Expedia accepts Coinbase, not Bitcoin. This is no different than accepting PayPal. Did you pay with PayPal balance, credit card, or bank account - it doesn't matter. You implement PayPal APIs and you receive dollars from PayPal. The rest is just speculation, but seems that price is dropping as "acceptance" like this can only lead to selling pressure if it ever gains any traction, of course. I'm really surprised all these merchants implementing Bitcoin for the PR, but confusing their checkout routine. The path to checkout should be as short as possible with as little decisions to be made along the way. Any distraction can lead to abandonment. Is the cheap PR all worth it? I personally doubt. It's obvious that the general public is not interested in Bitcoin and is, in fact, getting bored. I keep polling non-techie friends, the common theme is "Bitcoin is a scam". Even most tech people aren't much interested except the small share who invest in stocks, i.e. the speculator by nature.