The wife and I always pick up the Lonely Planet guide to wherever we’re going. It’s true, though, that the guides tend to become outdated rather quickly, because once a place gets a mention, the tourists flock to it. But we still find them a reasonable guide overall.
Excerpt: “In a move that’s already igniting suspicion among writers, Lonely Planet is cracking down on political bias, especially in the history and culture sections of its guides. At least one senior journalist has been to the publisher’s Footscray headquarters to speak to commissioning editors about objective reporting. Lonely Planet’s global publisher, Alex Fenby, says a formal policy, which stems from an internal review that began in March last year, will be rolled out to authors next week. Otherwise, the company remains tight-lipped about what sparked the move.”
Interesting. I’ve always been fond of Lonely Planet myself, and if some of their interpretive statements seem a bit biased, well geez, I’m a grown-up, I can evaluate matters myself.
But at the same time, it seems like only a matter of time until such guidebooks disappear entirely. When we don’t have a guidebook for a place we are going, the internet is a great substitute - and is only going to get better. Lonely Planet’s days are probably numbered no matter what.
Speaking of Lonely Planet and suchlike, whatever happened to Moon Publications? I used to like them until they dissed some friends of ours who ran a hotel in Micronesia. A Moon guidebook accused them totally unfairly of ripping off guests - details are boring, but the Moon guy had his facts all wrong. Haven’t touched one of those guides since. Are they still updating their books?
I used Lonely Planet for years upon years, while traveling through SE ASia, India and Nepal. I always found them well laid out and the information accessible. I used a Moon guide in South America and it wasn’t bad but not as well organized for my tastes.
I can understand wanting to maybe pull back on the politics, just a tad after a very long run as a free ride. I think I’ll wait and see before I decide if this is a good thing or a bad thing.
But, I promise, next time I’m in the bookstore I’ll be checking it out.
I seem to have a vague memory about a scandal in which one of those guidebook writers admitted to frequently reusing material from older editions without actually visiting all the places to see if such information was current.
I think it was the Colombia guidebook. The writer admitted plagiarising large sections and actually making others up. He had never visited Colombia either. The publisher reviewed his work, and couldn’t find any innaccuracies though.
One of their (former?) writers wrote a book about his first job with Lonely Planet. Called “Do All Travel Writers Go To Hell?” by Thomas Kohnstamm. He’s sent to Brazil and spends most of his time drinking, having sex, occasionally some drugs (and also sells some drugs because Lonely Planet pays their writers shit). Really a good read if the whole travel writer thing interests you.
My experience is that all guidebooks have political bias, but not all of them are explicit and up-front about it. I use Lonely Planet and Rough Guide specifically because they state their opinions, they don’t encourage tourists to be afraid of locals, and they identify problematic human rights practices. I don’t always follow their recommendations, but they are a useful tool to balance the bland, middle-class anxiety of Fodors and its ilk.