It seems the travel writers obsession with everything travel blogging has reached a new level, uncovering what seems like a harmless charitable initiative.
Tnooz seemed delighted at writing about the Men of Travel Blogging Calendar for 2013 with annoying cyber hat tips all around (complete with laughing emoticon). It’s as if people feel threatened by travel bloggers and scour the internet looking for evidence of unprofessional practices, slip ups or anything out of the ordinary.
Jaw Dropping Madness
What I found to be a harmless charitable initiative, Tnooz labelled it “jaw-dropping madness” and said that it had been “doing the rounds over recent days”.
Huge Travel Blogging Community
Here’s the problem, anyone can start a travel blog, there are little to no barriers to entry to start one. This means it’s a huge community with a lot of people doing many different things in various different ways. To actually lump all travel bloggers together saying that their initiatives such as the calendar aren’t helping travel bloggers is pretty ridiculous. Reading Tnooz you’d think there were only a handful of travel bloggers in world who all sit around a table coming up with these ideas.
There is always going to be bloggers experimenting and trying new things on the fringes, perhaps initiatives that some people don’t rate. Travel bloggers are going to vary in their approach and content, you cannot simply group them all together as one.
How’s Your Travel Writing?
If this were the case then perhaps all these travel journalists/writers are pretty much the same as Thomas Kohnstamm the Lonely Planet writer who never even set foot in Colombia but managed to write a guidebook about it?
It seems odd that the traditional travel writer spends so much time worrying about what bloggers are doing when in reality we’re all the same, we’re all writing about travel on the web.
Time would probably be better spent pitching rather than bitching and if some travel bloggers enjoy navel gazing it seems like a better past time than being a lurking Luddite.
Update – If you want to buy one of these outrageous calendars, you can do so right here: Travel Blogging Calendar
What a strange article they have written there. It seems like they wanted to have a go at travel bloggers as a whole with big generalisations and they picked a tounge-in-cheek calender for charity as their proof?
This bit especially mad me queasy “Anyway, if bloggers (and their industry fans, readers, etc) want to really give something back to charities then they can perhaps also look at the two which Tnooz supports: Footprints and Passports with Purpose.”
Did they really just slag off Travel bloggers attempts at raising money for a charity to plug the apparently superior charities which they support?
Hi Lee,
Thanks for the comment.
I just found the tone strange, like a very thinly veiled attempt to say that they support travel bloggers but then picking holes in what a small number do to undermine the majority. One of the reasons why I decided not to go to TBCamp this year.
All the best for the calendar sales and the charities involved, but I think the headshaking and tut-tutting is because it all looks a bit vain, does it not? You do a calendar either because you have a good body (French rugby stars) because you are a celebrity (Tom Daley) or because you have a tongue-in-cheek idea(Calendar Girls). I had a look at the pics and failed to see the tongue-in-cheekness in the photos myself. So what am I supposed to deduce?
Hi John,
I can see where you’re coming from but it is surely just a bit of fun? Tongue-in-cheek? One of the photos that I saw was a blogger entwined with a python… pretty sure that’ll supposed to be amusing.
It’s not that Tnooz highlighted it as navel glazing, it’s more the way they suggest that one project is a reflection of all travel bloggers.
Well, as the calendar itself is titled “Men of Travel Blogging” it is not the fault of Tnooz if this project casts a shadow upon more travel bloggers than the twenty-four in question. And twenty-four is, after all, a not inconsiderable sample.
The python was a welcome diversion, yes, but sadly not the rule. So what we are left with from the three cases I made above is (i) the 24 people involved think they have beautiful bodies or (ii) think they are celebrities. Sadly, I think that both fall into the “navel gazing” trap.
Sorry we won’t see you there this year!
“Did they really just slag off Travel bloggers attempts at raising money for a charity to plug the apparently superior charities which they support?”
Read the article again. Not sure I suggested anywhere that one charity was better than another. That would surely be even less charitable than apparently slagging bloggers off.
Hey Paul.
Thanks for the piece and the link to the Tnooz story! Much appreciated.
But seriously, few points:
1) The post took me 10 minutes to write – I have heaps of far more interesting industry issues to focus on. It was a swipe at what I consider to be a bit of a silly, and yes, navel-gazing initiative. Damned for having an opinion, I’ll happily take it on the chin.
