Frustrated Airline Travelers Vent Anger on Web Sites.

Byline: Kevin Simpson

Sep. 17--Their summer travel plans may have been grounded by the Friendly Skies, but that didn't stop thousands of angry fliers from taking off on United Airlines -- in cyberspace complaint forums.

As technology merges with temper, chronic flight delays and improbable excuses have moved more and more passengers -- and frustrated employees -- to the ranks of point-and-click protesters.

Traffic on Untied.com, a Web site that three years ago transposed two letters of the company name and started fielding flier complaints and employee beefs, spiked dramatically during August.

Jeremy Cooperstock, an assistant professor at Montreal's McGill University who launched the site, said that from July to August visits to the site increased nearly 180 percent to more than 33,000.

The Untied.com phenomenon mirrors the online trend in consumer activism that has caught on with the disgruntled flying public this summer travel season.

NorthworstAir.org has been a magnet for criticism of Northwest Airlines since the carrier broke a Michigan inventor's laptop computer and gave him "the classic bureaucratic runaround" that inspired him to found the site.