18 February 2026
Why 'Travel Joystick™' Could Define the Next Generation of Travel Apps
We filed for a trademark on "Travel Joystick™" today. Not because we're patent trolls. Because we think we've discovered a fundamental interaction pattern that will define how people explore travel for the next decade.
Let me explain why.
The Problem with How We Search for Travel Today
Open Google Flights. Pick your dates. Pick your destination. See the price.
Open Airbnb. Pick your dates. Pick your neighborhood. Filter by price. Sort. Scroll.
Open Booking.com. Same thing. Dates. Place. Price. Features. Search.
Notice the pattern? You have to know what you want before you start searching.
This works great when you're booking Christmas flights to visit family. It fails completely when you're sitting in Basel fog on a Saturday morning thinking "I just want to be somewhere sunny today."
The Problem We Actually Solved
The original FOMO Sun problem was: I don't know where I want to go. I just know I want sun. And I want it within driving distance. Today.
Initial solution (V1-V40): A slider. Drag left for closer. Drag right for farther. Reasonable!
But something felt wrong. Here's what I wrote in my product notes at V40:
"The slider feels like I'm setting a constraint. Not exploring possibilities. I'm telling the app my limit—not asking it to inspire me."
That's when we realized: Travel exploration isn't filtering. It's browsing.
And browsing needs a different interaction.
Enter: The Joystick
V54: We replaced the slider with something nobody was expecting.
A spring-back joystick. Push left for nearby options. Push right for farther adventures. Let go—it returns to center. Flick it—it snaps to a bucket.
What makes it different:
1. It's Gestural, Not Declarative
Slider says: "I want destinations 2.5 hours away."
Joystick says: "Show me some options. No wait, farther. Actually, let's try closer."
The interaction matches the mental model. You're exploring, not constraining.
2. It Has Memory Through Physics
The joystick returns to center. This is crucial.
Every push is ephemeral. You're not committing to 3 hours of travel—you're peeking at what's available at 3 hours.
Want to go back to 1 hour? Just flick left. The joystick doesn't "remember" your last position. Every interaction is fresh.
This matches how people actually browse: "Let me see far options... ok too far... what about medium... hmm let me check far again..."
3. It Uses Direction as Meaning
Push right → hero card slides in from the right.
Push left → hero card slides in from the left.
Your physical gesture maps to spatial results. Right = farther = more adventurous = slides from distance. Left = closer = safer = slides from nearby.
This is the same reason Tinder's swipe feels right and a "Next" button feels wrong.
4. It Has Haptic Feedback Through Resistance
When you push the joystick, you feel the spring resistance.
When it snaps to a bucket, there's a moment of tactile feedback (on supported devices).
When there are no options in a bucket, it shakes and bounces back.
The interface isn't just showing you information—it's responding to your exploration with physical language.
Why This Matters Beyond FOMO Sun
The Travel Joystick™ isn't specific to fog escapes. It's a pattern.
It works anywhere you have:
- A spatial dimension (distance, time, price, size)
- Multiple options at different points on that dimension
- Users who don't know exactly what they want
- A need to quickly browse without committing
Possible applications:
Hotel search: Push up for luxury. Push down for budget. Let go—center is "best value."
Flight search: Push right for flexible dates. Push left for specific dates. Let go—center is "recommended window."
Restaurant search: Push right for special occasion. Push left for casual. Center is "tonight's vibe."
Event search: Push forward for tonight. Push back for next month. Center is "this weekend."
Real estate: Push right for bigger. Push left for cheaper. Center is "your range."
The interaction is the same. The dimension changes. The browsing behavior is universal.
The Technical Breakthrough
Making this feel right took 6 iterations across V54-V63:
V54: Proof of Concept
- Built basic joystick with fixed travel windows
- No physics yet, just click detection
- Felt too… digital
V55: Spring-Back Physics
- Added actual spring constants and damping
- Joystick returns to center when released
- This was the breakthrough moment
The difference between V54 and V55 was the difference between "this is interesting" and "holy shit this feels good."
V56-V57: Rigidity Tuning
- Too loose: joystick wobbles, feels floaty
- Too tight: joystick feels stuck
- Goldilocks: stiff enough to feel precise, loose enough to feel gestural
We landed on: spring: 0.3, damping: 0.7 in the framer-motion config.
V62: Keyboard Support
- Arrow keys move between buckets
- Global keyboard listener (no focus required)
- This made the joystick accessible on desktop
V63: Directional Card Flow
- Push left → results slide from left
- Push right → results slide from right
- The spatial relationship between gesture and content became physical
Why We're Trademarking It
Because interaction patterns matter.
Someone trademarked "Pull to Refresh." It's now ubiquitous. That's not a bad thing—it standardized a pattern.
Someone should have trademarked "Swipe to Match" before Tinder. Now everyone copies it without attribution.
We're trademarking "Travel Joystick™" because we think this interaction will become standard in travel exploration. And when it does, we want to be able to say: We invented this. We proved it works. We shared how to build it.
We're not going to sue people for using joystick-like interactions. That's not the point. The point is:
- Attribution matters: If everyone starts using joysticks for travel search, we'd like credit for the innovation
- It's a real invention: This isn't just a UI skin. It's a new interaction pattern with specific technical implementation
- It opens doors: If this pattern works for travel, what else does it work for? Having the trademark lets us explore those applications
The Open Question
We've proven this works for fog escapes. The question is: does it generalize?
I think yes. Here's my hypothesis:
Any time you're browsing multidimensional space with fuzzy preferences, a joystick beats a slider.
Sliders are 1-dimensional. You pick a value. You're done.
Joysticks are 1-dimensional exploratory. You peek at values. You compare. You iterate. The interaction supports the cognitive process.
Try It Yourself
Go to fomosun.com. Load it on your phone.
Flick the joystick a few times. Pay attention to how it feels.
Then ask yourself: what else could this work for?
If you build something with it, I'd love to see it. Seriously. Email me: leander@fomosun.com
What's Next
We're going to keep refining the joystick interaction. V89 isn't the final version. Some ideas:
Pressure sensitivity: Push harder → jump two buckets instead of one
Multi-axis joystick: Horizontal = distance, vertical = price/luxury
Joystick with memory: Long-press to "pin" a position, create comparison sets
Collaborative joysticks: Two people, two phones, one synchronized joystick for group planning
The core interaction is proven. Now we get to explore what it unlocks.
Try the Travel Joystick™ at fomosun.com. Built in 7 days with Claude, Codex, and a lot of fog. Follow the build at @fomosun.