The multiple deaths of the travel guidebook

The expansion of location-centric apps and websites, starting about 15 years ago, with the quick rise of platforms like Foursquare, prefaced by platforms like Tripadvisor, which is closing in on its 24th birthday, resulted in the death, or near-death of most conventional guidebook series.

Already back in 2012(!) this industry-wide decline saw Lonely Planet emerge as, if only just, the leader in US guidebook sales. But only because they managed to limit their decline; In the space of just 6 years, Frommer's, the former leader, had seen its sales decline by about 50%, whereas Lonely Planet 'only' lost about 25% of their sales over the same period.
Lonely Planet experimented early on with their online presence (for one, they created an online community, The Thorn Tree, way back in 1996), which might have kept them somewhat in tune with the changing needs of younger travellers, allowing them to stay more relevant, if only somewhat. But, their subsequent, that is, after 2012, survival was more due to the BBC's sale of Lonely Planet to NC2 Media, which used fire sales of the guidebooks to support their other media ventures.

In December 2020, Lonely Planet was sold again, this time to a company that primarily handles online, mostly tech-oriented, media. And, as by 2018 Lonely Planet's turnover had again decreased significantly, it's hard not to see Lonely Planet's trajectory as the slow sunset of the travel guidebook industry, with platforms like the aforementioned Foursquare, Tripadvisor, Google Maps, and others, eating their lunch. Even if the quality of their content, crowdsourced and badly vetted, though perhaps more comprehensive, typically also leaves a lot to be desired, specifically when looking for material that's not expected to appeal to the masses.

Who, indeed, still buys guidebooks? For me, Lonely Planet was for many years, by far, the preferable source of travel information. But, the area where it excelled, practical travel information, particularly for out-of-the-way destinations, a long time ago was superseded by practical sources like Wikivoyage and Wikipedia. And, as I'm not interested to be told by Google Maps where the best restaurant is in town, the same restaurant everyone else wants to go to, I seldom used guidebooks, digital or not, to tell me where to eat or drink.
So, the last time I bought a Lonely Planet is easily more than 5 years ago.

The rise of online media, with a focus on travel destinations, was the first death of the travel guidebook. But, there's another death knell coming, and it will kill off the last vestiges of the guidebook, and it might take the online sources of travel information with it.

Just today, the NYT ran an article on how Amazon is being flooded by AI-generated guidebooks, supported by fake 5-star reviews, some of these publications even ending up being 'recommended by Amazon', betraying Amazon's use of AI-tools in the process of trying to make more money off unsuspecting customers.

True to what has become the hallmark of AI-generated material, the books look real enough, but, on close inspection, turn out to be full of errors. Worse, they tend to be so generic as to be unusable.

The publishers of these books will make a quick buck, and will, at some point, be removed from Amazon, but the damage might then already be done, and this first wave will be followed by wave upon wave of fake guidebooks. Right now, we might know which guidebook series are reliable enough. In a few years, perhaps when the last trustworthy guidebook series have gone under, we might not, and any guidebook that claims to be the definite source on, say, Paris, might be exactly that, or not at all.
Who's going to try their luck in spending their money on what might be a paper-based paper weight?

Meanwhile, practical information on travel destinations has mostly been commodified; that list of Paris restaurants is pretty much the same, wherever you get it from. Therefore, to set yourself apart, when providing travel-related information, the need is to be able to provide access to a unique experience. AirBNB tried this with their 'experiences', HeyGo tried this with live virtual tours, and, during the pandemic, even Amazon joined the bandwagon with their Amazon Explore.

I wasn't expecting these kinds of initiatives to be hugely popular in Europe, as they are too curated, but Americans seemed to lap them up. Except that, now a few years after their introduction, these platform offerings are dead, or dying. Sure, during the pandemic we all traveled less, but the travel industry has healthily bounced back, and we're all, collectively, back on track to help destroy the world with our carbon emissions as a consequence of long distance air travel (though, to be clear, private air travel should be the first to be completely barred).

So, my takeaway is that we, as travellers, are less interested in being told what to see or do, and want to feel we have agency over our choices, when at home, and when traveling. We might not realise that typing into Google 'best Thai restaurant' does not actually give us any agency, but to many, it feels it does, which is enough for the majority.
The guidebook is on its last legs.

Now, I should add a paragraph on how those that put an emphasis on 'walking' as an important aspect of their travels are of course much more in tune with their environment, their sense of agency, and their ability to uniquely explore their surroundings, unaided by modern, exploitative, media.
Us walkers don't need no guidebooks to tell us what to do. Amiright?

Or?

Either way, keep walking!

Note that, Monday night (August 14) marks the deadline for our writing competition!

New walking pieces

Upcoming events

From our network

Stuff we found

Follow us on social media