefield of Murray, Kentucky. He applied this patent to "cave radio" telephones and not directly to cellular telephony as the term is currently understood.[3] Cells for mobile phone base stations were invented in 1947 by Bell Labs engineers at AT&T and further developed by Bell Labs during the 1960s. Radiophones have a long and varied history going back to Reginald Fessenden's invention and shore-to-ship demonstration of radio telephony, through the Second World War with military use of radio telephony links and civil services in the 1950s, while hand-held cellular radio devices have been available since 1973. A patent for the first wireless phone as we know today was issued in US Patent Number 3,449,750 to George Sweigert of Euclid, Ohio on June 10, 1969.In 1945, the zero generation (0G) of mobile telephones was introduced. Like other technologies of the time, it involved a single, powerful base station covering a wide area, and each telephone would effectively monopolize a channel over that whole area while in use. The concepts of frequency reuse and handoff, as well as a number of other concepts that formed the basis of modern cell phone technology, are first described in U.S. Patent 4,152,647, issued May 1, 1979 to Charles A. Gladden and Martin H. Parelman, both of Las Vegas, Nevada and assigned by them to the United States Government.This is the first embodiment of all the concepts that formed the basis of the next major step in mobile telephony, the Analog cellular telephone. Concepts covered in this patent (cited in at least 34 other patents) also were later extended to several satellite communication systems. Later updating of the cellular system to a digital system credits this patent.Martin Cooper, a Motorola researcher and executive is widely considered to be the inventor of the first practical mobile phone for hand-held use in a non-vehicle setting. Cooper is the inventor named on "Radio telephone system" filed on October 17, 1973 with the US Patent Office and later issued as US Patent 3,906,166.[4] Using a modern, if somewhat heavy portable handset, Cooper made the first call on a hand-held mobile phone on April 3, 1973 to a rival, Dr. Joel S. Engel of Bell Labs.[5]The first commercial citywide cellular network was launched in Japan by NTT in 1979. Fully automatic cellular networks were first introduced in the early to mid 1980s (the 1G generation). The Nordic Mobile Telephone (NMT) system went online in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden in 1981.[6]ersonal Handy-phone System mobiles and modems used in Japan around 1997-2003In 1983, Motorola DynaTAC was the first approved mobile phone by FCC in the United States. In 1984, Bell Labs developed modern commercial cellular technology (based, to a large extent, on the Gladden, Parelman Patent), which employed multiple, centrally controlled base stations (cell sites), each providing service to a small area (a cell). The cell sites would be set up such that cells partially overlapped. In a cellular system, a signal between a base station (cell site) and a terminal (phone) only need be strong enough to reach between the two, so the same channel can be used simultaneously for separate conversations in different cells.Cellular systems required several leaps of technology, including handover, which allowed a onversation to continue as a mobile phone traveled from cell to cell. This system included variable transmission power in both the base stations and the telephones (controlled by the base stations), which allowed range and cell size to vary. As the system expanded and neared capacity, the ability to reduce transmission power allowed new cells to be added, resulting in more, smaller cells and thus more capacity. The evidence of this growth can still be seen in the many older, tall cell site towers with no antennae on the upper parts of their towers. These sites originally created large cells, and so had their antennae mounted atop high towers; the towers were designed so that as the system expanded—and cell sizes shrank—the antennae could be lowered on their original masts to reduce range.A 1991 GSM mobile phoneThe first "modern" network technology on digital 2G (second generation) cellular technology was launched by Radiolinja (now part of Elisa Group) in 1991 in Finland on the GSM standard which also marked the introduction of competition in mobile telecoms when Radiolinja challenged incumbent Telecom Finland (now part of TeliaSonera) who ran a 1G NMT network.The first data services appeared on mobile phones starting with person-to-person SMS text messaging in Finland in 1993. First trial payments using a mobile phone to pay for a Coca Cola vending machine were set in Finland in 1998. The first commercial payments were mobile parking trialled in Sweden but first commercially launched in Norway in 1999. The first commercial payment system to mimic banks and credit cards was launched in the Philippines in 1999 simultaneously by mobile operators Globe and Smart. The first content sold to mobile phones was the ringing tone, first launched in 1998 in Finland. The first full internet service on mobile phones was i-Mode introduced by NTT DoCoMo in Japan in 1999.In 2001 the first commercial launch of 3G (Third Generation) was again in Japan by NTT DoCoMo on the WCDMA standard.