Lonely Planet. Thank God Its Finally Dead

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Lonely Planet. Thank God Its Finally Dead

Postby RYP » Mon Mar 14, 2011 5:54 am

BBC did to LP what AOL did to CNN and Disney did to ABC News.

BBC completes guide book takeover
(UKPA) – Feb 18, 2011
BBC Worldwide has bought the remaining 25% stake in travel guide Lonely Planet that it does not already own for £42.1 million.
Lonely Planet founders Tony and Maureen Wheeler, who launched the Australian travel publisher in 1973, sold their shareholding under an option agreed when the BBC's commercial arm snapped up 75% of the company for £88.1 million in 2007.
Marcus Arthur, chairman of Lonely Planet and managing director of BBC Worldwide Global Brands, said: "The put option enabled us to benefit from the Wheelers' experience over the last three-and-a-half years.
"They have supported Lonely Planet's ongoing migration from a traditional book publisher to a multi-platform brand. I would like to wish them the very best in the next phase of their lives."
It is understood that while Mr and Mrs Wheeler no longer have a stake or management role, they will continue to act as brand ambassadors on an ad hoc basis.
Mr and Mrs Wheeler said: "The last three years have seen Lonely Planet embark on a journey of its own - giving its users and readers ever more choice and utility. We wish the business and the Lonely Planet community every success in the future."
Lonely Planet has bounced back from difficult market conditions that took their toll after BBC Worldwide bought the firm.
The group has been leading a push to grow digital revenues - a tactic that has paid off with non-print revenue up from 9% when bought by BBC Worldwide to 22% in the year to the end of last March, helped by the launch of travel applications for smartphones. The print operation has also been boosted in the past few years by the launch of the Lonely Planet magazine in 2008.
Figures published showed the magazine - which now has eight editions globally - grew its UK and Ireland circulation by 33.4% year on year to 60,106 in the final six months of 2010.
But BBC Worldwide's takeover in 2007 sparked controversy that the deal went beyond its remit of focusing on activities with a direct link to the broadcaster's brands. Its internal regulator, the BBC Trust, ruled in 2009 after an 18-month review that BBC Worldwide must only make such acquisitions in exceptional circumstances in the future.
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Re: Lonely Planet. Thank God Its Finally Dead

Postby Virosa » Mon Mar 14, 2011 3:18 pm

Lonely Planet books served me really well in Turkey, Syria, and Romania. (didn't know about them when I went to Colombia/Brazil)

I think I recall a scandal a while back where one of their writers was just making up stuff (was that for Colombia?), but don't know much about their history. Why the hate?
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Re: Lonely Planet. Thank God Its Finally Dead

Postby Sri Lanky » Mon Mar 14, 2011 4:06 pm

Friendlyskies could tune you in to exactly why.
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Re: Lonely Planet. Thank God Its Finally Dead

Postby Virosa » Mon Mar 14, 2011 5:28 pm

Is there a short answer that doesn't involve e-stalking some dude with 5200 posts?
Send Lawyers, Guns and Money. The shit has hit the fan.
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Re: Lonely Planet. Thank God Its Finally Dead

Postby coldharvest » Mon Mar 14, 2011 5:53 pm

Virosa wrote:Is there a short answer that doesn't involve e-stalking some dude with 5200 posts?

Yeah.
They're cunts.
I know the law. And I have spent my entire life in its flagrant disregard.
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Re: Lonely Planet. Thank God Its Finally Dead

Postby Kurt » Mon Mar 14, 2011 5:57 pm

Virosa wrote:Lonely Planet books served me really well in Turkey, Syria, and Romania. (didn't know about them when I went to Colombia/Brazil)

I think I recall a scandal a while back where one of their writers was just making up stuff (was that for Colombia?), but don't know much about their history. Why the hate?


As guide books they had their place..that is for sure. I got served well by them in Europe and by the old "Lets Go" as well years ago.

But their Haiti edition from 2001 could have killed people. It almost killed me "You should be able to get tap-taps to Cap Hatien right at the border crossing" (a two mile walk and three muggings later I arrived where the tap-taps were). When I got to the Hotel in PAP I was told that the women who wrote it (whom everyone really liked) just hung out at the hotel and talked to people about places in Haiti and wrote the book that way.

The one to Colombia in 2004 claimed camping in National parks was an option but you should be cautious and I am sure there were many more. They did really well in heavy touristed areas or even off the beaten path of the heavily toured areas (like 100 miles away from a popular place) but their guide book and all guide books needed to be used carefully and skeptically when it came to the more dodgy areas of the world.

Live interaction is the way to go these days. Someone could post here about Guinea Bissau and asking what it is like to travel there recently and though no one that I know could answer that question now, it would still be about as useful as the LP guidebook to Guinea Bissau since they wouldn't have any current updates either.
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Re: Lonely Planet. Thank God Its Finally Dead

Postby Sri Lanky » Tue Mar 15, 2011 12:29 am

I would imagine that with ever-increasing globalization things are becoming increasingly fluid and unpredictable. This would include first world nations as well. As the Chinese would say -- may you live in interesting times.
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Re: Lonely Planet. Thank God Its Finally Dead

Postby ReptilianKittenEater » Tue Mar 15, 2011 2:49 am

130 million is good sum for smelly backpackers
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Re: Lonely Planet. Thank God Its Finally Dead

Postby vagabond » Fri Mar 18, 2011 6:13 pm

Would say it'd be more of an investment to go after young Chinese tourists - they don't like to spend a lot of money but want cleanliness and quality for what they do spend on. Their only problem is being limited by visa prohibitions.