2) Agree with you COMPLETELY. We (whatever we is) are all doing the same thing: writing content for the web. I get called a blogger ALL THE TIME, funnily enough, primarily because we use a WordPress platform on Tnooz, do not trot out press releases like some of our counterparts in the trade media and dare to have an opinion on things. Do I care about people not recognising I’ve been a journo for nearly 20 years? No. Far bigger things to worry about.
3) I am not a travel writer, let alone a traditional travel writer. I’m a business journo who writes specifically about the digital travel economy, and sometimes I look at how bloggers and writers interact with the industry. As for luddites? Not sure if that was aimed at me, but for what it’s worth I’ve been writing online since 2003 and editor of three websites since 2004.
Hi Kevin,
If we’re not writing opinions it’d be a boring world. I think more opinions are welcome, too often it’s avoided.
The point I was trying to make is that there is a sense of “blogger bashing” at times. There are always going to be some misguided projects as bloggers try new things and we’re always going to be an easy target.
I wasn’t talking about the time Tnooz spent analysing bloggers but travel writers/journos/whatever in general.
Also the luddite comment was a general one, I think good progressive writers are online but there are those that still seem bemused by it all (I know because I often work with some).
Thanks for writing about something that I was engaged enough to respond to.
Want to know a good rule of thumb for separating the successful (as in earning a living) writers/ journalists/ bloggers from the unsuccessful ones? The unsuccessful ones care about what label they’re given. The others are too busy getting on with what they do – which often spans multiple labels.
As for the calendar, I suspect I could raise more for charity by clearing out my old pants drawer and putting the tatty, dog-eared boxer shorts in a clothing bank. It’s an act of staggering, delusional vanity that caters to demand from precisely no-one.
You may be surprised to hear that sometimes criticism isn’t a result of feeling threatened – it’s because what the subject of the criticism is doing is utterly risible.
I don’t see what tnooz think is so bad about the calendar, why is it madness?
Somewhere along the lines of that article, Kevin deduced that ‘naval gazing’ and being vain are bad things, they are not. It all comes down to whether you consider the author to be an authority on your personal moral issues. Kevin and the calendar ‘tut tut’ naysayers have their opinions, I have mine, other people have theirs and all of us are entitled to think what we want.
Some people might tut at me if I said I would feature in, and look at that calendar, no matter if it was for charity or not, which I would. Luckily I don’t consider the tutters to be my peers, and I don’t think the people behind the calendar do either.
I think it’s fun, a good idea. When I heard about the calendar, the thought that criticism would come about in the form of moral issues didn’t even cross my mind until I read the tnooz page.
My thoughts reading the tnooz article –
When I read this:
“But some might argue that such an initiative does not fit so well with the aims of what the wider travel blogging community is trying to do (and we think generally that it is slowly getting there).
We continually hear about – to continue the analogy – how bloggers want to be considered in the industry as luxury Middle East airlines rather than low cost carriers.
Something doesn’t chime so well here.”
My first thoughts were “F**K all that, I want bloggers to have their own, honest personality and character, not follow the ‘aims’ of some travel-blogging dogma”
Most ‘pro’ travel bloggers are boring and lack character, I hardly tweet around anymore and have begun reading ‘amateur’ blogs that first-time backpackers write on the road. These amateur blogs are golden entertainment, they hold real, interesting personal travel experiences because the authors don’t give a damn about what the community thinks, are not even aware of a community, the thought of ‘authority’ and ‘what people think’ never crosses their mind when they write, it comes from the heart.
One of my favourite bloggers is Hogga from the traveller world guide, she’s one of the few out there who still writes honest, candid travel stories, she takes it to the gutter if necessary.
I think this ‘aim’ of the travel blogging community is terrible, when innovative people do something offbeat with the community like make a calendar, it’s considered as ‘madness’ – what a boring, stale community of cyborgs.
Now I’m off to do some reps and work on the Sliceps, I might make the 2014 calendar.
I suspect you’re a dead cert for 2014. I’ll definitely buy it.
HAHAHA! Thanks!
Hi David,
Successful people in varying industries tend to have thick skin and wouldn’t take a bit of notice of what anyone labels them as.
