I found this article interesting - misconceptions about airfare

Interesting read. I think most experienced travelers would come to the same conclusions. While there are articles promoting days of the week, x days in advance, etc, I have never found that advice to be reliable. For example, I have never been able to get the fare alert or watch to work for me. By the time I respond to a fare alert it is gone. I come to the conclusion that it is more productive to focus on saving money on others parts of the trip rather than the air fare. Reduced a huge amount of stress.

Thanks, Joel. It confirms what I've believed for a long time. The only postscript I'd add is that if you see a huge sale close to your departure date, as sometimes happens, look closely. Case in point. One time Delta sent me an e-mail announcing a sale 3 weeks before our departure. The prices were $375/pp lower than we had paid. Even with the $250/pp fee to change our tickets, we would come out $125/pp ahead. Of course, I did it. The difference was refunded in the form of vouchers with a 1-year expiration date. That wasn't a problem for us, since we go to Europe every year, as well as visiting East Coast family regularly.

I've never found that buying on a certain day of the week thing to be true either.

I think as long is you are OK with booking well ahead of time, the most important factor re: price is how much layover time one is willing to stand. For our upcoming late winter Chicago/Paris - Naples/Chicago trip, we could save a good $800 between the two of us if we accepted 2-3 stops each way, and up to 36 hours total travel time each way. Nope, maybe when I was 20, footloose, fancy-free (and broke!). We're doing nonstop to Paris (8+ hrs), then one stop in Munich with a 2-hour layover on the way back, total of 13 hrs. Still got a reasonable price of just over $2K for the two of us.