[7]Until the early 1990s, following introduction of the Motorola MicroTAC, most mobile phones were too large to be carried in a jacket pocket, so they were typically installed in vehicles as car phones. With the miniaturization of digital components and the development of more sophisticated batteries, mobile phones have become smaller and lighter.HandsetsA Nokia phone with box.A printed circuit board inside a mobile phoneThere are several categories of mobile phones, from basic phones to feature phones such as musicphones and cameraphones, to smartphones. The first smartphone was the Nokia 9000 Communicator in 1996 which incorporated PDA functionality to the basic mobile phone at the time. As miniaturisation and increased processing power of microchips has enabled ever more features to be added to phones, the concept of the smartphone has evolved, and what was a high-end smartphone five years ago, is a standard phone today. Several phone series have been introduced to address a given market segment, such as the RIM BlackBerry focusing on enterprise/corporate customer email needs; the SonyEricsson Walkman series of musicphones and Cybershot series of cameraphones; the Nokia N-Series of multimedia phones; and the Apple iPhone which provides full-featured web access and multimedia capabilities.FeaturesMain articles: Mobile phone features, Smartphone, and iPhoneMobile phones often have features beyond sending text messages and making voice calls, including call egisters, GPS navigation, music (MP3) and video (MP4) playback, RDS radio receiver, alarms, memo and document recording, personal organiser and personal digital assistant functions, ability to watch streaming video or download video for later viewing, video calling, built-in cameras (3.2+ Mpx) and camcorders (video recording), with autofocus and flash, ringtones, games, PTT, memory card reader (SD), USB (2.0), infrared, Bluetooth (2.0) and WiFi connectivity, instant messaging, Internet e-mail and browsing and serving as a wireless modem for a PC, and soon will also serve as a console of sorts to online games and other high quality games.Some phones include a touchscreen.The largest categories of mobile services are music, picture downloads, videogaming, adult entertainment, gambling, video/TV.Nokia and the University of Cambridge are showing off a bendable cell phone called Morph.[8]ApplicationsA phone with touchscreen feature.Mobile phone subscribers per 100 inhabitants 1997-2007The most commonly used data application on mobile phones is SMS text messaging, with 74% of all mobile phone users as active users (over 2.4 billion out of 3.3 billion total subscribers at the end of 2007). SMS text messaging was worth over 100 billion dollars in annual revenues in 2007 and the worldwide average of messaging use is 2.6 SMS sent per day per person across the whole mobile phone subscriber base. (source Informa 2007). The first SMS text message was sent from a computer to a mobile phone in 1992 in the UK, while the first person-to-person SMS from phone to phone was sent in Finland in 1993.The other non-SMS data services used by mobile phones were worth 31 Billion dollars in 2007, and were led by mobile music, downloadable logos and pictures, gaming, gambling, adult entertainment and advertising (source: Informa 2007). The first downloadable mobile content was sold to a mobile phone in Finland in 1998, when Radiolinja (now Elisa) introduced the downloadable ringing tone service. In 1999 Japanese mobile operator NTT DoCoMo introduced its mobile internet service, i-Mode, which today is the world's largest mobile internet service and roughly the same size as Google in annual revenues.The first mobile news service, delivered via SMS, was launched in Finland in 2000. Mobile news services are expanding with many organisations providing "on-demand" news services by SMS. Some also provide "instant" news pushed out by SMS. Mobile telephony also facilitates activism and public journalism being explored by Reuters and Yahoo![9] and small independent news companies such as Jasmine News in Sri Lanka.Companies like Monster.com are starting to offer mobile services such as job search and career advice. Consumer applications are on the rise and include everything from information guides on local activities and events to mobile coupons and discount offers one can use to save money on purchases. Even tools for creating websites for mobile phones are increasingly becoming available.Mobile payments were first trialled in Finland in 1998 when two Coca-Cola vending machines in Espoo were enabled to work with SMS payments. Eventually the idea spread and in 1999 the Philippines launched the first commercial mobile payments systems, on the mobile operators Globe and Smart. Today mobile payments ranging from mobile banking to mobile credit cards to mobile commerce are very widely used in Asia and Africa, and in selected European markets. For example in the Philippines it is not unusual to have one's entire paycheck paid to the mobile account. In Kenya the limit of money transfers from one mobile banking account to another is one million US dollars. In India