From the Snowy Mountains to the Swiss Alps: The Global Ski Pass That Opens New Door
Access to Verbier’s iconic slopes is now included in a pass that already unlocks 75 of the world’s top resorts — and Australians are quietly taking notice.
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Australians planning their next alpine adventure may soon find themselves gazing across the peaks of the Swiss Alps. Verbier 4 Vallées — Switzerland’s premier ski region with sweeping views of the Matterhorn and Mont Blanc — has just become more accessible than ever for local snow lovers.
From high-altitude bowls to off-piste playgrounds, Verbier is famed for its European glamour and world-class terrain.
nd now, for the first time, select Australian travellers will have five consecutive days of access included in their ski season pass — a significant new addition that’s quietly redefining what it means to plan a winter holiday from the Southern Hemisphere.
The inclusion of Verbier joins an already expansive list of global destinations that Australians can tap into with one pass: Whistler Blackcomb in Canada, Hakuba Valley and Rusutsu Resort in Japan, Vail and Park City in the U.S., and the Australian favourites of Perisher, Falls Creek and Hotham.
For those who ski regularly — either locally or abroad — it’s a compelling offering. Not only does the pass cover a vast network of mountains, it comes with perks tailored to travellers: discounts on accommodation, lessons, rentals, dining and more, both in Australia and overseas.
And for more occasional skiers and snowboarders, a new four-day pass has been introduced for use at Perisher, Falls Creek and Hotham. It’s a flexible, lower-commitment option that still brings notable savings compared to single-day lift tickets.
Behind the scenes, this expansion signals a broader shift in the way Australians are approaching winter travel — seeking out global access, exclusive experiences, and curated benefits in place of one-size-fits-all ski trips. As European and North American resorts prepare for a strong northern season, and Australian slopes look to an early winter, timing and access are once again everything.
The current prices are available until April, 23, after which they are expected to increase. But for those already planning ski holidays across multiple continents — or even just dreaming of a long weekend in the Snowy Mountains — it’s a move that puts the world’s most iconic slopes a little closer to home.
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Meta is betting on a human-first AI future, but growing legal battles and declining public trust are putting Mark Zuckerberg’s vision to the test.
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“Call us optimists. Call us dreamers. Call us whatever the hell you want, but we’re betting on people, and we like those odds. The future is for everyone.”
That ad copy is from the voice-over of a July Meta Platforms META -3.38%.
spot that’s been part of a public-relations blitz to position Meta as the humanist AI company. The message was undercut by the ad’s inclusion of David Bowie’s “Five Years,” a brooding 1972 song about an impending apocalypse. But this week CEO Mark Zuckerberg left no ambiguity, publishing a 6,500-word manifesto—about 10 times the length of this newsletter—with a title that echoed the ad: “The Future is for Everyone.”
That seems to be Meta’s new tagline. In light of sinking public opinion and the company’s thousands of lawsuits from states, school districts, parents, and users, Meta’s public relations have been defensive. This push represents a return to offense, with a chance to distinguish Meta’s approach to AI from other labs like OpenAI, Anthropic, or SpaceX SPCX +9.65%.
“It is surprising that the discourse from many developing AI is so filled with doom,” Zuckerberg wrote. “I do not understand why anyone who believes that AI will eliminate most jobs and much of humanity’s relevance would rush to build that future.”
Zuckerberg frames what sort of future we build with AI as the central issue of our time. “We believe that delivering superintelligence to everyone is the way to answer this question,” he says. “This has the potential to begin a new era of personal empowerment where individuals can use this powerful new capability to reach their full potential, pursue their interests, and improve their lives and the world more than ever before.”
The flood of words belies the situation on the ground in mid-2026. Americans, at least, have a love-hate affair with social media. A November Pew Research Center poll reported that 71% of U.S. adults used Facebook, and 51% used Instagram. Worldwide, 3.6 billion people use at least one Meta app every day.
But in a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted in July and August, 61% of respondents said they wanted more government oversight of social media, and two-thirds supported laws to keep children under 16 years old off the platforms. When it comes to Meta in particular, in the 2026 Axios Harris 100, an annual poll about corporate reputation, Meta placed 96th out of 100. It’s only above two other social media companies, Chinese ultracheap retailer Temu, and Spirit Airlines, a defunct air carrier. Regarding ethics, Meta came in last, and it was only ahead of TikTok in trust.
The steady drip of headlines in the teen social media trials isn’t helping. Last week, Meta lost a judgment in New Mexico state court that raised their liability in that relatively small jurisdiction to nearly $1 billion dollars. On Wednesday, jury selection began for a federal case with four states suing Meta over addictive product design, and false marketing that said its platforms were safe for teenagers. In July, Meta claimed that the states are asking for a total of $1.4 trillion in damages, in addition to design changes in the apps. This is part of a multidistrict litigation, where thousands of federal trials with social media defendants are coordinated in Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers’ district courthouse in Oakland, Calif.
There is a separate such group of thousands of cases in California state court, mostly with individual plaintiffs. The steady drip of bad headlines from the courts will continue unless Meta decides to settle en masse.
Meanwhile, in the second quarter, Meta booked “$2.40 billion of charges related to legal proceedings,” according to its quarterly filing. That may be just the beginning.
Zuckerberg spent 6,500 words getting his utopian message out, but I can sum it up in two: Trust us. The evidence is that Meta has a long way to go to win back that trust.
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