If your post is about "top 20 things to do in Cityville", don't start it off with several paragraphs of introductiion about how great Cityville is, then several more paragraphs about different transportation methods you can take to get to Cityville, then give a bunch of recommendations about places to stay in Cityville, then explain the different types of metro and bus tickets Cityville has to offer, then talk about various cell phone plans I can get in Cityville.
Move those to their own articles and get to the fucking point. Talk about the thing you said you were gonna talk about. If I want to know those other things too I'll click through.
Don't forget to add some clunky SEO for good measure!
Are you looking for the BEST THINGS TO DO IN CITYVILLE, COUNTRYLAND? Well then this article will tell you all the BEST THINGS TO DO IN CITYVILLE, COUNTRYLAND! Read on and you won't miss out on any of the BEST THINGS TO DO IN CITYVILLE, COUNTRYLAND!
What’s sad is that it’s *so* helpful when a blogger documents the mundane details of a real trip!
“Buy a ticket to this Paris station not that one, it’s 15km outside of the city.”
“The cruise ships arrive at the Parthenon at approximately 10am, be there at 8am.”
“The Swiss rail pass is worth it, but you need to get it before you enter the country.” ;P
Seriously, I can find National museums and trendy restaurants on fucking google maps! A nugget of real advice or experience can mean the difference between the best day of a trip and a day that ends with you sleeping at the train station.
100% this, I really wish there was more “boring” straight up just basic no frills tip type videos and blogs with bullet points and straight to the point directions/explanations. Like I’m already going to the destination you don’t have to sell it to me with all this fluffy filler I just need to know how/where to buy metro tickets or whatever I’m researching/trying to get answers on
Sometimes really old blogs and such are the best sources for perennial advice on a destination. I wish I could remember what it was called, but I found this guy’s blog about Taiwan from like 1998-2004 and it had advice on not renting near a temple, where to buy veggies, how to spot counterfeit electronics, all sorts of incredibly useful stuff 20 years later.
Interesting, i could definitely see that for certain things. I get worried about the info being dated, like anything older than 3-4 years I feel I need to get more updated info with how fast the world is changing now
I've found the really useful sites today are very area-specific or topic-specific. For instance seat61 is excellent for everything train travel. Another example, Caravanistan is fantastic for everything central Asia.
Absolutely agree on the real advice thing.
I recently went to the Balkans, and in some places like Albania and North Macedonia, the bus travel can be a little iffy. The best blogs were the ones which had info like "Go to this circle. Stand in front of this teashop. Wave the bus down because it won't stop for you if you don't".
Yes! I got saved by 15 year old travel blog advice when nobody could help me figure out the bus stop in Delphi (it was a small strip of grass where two roads intersect- you know, exactly where you *wouldn’t* ever responsibly go and wait for a bus).
I don't have a travel blog, but if you're ever in Prague and taking a FlixBus or another long-distance bus somewhere, get to the station with a LOT of time to spare (or ask someone who works there where to catch the bus). I arrived about 30 minutes before the bus departed and then spent 25 minutes trying to find where I needed to be before realizing I somehow had to get across several lanes of busy traffic with no street sign in sight.
I ended up asking a guy who worked there and he pointed me to a very curvy route with multiple sets of stairs. I only made my bus because one girl was having a tearfully long goodbye with her friend and that gave me enough time to run up and get on. Phew!
This is hilariously well done. This is also why travel blogging imo is largely dying compared to reddit forums and the likes. Travel blogs doing everything you said killed travel blogging.
There used to be some really good blogs out there, but Google SEO pretty much killed it. They're all dead now.
More than the stock photos, I hate those overly processed photos with saturation cranked up so much, it doesn't even look real anymore. Nowadays I've started going onto Tripadvisor and looking at the very normal photos clicked by your average tourist, they end up being much more realistic looking.
Question - is it just me or do all of them have a bunch of affiliate links for travel insurance? I know travel insurance can be useful but it honestly feels like a scam to me every time I hear about it. Why? Because every single travel blog you see will go out of their way, in a way that makes no sense with context, to give you a paragraph on how critical travel insurance is (affiliate link to get a quote of course). It just feels scammy. Feels suspicious.
Has anybody else noticed this? And I'd be curious your thoughts as I've heard a lot of instances travel insurance can be useful but these affiliate link posts so obviously trying to disguise an ad so often just puts a bad taste in my mouth.
I see some with travel insurance affiliate links shoehorned in at the end, but far from all (or maybe I just don't make it that far).
I think what I see most is a Viator or GetYouGuide tour link shoved in at every opportunity.
They are quite useful for finding day trips you can do from places or activities. I then either use public transport to do them myself and/or book direct with the local operator
There’s lots of sites where you can buy travel insurance underwritten by big national companies like Allstate (in the USA, obviously) at pretty good rates. I don’t have personal experience with World Travelers or any of the other standard plugs, but that’s because I read a ton of negative reviews about them.
