More Thoughts About the Future of Guidebooks
Travel Blog • Michael Yessis • 08.13.10 | 11:54 AM ET
The latest analysis comes from Financial Times travel editor Tom Robbins. A positive note:
Sales figures may be dire, the challenges mounting, but this summer there’s a buzz in the world of travel publishing, a sense of being on the verge of a totally new era. The internet allowed people to research their trips themselves before setting out, but smartphone apps and iPads travel with them. Suddenly the guidebook publishers, who for years seemed to be looking on from the sidelines, unsure of how to make websites work for them, have found themselves with a medium that makes sense.
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Michael Yessis is the cofounder and coeditor-in-chief of World Hum.
Steve 08.16.10 | 11:20 AM ET
Here’s the problem with travel guidebooks: they try to be all things to all people. For instance, the “Rick Steve’s Paris” book is 648 pages! Frommer’s New York is almost 500 pages and weighs about a pound-and-a-half. Does everyone really need 650 pages on Paris or 500 pages on New York?
When I wrote “The Traveling Professor’s Guide to Paris”, I tried to figure out what 95% of people wanted in a travel book. According to the reviews I get on Amazon, I did a pretty good job with less than 140 pages.
The point I’m making is that most of us don’t need to carry a brick of a book around when we travel. We want a book that is light, compact, and easy to find things in. That’s why you are going to see the extinction of the 650 page travel guide.