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Academic
: ConglomerateLonely Planet Travel Writer Thomas Kohnstamm Gives New Meaning to the Phrase "Phone It In"
By Gordon Smith, Christine, Hurt, Vic Fleischer, Fred Tung, Lisa Fairfax, David Zaring
Forget backdating scandals and accounting scandals, a new fraud revelation is shaking the travel guide industry! Thomas Kohnstamm, a travel writer for among other publishers, Lonely Planet, is making news by blowing the whistle on the crafting of guidebooks. In particular, Kohnstamm claims that the payment schemes for travel writers (who contribute to guidebooks for a fee, but share no royalties and are not reimbursed for expenses) creates incentives for writers to cheat: accept free meals and lodging, cut and paste information on tourist sights from other sources, and include information for places not personally visited. As an outrageous example, Kohnstamm admits to not visiting Colombia while contributing to Lonely Planet's guidebook to that country. Kohnstamm recounts the results of these agency problems in his new book Do Travel Writers Go to Hell? A Swashbuckling Tale of High Adventures, Questionable Ethics & Professional Hedonism.
What is interesting is Kohnstamm's unapologetic non-whistleblower stance. Kohnstamm obviously thinks guidebook publishers should pay more if they want to get more, but he also thinks that buyers of guidebooks should take them with a grain of salt. I was listening to an interview with him on Sirius NPR, and he stressed that no guidebook is the insurer of the reader's vacation. So, if a reader stays at a resort based on its review in the book, which turns out to be recycled for years gone by, and the resort turns out to be a dump -- that's the readers fault for being so gullible. Interesting.
Full post as published by Conglomerate on May 12, 2008 (boomark / email).
Lonely Planet Author Admits He Made Up Parts of One Book
Thomas Kohnstamm admitted to the Daily Telegraph that he didn't really go to Colombia before writing the Lonely Planet guide to that country because "they didn't pay me enough." Instead, he pumped a girlfriend who worked at the Colombian Consulate...
Lonely Planet Responds To Kohnstamm's Claims
The Lonely Planet folks have launched a counter-attack against writer Thomas Kohnstamm's claims that parts of the guides he wrote for the publisher are inaccurate or faked. Read more here in a BBC article.
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