paying utility bills with mobile gains a 5% discount. In Estonia the government found criminals collecting cash parking fees, so the government declared that only mobile payments via SMS were valid for parking and today all parking fees in Estonia are handled via mobile and the crime involved in the activity has vanished.Mobile Applications are developed using the Six M's (previously Five M's) service-development theory created by the author Tomi Ahonen with Joe Barrett of Nokia and Paul Golding of Motorola. The Six M's are Movement (location), Moment (time), Me (personalization), Multi-user (community), Money (payments) and Machines (automation). The Six M's / Five M's theory is widely referenced in the elecoms applications literature and used by most major industry players. The first book to discuss the heory was Services for UMTS by Ahonen & Barrett in 2002.In addition to the battery, GSM mobile phones require a small microchip, called a Subscriber Identity Module or SIM Card, to function. proximately the size of a small postage stamp, the SIM Card is usually placed underneath the battery in the rear of the unit, and (when properly activated) stores the phone's configuration data, and nformation about the phone itself, such as which calling plan the subscriber is using. When the subscriber removes the SIM Card, it can be re-inserted into another phone and used as normal.Each SIM Card is activated by use of a unique numerical identifier; once activated, the identifier is locked down and the card is permanently locked in to the activating network. For this reason, most retailers refuse to accept the return of an activated SIM Card.Those cell phones that do not use a SIM Card have the data programmed in to their memory. This data is accessed by using a special digit sequence to access the "NAM" as in "Name" or number programming menu. From here, one can add information such as a new number for your phone, new Service Provider numbers, new emergency numbers, change their Authentication Key or A-Key code, and update their Preferred Roaming List or PRL. However, to prevent someone from accidentally disabling their phone or removing it from the network, the Service Provider puts a lock on this data called a Master Subsidiary Lock or MSL.The MSL also ensures that the Service Provider gets payment for the phone that was purchased or "leased". For example, the Motorola RAZR V9C costs upwards of CAD $500. You can get one for approximately $200, depending on the carrier. The difference is paid by the customer in the form of a monthly bill. If the carrier did not use a MSL, then they may lose the $300–$400 difference that is paid in the monthly bill, since some customers would cancel their service and take the phone to another carrier.The MSL applies to the SIM only so once the contract has been completed the MSL still applies to the SIM. The phone however, is also initially locked by the manufacturer into the Service Providers MSL. This lock may be disabled so that the phone can use other Service Providers SIM cards. Most phones purchased outside the US are unlocked phones because there are numerous Service Providers in close proximity to one another or have overlapping coverage. The cost to unlock a phone varies but is usually very cheap and is sometimes provided by independent phone vendors.Having an unlocked phone is extremely useful for travelers due to the high cost of using the MSL Service Providers access when outside the normal coverage areas. It can cost sometimes up to 10 times as much to use a locked phone overseas as in the normal service area, even with discounted rates. T-Mobile will provide a SIM unlock code to account holders in good standing after 90 days according to their FAQ.For example, in Jamaica, an AT&T subscriber might pay in excess of US$1.65 per minute for discounted international service while a B-Mobile (Jamaican) customer would pay US$0.20 per minute for the same international service. Some Service Providers focus sales on international sales while others focus on regional sales. For example, the same B-Mobile customer might pay more for local calls but less for international calls than a subscriber to the Jamaican national phone C&W (Cable & Wireless) company. These rate differences are mainly due to currency variations because SIM purchases are made in the local currency. In the US, this type of service competition does not exist because some of the major Service Providers do not offer Pay-As-You-Go services. [Needs Pay-As-You-Go references, rumored T-Mobile,Verizon provide one, AT&T does not as of 12/2008]arketobile phone manufacturers' market share in Q3/2008In Q3/2008, Nokia was the world's largest manufacturer of mobile phones, with a global device market share of 39.4%, followed by Samsung (17.3%), Sony Ericsson (8.6%), Motorola (8.5%) and LG Electronics (7.7%). These manufacturers accounted for over 80% of all mobile phones sold at that time.[11]Other manufacturers include Apple Inc., Audiovox (now UTStarcom), Benefon, BenQ-Siemens, CECT, High Tech Computer Corporation (HTC), Fujitsu, Kyocera, Mitsubishi Electric, NEC, Neonode, Panasonic, Palm, Matsushita, Pantech Wireless Inc., Philips, Qualcomm Inc., Research in Motion Ltd. (RIM), Sagem, Sanyo, Sharp, Siemens, Sendo, Sierra Wireless, SK Teletech, T&A Alcatel, Huawei, Trium and Toshiba.