LP will be around for a while now that 'gap year travel' is pretty institutionalized in UK/Aus. US-based young backpackers will probably continue to stick with Europe and only do summer or 6 month stints on their study abroad trips.

Anything digitized, rateable, and easily updateable will beat it in the long-term.
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Re: Lonely Planet. Thank God Its Finally Dead

Postby friendlyskies » Sun Mar 20, 2011 5:12 pm

Virosa wrote:Is there a short answer that doesn't involve e-stalking some dude with 5200 posts?


hahahahaha I don't really do short answers. "They're cunts" covers it. Although the BBC did fire the guy I had the least respect for there (for losing something like US$10m in one year lulz), and for that alone I will wish the Beeb best of luck with their bruised brand. LP does have the best maps, and for me that's the most important component of any guide. And anyway, it's all about the writer(s) - sometimes LP does have the best book available.
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Re: Lonely Planet. Thank God Its Finally Dead

Postby marie-angelique » Sun Mar 20, 2011 5:33 pm

friendlyskies wrote:LP does have the best maps, and for me that's the most important component of any guide. And anyway, it's all about the writer(s) - sometimes LP does have the best book available.


agreed. i have a bunch of them. i usually cut them up and always keep the maps and the little history section, and once in a while, the hotel section for certain towns.

if there is a Trailblazer guide for a place, it is usually the best, but sometimes those lack the basic info - and the maps are often hand drawn (jeepers). so i end up buying both.

anyhoo, i hope the change makes it better for the writers and consumers.
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Re: Lonely Planet. Thank God Its Finally Dead

Postby friendlyskies » Sun Mar 20, 2011 5:44 pm

There is nothing worse than a company that doesn't believe cartography is a specialized skill, and just freelances out map work to designers or illustrators. UGH. The worst is when they lift that shit off of Google Maps, which just sucks balls outside the first world. I have had an argument with a designer (I will not call him a carto) who refused to believe three (3!) source maps, including a government map used for surveilling and property rights, that agreed a major road (which I had been on) existed, because it wasn't on the fucking Googles! For Mexico, no less, and a relatively developed region in Mexico - Huatulco, Oaxaca. WTF.

Google Maps is the Wikipedia of cartography. Useful, but don't trust it!
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Re: Lonely Planet. Thank God It Will Never Die.

Postby buffybot_in_beirut » Mon Mar 21, 2011 5:51 pm

LP guidebooks will stay around for a long time because they are indispensable, obtainable and make travel seductively easy. Choosing them and using them has become a matter of instinct or automatism, like dressing in the dark. Grab socks, pull up pants, buy LP book. Unfortunately, LP knows this, so they can allow the quality of some (many?) books to slip, knowing they will not be punished for it. I grew up with LP and the simple effort of adjusting to the structure, paper thickness, style and font of another book is just painful to me. LP laughs and wins again.

The best "new" thing about LP is the TT forum. I am not being ironic. The sheer number of users means you can find info about almost any destination. Some of it is wrong, much of it is vague, and nothing is complete enough to replace a guidebook, but it's free, so why complain? Most other new LP products are rubbish. Smartphone apps, WTF, I don't even have a smartphone! Digital downloads? Saved my ass a while ago when I had no opportunity to buy a real book, but boy did I hate this stack of loose, soggy, disorganized sheets of paper in my daypack. I'll take a bound "brick" any time.
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Re: Lonely Planet. Thank God Its Finally Dead

Postby vagabond » Tue Mar 22, 2011 2:06 am

friendlyskies wrote:There is nothing worse than a company that doesn't believe cartography is a specialized skill, and just freelances out map work to designers or illustrators. UGH. The worst is when they lift that shit off of Google Maps, which just sucks balls outside the first world. I have had an argument with a designer (I will not call him a carto) who refused to believe three (3!) source maps, including a government map used for surveilling and property rights, that agreed a major road (which I had been on) existed, because it wasn't on the fucking Googles! For Mexico, no less, and a relatively developed region in Mexico - Huatulco, Oaxaca. WTF.

Google Maps is the Wikipedia of cartography. Useful, but don't trust it!


I feel that Google Maps has actually gotten worse than when it was first introduced. Or maybe I'm just noticing more errors from the different layers. Sometimes map and satellite images don't match up, etc. But it's free and usable for 99% of what I need it for so really no room to complain.
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Re: Lonely Planet. Thank God Its Finally Dead

Postby Tonne » Mon Apr 04, 2011 11:16 pm

I am hating them since my first trip to North Africa. Arrived in Marrakech at the bus stop, found it on a map in the LP-book, looked for the youth hostel for an entire day (while walking the entire city) only to discover that it was 100meters away from the bus stop. Their maps are shit when there's no highway or fancy bar in the vicinity to relate to. I've stuck to Bradt ever since, if they were available for the country that's next.
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