The reaction to a humorous charity calendar reveals much more about those reacting to it than those who produced it in the first place.
As they say, no publicity is bad publicity… your calendar may very well be in the post…
Got to agree with you there… it’s important that bloggers aren’t afraid to innovate. Trying new things (even if they don’t all work) it is what actually separates a lot of bloggers from journos/writers.
I may even purchase a couple of calendars now, Kevin’s done a decent PR job!
Hey Slice, Mr January here! You won’t worry too much about the sit-ups after seeing me wallowing in a lake….for all the nay-sayers out there, it is completely tongue in cheek and just a bit of a fun way to raise money for a good cause.
“Anyway, if bloggers (and their industry fans, readers, etc) want to really give something back to charities then they can perhaps also look at the two which Tnooz supports: Footprints and Passports with Purpose.”
I think it was the use of the word “really” as if buying the calender would not “really” help anything.
Agreed!
As said python entwined blogger, I can confirm that this was done with the noblest artistic ideals in mind. With overtones of the garden of eden, the futility of mans struggle against evil and ego, and yes, the use of a chicken to embody that age old question of which came first, my shoot was an expression of one man’s struggle with his personal demons. I wasn’t just gazing into my navel, I was diving into it, piercing through my id, and emerging from the other side, reborn. I hope that all came across.
Paul, many thanks for this post! Obviously, no one else than Kevin could write this. He seems to have nothing else to do but bitching around bloggers … seems like not an obsession, but fear of us because we are better!
Did you sell your old pants for charity then???? Or just saying stupid things like 10 year old?
Haha Paul, love this one 🙂 We have to come up with new things, and most of them do work.
Thanks Alexandra, I think it’s great that bloggers are trying new things, working together and using their initiative…
Simple as that. Good work guys, I’ll be buying a copy or two to give to people!
Hi Alexandra, I think it’s the tone of the Tnooz article that made me want to blog about it.
It gives an impression that there is a community of travel journos/writers writers acting like kids in a playground awaiting any little piece of evidence of bloggers doing something that they believe is not worthy.
Hi John, thanks for the best wishes for the sales mate, just to clarify the photographs on the website are not those which will appear on the calendar
Kevin, David, Jeremy et al… have all been invited to TBU. To see for themselves what we do, first hand.
Still waiting for them to attend…..
I’m not going to try and compete in the saying stupid things like a ten year old market. The competition’s far too fierce.
I know, Paul, they are just looking for anything to bitch about without anyone involving them. I am so happy you wrote this post as I would not have found out about Kevin’s post otherwise.
They definitely will not come as they do not want to see the truth about bloggers and blogging 🙂
Hi Paul. Serious response rather than petty baiting/ point scoring this time.
This is where I reckon you’ve got the wrong end of the stick: “It gives an impression that there is a community of travel journos/writers writers acting like kids in a playground awaiting any little piece of evidence of bloggers doing something that they believe is not worthy.”
There may be a few dinosaurs out there that are totally dismissive of blogging as a whole, but they are few and far between. Most believe that blogs are an undeniable part of travel writing. Travel blogging is part of a bigger travel media industry, and often the delineation is fairly arbitrary and unnecessary. Travel blogging and travel writing aren’t different things – one’s a subsection of the other. And you can hardly be dismissive of blogging per se when you have your own blog.
I suspect I could guess who most of the people you’d place in that “community of travel journos/ writers” are. And they’re almost without exceptions the ones that have embraced online media/ blogging/ travel websites the most. Most will earn a substantial part of their income from writing online.
Obviously, these are the people that are going to be online more. And when they see something utterly ridiculous online, they’re more likely to share it or pass comment on it. This applies to absurd statements by politicians, awful celebrity travel pieces published by national newspapers, funny Youtube videos, whatever. Occasionally, something on a blog captures attention and – rightly or wrongly – it might get commented on/ mocked/ debated.
Naturally, you’re only going to see the debates that apply to you. If you only tune in when a blogging practice/ initiative is being criticised, then of course you’re going to find
No-one’s “awaiting any little piece of evidence of bloggers doing something that they believe is not worthy.” They just come across something occasionally. And if they’re debating it/ criticising it, it’s because they actually care about their industry.
Sorry, that should be OUR industry. Because we are all in the same industry. The more seriously travel blogging is taken as a subsection of that industry, and the more money that is pumped into it, the better for all.