[citation needed] There are also specialist communication systems related to (but distinct from) mobile phones.MediaThe mobile phone became a mass media channel in 1998 when the first ringing tones were sold to mobile phones by Radiolinja in Finland. Soon other media content appeared such as news, videogames, jokes, horoscopes, TV content and advertising. In 2006 the total value of mobile phone paid media content exceeded internet paid media content and was worth 31 Billion dollars (source Informa 2007). The value of music on phones was worth 9.3 Billion dollars in 2007 and gaming was worth over 5 billion dollars in 2007 (source Netsize Guide 2008 [12]).The mobile phone is often called the Fourth Screen (if counting cinema, TV and PC screens as the first three) or Third Screen (counting only TV and PC screens). It is also called the Seventh of the Mass Media (with Print, Recordings, Cinema, Radio, TV and Internet the first six). Most early content for mobile tended to be copies of legacy media, such as the banner advertisement or the TV news highlight video clip. Recently unique content for mobile has been emerging, from the ringing tones and ringback tones in music to "mobisodes," video content that has been produced exclusively for mobile phones.The advent of media on the mobile phone has also produced the opportunity to identify and track Alpha Users or Hubs, the most influential members of any social community. AMF Ventures measured in 2007 the relative
and Internet connectivity; snack foods and drinks may be supplied in a mini-bar, and facilities for making hot drinks. Larger hotels may provide a number of additional guest facilities such as a restaurant, a swimming pool or childcare, and have conference and social function ervices.Some hotels offer meals as part of a room and board arrangement. In the United Kingdom, a hotel is required by law to serve food and drinks to all guests within certain stated hours; to avoid this requirement it is not uncommon to come across private hotels which are not subject to this equirement.[citation needed] In Japan, capsule hotels provide a minimized amount of room space and shared facilities.In Australia, Canada and Ireland, the word may also refer to a pub or bar and might not offer accommodation. In India, the word may also refer to a restaurant since the best restaurants were always situated next to a good hotel.[citation needed]EtymologyCorinthia Grand Hotel Royal, Budapest, HungaryThe word hotel is derived from the French hôtel (coming from hôte meaning host), which referred to a French version of a townhouse or any other building seeing frequent visitors, rather than a place offering accommodation. In contemporary French usage, hôtel now has the same meaning as the English term, and hôtel particulier is used for the old meaning. The French spelling, with the circumflex, was also used in English, but is now rare. The circumflex replaces the 's' found in the earlier hostel spelling, which over time took on a new, but closely related meaning. Grammatically, hotels usually take the definite article - hence "The Astoria Hotel" or simply "The Astoria".[edit] ClassificationA budget hotel located in MalaysiaThe cost and quality of hotels are usually indicative of the range and type of services available. Due to the enormous increase in tourism worldwide during the last decades of the 20th century, standards, especially those of smaller establishments, have improved considerably.[citation needed] For the sake of greater comparability, rating systems have been introduced, with the one to five stars classification being most common[citation needed] and with higher star ratings indicating more luxury. Hotels are independently assessed in traditional systems and these rely heavily on the facilities provided.[citation needed] Some consider this disadvantageous to smaller hotels whose quality of accommodation could fall into one class but the lack of an item such as an elevator would prevent it from reaching a higher categorization.[citation needed] In some countries, there is an official body with standard criteria for classifying hotels, but in many others there is none. There have been attempts at unifying the classification system so that it becomes an internationally recognized and reliable standard[citation needed] but large differences exist in the quality of the accommodation and the food within one category of hotel, sometimes even in the same country. The American Automobile Association (AAA) and their affiliated bodies use diamonds instead of stars to express hotel and staurant ratings levels.[edit] Historic hotelsotel Astoria and a statue of Tsar Nicholas I of Russia in front, in Saint PetersburgSome hotels have gained their renown through tradition, by hosting significant events or persons, such as Schloss Cecilienhof in Potsdam, Germany, which derives its fame from the Potsdam Conference of the World War II allies Winston Churchill, Harry Truman and Joseph Stalin in 1945. The Taj Mahal Palace & Tower in Mumbai is one of India's most famous and historic hotels because of its association with the Indian independence movement. Some establishments have given name to a particular meal or beverage, as is the case with the Waldorf Astoria in New York City, United States where the Waldorf Salad was first created or the Hotel Sacher in Vienna, Austria, home of the Sachertorte. Others have achieved fame by association with dishes or cocktails created on their premises, such as the Hotel de Paris where the crêpe Suzette was invented or the Raffles Hotel in Singapore, where the Singapore Sling cocktail was devised.