No one can argue that today, information on travel and destinations abounds. Sites like Frommers (http://www.frommers.com/) and Fodors (http://www.fodors.com/) have created travel guides that give us a very detailed round-up of popular destinations. Try searching for New-York City or Paris and you have a very good start for everything from where to stay, where to eat and what to see and do. Welcome to travel guides. If you want more, of course, you can order a detailed printed book, which incidentally is not a bad idea.
Another leading on-line destination that I found quite interesting (and so did a lot of you) was Virtual Tourist (http://www.virtualtourist.com/). Started in 1999, VT has managed to climb to one of the top web destinations in terms of traffic. It did this because it was able to give people an easy way to get what they want. There is a lot of functionality on VT, but here is my simplified take on what works.
Atomic Information: The Travel TIP
You can blog on VT, but that's if tips don't do it for you. The travel tip is the most atomic piece of information people share on VT. You can write about your hotel in Rome, that nice bistro in Nice or Pier 39 in San Francisco. It is clear, concise and easily manipulable (more on that below). Clarity is important. People hate to dig and have to read a lot to get to the information they want. It is also easier to share. Blogging is not for everyone and is time-consuming. Writing a travel tip may actually be quite simple. You can write as many or as little of them as you wish. All in all, VT has found a formula that gathers as much information as possible from everyone. It seems simple, but it is quite a feat. TripAdvisor calls it a review, which implies a rating. A review is also atomic, but less flexible I find. VT has harnessed the tip in a powerful way, which bring me to the other thing they do well.
Travel Guides by the Community
VT uses the tips and manipulates them to create travel guides. A visit really tells a lot. VT also uses popularity to further enhance the guide (if people write most often about the Colosseum in Rome, it must mean something - and it does!). So you get Fodors or Frommers-style guides, but written by people like you and me. And you can even create you OWN travel guide by picking and choosing specific tips, and print it. Go and play with it and you will see the power and why this site is popular.
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