Subsequently, when I see something that makes travel blogging seem like a joke – and vanity calendars is certainly a laugh at not laugh with scenario – it irritates me. I don’t want to revel in the unworthiness of travel blogging. In fact, it’s the exact opposite. I am one myself (although my blog is just one of my income sources), and every generalised sneering dismissal of travel blogging ends up applying to me too.
The default defensive “Oh they’re just feeling threatened” response helps no-one. It may be easier to brand any critic as an outsider who doesn’t know what they’re talking about. But most of the time, that’s absurdly far from the truth. And it’s impossible to have intelligent debate within that the framework of opposing opinions being dismissed as running scared.
Sorry. Missed the end of a sentence there.
“Naturally, you’re only going to see the debates that apply to you. If you only tune in when a blogging practice/ initiative is being criticised, then of course you’re going to find” should have “undue emphasis” on the end.
Did you not read David’s post? He’s in the same industry. He blogs, is a blogger, both self-published and employed by businesses to blog.
Maybe he, along with many others, are too busy actually travelling and writing to spend time at conferences.
Thank you Oliver for the invitation. Alas, all the evidence I’ve seen regarding TBU suggests I wouldn’t gain much from attending. The same applies to lots of other events in the travel media world. It’s neither possible nor desirable to attend them all, and I have to be selective about the ones I do go to.
I don’t think they are too busy if they have time to bitch about the industry they are in themselves without knowing the facts.
Hi David,
“Obviously, these are the people that are going to be online more. And when they see something utterly ridiculous online, they’re more likely to share it or pass comment on it.”
But the problem is Tnooz is hardly impartial on the subject. Unfortunately I believe this slant is the reason why many bloggers won’t attend TBCamp this year (TBCamp should perhaps change its name?).
Bloggers including myself try to be innovate, test out new things, have many different projects on the go. I applaud them for finding the time to produce things on the side on top of their blogging especially when it come to charity. Not everything bloggers try will be successful and like many innovations they may fail, this does not then label a whole community as unprofessional because a minority have tried to do a side project and a small number of people disapprove.
There are also always going to be newbies to the world of travel blogging who are going to be easy targets to criticise, picking out those examples and labelling all bloggers because of it is unproductive and cynical. Constructive criticism is a good thing, but any innovation should be encouraged not sneered at.
I could find many travel articles/books that I think are a bit of a joke but I wouldn’t label all travel writers/journos based on that one project.
Oliver – was invited to TBEX as well. Alas during any of the events I have been too busy running my own (hackathons in San Francisco in Singapore) at the time.
Coincidentally, your next event is the same night as TravelBlogCamp at WTM!! Which Jeremy and I will be attending.
Perhaps ask yourself why I would put an event on, at the same time and on the same night?
@oliver – seriously, I have no idea
Not to worry then
I bet I could find more travel articles/ books 🙂
Seriously, the same applies to what for the sake of argument we’ll call traditional travel writers. The same arguments have been happening for years regarding people who trot out any old crap to keep the people who gave them free trips happy or swagger around insisting they’ve got far more influence than they have.
When PRs/ travel companies see lazy junketeers swaggering around with ludicrous self importance, it does damage the image of travel writing as a whole. The whole community doesn’t get labelled on the back of one person’s actions, but when actions are consistently repeated by more than one person, the reputation does stick to people within that community who are equally critical of those actions.
The blogger/ writer/ whatever labels are really immaterial.
I’d actually agree with a lot of what you’re saying here David.
Although i think there are more barriers to getting work published rather than simply blogging, therefore there are always going to be some questionable work out there.
I’m not saying the calendar is, I actually think they deserve lots of credit for taking the initiative, if the calendar is anything like the website it should be pretty good.
Well Done – a beautifully crafted response to a ridiculously badly written critique! Hats off to all the calendar participants. Hoping that all the publicity (both good and otherwise) from shamelessly jealous individuals brings you many dollars to go towards your chosen causes. Someone should get his postal address and send him one so that he can continue with his green-eyed jealousy as he plans his new year!
Hi Mel,
Thanks for the comment. I wish the calendar bloggers the best of luck selling as many as possible for these good causes. I’ve bought a couple already.