ôtel Ritz in ParisA number of hotels have entered the public consciousness through popular culture, such as the Ritz Hotel in London, UK, through its association with Irving Berlin's song, 'Puttin' on the Ritz'. The Algonquin Hotel in New York City is famed as the meeting place of the literary group, the Algonquin Round Table, and Hotel Chelsea, also in New York City, has been the subject of a number of songs and the scene of the stabbing of Nancy Spungen (allegedly by her boyfriend Sid Vicious). The Waldorf Astoria and Statler hotels in New York City are also immortalized in the names of Muppets Statler and Waldorf.The luxurious Grand Hotel Europe in Saint Petersburg, Russia achieved fame with its inclusion in the James Bond film GoldenEye.[edit] Unusual hotelsChicago's Magnificent Mile has hosted many skyscraper hotels such as the Allerton Hotel.Many hotels can be considered destinations in themselves, by dint of unusual features of the lodging or its immediate environment:[edit] Treehouse hotelsSome hotels are built with living trees as structural elements, for example the Costa Rica Tree House in the Gandoca-Manzanillo Wildlife Refuge, Costa Rica; the Treetops Hotel in Aberdare National Park, Kenya; the Ariau Towers near Manaus, Brazil, on the Rio Negro in the Amazon; and Bayram's Tree Houses in Olympos, Turkey.[edit] Cave hotelsDesert Cave Hotel in Coober Pedy, South Australia and the Cuevas Pedro Antonio de Alarcón (named after the author) in Guadix, Spain, as well as several hotels in Cappadocia, Turkey, are notable for being built into natural cave formations, some with rooms underground.[edit] Capsule hotelsCapsule hotels are a type of economical hotel that are found in Japan.[edit] Ice and snow hotelsain article: Ice hotelThe Ice Hotel in Jukkasjärvi, Sweden, and the Hotel de Glace in Duschenay, Canada, melt every spring and are rebuilt each winter; the Mammut Snow Hotel in Finland is located within the walls of the Kemi snow castle; and the Lainio Snow Hotel is part of a snow village near Ylläs, Finland.[edit] Garden hotelsGarden hotels, famous for their gardens before they became hotels, include Gravetye Manor, the home of garden designer William Robinson, and Cliveden, designed by Charles Barry with a rose garden by Geoffrey Jellicoe.[edit] Underwater hotelsSome hotels have accommodation underwater, such as Utter Inn in Lake Mälaren, Sweden. Hydropolis, under construction in Dubai, will have suites on the bottom of the Persia Gulf, and Jules Undersea Lodge in Key Largo, Florida requires scuba diving to access its rooms.[edit] Other unusual hotels* The Library Hotel in New York City is unique in that each of its ten floors are assigned one category from the Dewey Decimal System.* The Burj al-Arab hotel in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, built on an artificial island, is structured in the shape of a boat's sail.* The former ocean liner RMS Queen Mary in Long Beach, California uses its first-class staterooms as a hotel.* The Jailhotel Löwengraben in Lucerne, Switzerland is a converted prison now used as a hotel.* The Luxor, a hotel and casino on The Las Vegas Strip in Paradise, Nevada, United States due to its pyramidal structure.* The Liberty Hotel in Boston used to be the Charles Street Jail.[edit] Resort hotelsThe Luxor Hotel in Las Vegas, a resort hotel serving an attached casino.Some hotels are built specifically to create a captive trade, example at casinos and holiday resorts. Though of course hotels have always been built in popular desinations, the defining characteristic of a resort hotel is that it exists purely to serve another attraction, the two having the same owners.n Las Vegas, Nevada there is a tradition of one-upmanship with extravagant themed hotels in a concentrated area known as the Las Vegas Strip. This trend now has extended to other resorts worldwide, but the concentration in Las Vegas is still the world's highest: neteen of the world's twenty-five largest hotels by room count are on the Strip, with a total of over 67,000 rooms.[1]In Europe Center Parcs might be considered a chain of resort hotels, since the sites are largely man-made (though set in natural surroundings such as country parks) with captive trade, whereas holiday camps such as Butlins and Pontin's are probably not considered as resort hotels, since they are set at traditional holiday destinations which existed before the camps.[edit] Railway hotelsFrequently, expanding railway companies built grand hotels at their termini, such as the Midland Hotel, Manchester above St Pancras railway station, the Chiltern Court Hotel above Baker Street tube station and Canada's grand railway hotels. They are mostly, but not exclusively, used by those travelling