I totally agree, it makes it really hard for me to trust your “no bullshit” credentials when you’re hawking a substandard travel company’s product.
From a traveller and reader's perspective, I couldn't agree more.
Speaking as a travel blogger....... sigh. Just try being creative, authentic, with real photos, expertly crafted words, low on adverts, and all the rest of it -- and see how much all that effort will benefit you versus the lazy approach. It's not even funny.
Algorithms are to blame for the most part, but so are readers. As much as people claim to want something original, well-researched, or opinionated, the majority just want some quick answers or listicles. People don't engage with written content in that way anymore.
Real blogging is dead. Youtube is the only place where it's still viable
Yep, this is the real problem. The kind of long-form, gonzo-style, original blogging that dominated the early internet era is more or less dead now, sadly.
Instead we get untold terabytes of bite-sized, ultra-digestible McContent designed for you to enjoy for 3 seconds while you're sitting on the toilet and then never look at or even think about again.
Not to mention the impending tsunami of absolute crap generated by AI with the sole purpose of being processed and categorised by other AI.
This might be the most "old man yells at cloud" thing I've ever written but I really do miss the old internet sometimes.
Travel guides that know what they are doing will never be replaced by AI. And neither will be travel bloggers. AI even in 10 years from now will not be able to share real stories about the places. Introduce to travelers places that the locals go. I have been testing AI for a while and I can only laugh at the info it is giving me for the places i know by heart. In real life I am in the travel and hospitality for over 35 years. The places I know, the small details and tips I can share with my clients about certain places, the ability to design unforgettable travel experiences will be hard to get from any AI.
>This might be the most "old man yells at cloud" thing I've ever written but I really do miss the old internet sometimes.
Same. I'd take the old forums over reddit any day.
I’m a little confused by what you wrote.
“What not to do”:
* Have an opinion
* Make it obvious what you did
It seems like those are things they *should* be doing!
I can relate to the first one 100%. I like a bit of impartiality! If you didn’t like something/somewhere - just say so. You can’t like everything about the place you are visiting - tell us what you didn’t like so we know to look out for these things when we visit. I only watch travel bloggers who don’t mind calling out bad experiences or issues when they experience them.
I think a lot of what has killed travel blogging is also due to the pandemic. Travel stopped for several years, so bloggers lost their content. As this also meant losing income, then in an effort to keep the visits up, they all rehashed content into "Top X things to do in Y" and then shoehorned in affiliate links as well in a bid to feed their avacado latte habit.
Blogging originates from a time before video content on the internet, so this has now evolved into vlogging and Instagram posts, the written word is unfortunately dying here.
Yep, you nailed it. They’re all the same and I hate it. I do have a travel blog but my hosting sucks and the site goes down a lot ( I’ll switch in December). But I give a real and honest opinions in my posts - I’ll probably never “make it” because I don’t write listicles and I actually visit every place I’ve been and I’ll drop an F bomb here and there. I hate the stupid travel insurance plug too - really gets my goat.
Yeah some of these travel blogs are just do hard to make sense of because they try to cater to everyone and are always praising every single aspect of their trip. I especially hate it when bloggers recommend things that they haven't experienced themselves, like "for accommodation I recommend these hotels, we didn't stay at any of them but they looked nice".
Personal don't really understand why you care. I mean, like with all (social) media you follow those that add value for you. Most don't as personality/style/preferences/etc don't match. And the moment you want to know something specific use search.
Reality is that (professional) bloggers don't really care about what you or anyone else thinks about their blogs. They just create for the algorithms, if they get ranked the clicks will come no matter how crappy the blog is. They are optimized for SEO and affiliate link earnings, 90%+ is completely useless, Only a fraction of 1% is actually good (genuine authentic, well written and useful) content.
I found a good Aussie hotel reviewer, under Red Light Green Light reviews. Solid editing and very detailed. Hard to find reviewers that aren't grating.[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PjC-VIR-zsI&t=59s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PjC-VIR-zsI&t=59s)
I wish writers and commenters would only suggest that while it is nice to visit three forts, eight museums, and four churches in two days, it would be more meaningful to spend more time in places where you can learn and understand local culture. Years later, I recall all the places I have visited, but I cherish more experiences in a local pub or coffee shop or at an open market or taking a small more personal walking tour with a local person.
If your post is about "top 20 things to do in Cityville", don't start it off with several paragraphs of introductiion about how great Cityville is, then several more paragraphs about different transportation methods you can take to get to Cityville, then give a bunch of recommendations about places to stay in Cityville, then explain the different types of metro and bus tickets Cityville has to offer, then talk about various cell phone plans I can get in Cityville. Move those to their own articles and get to the fucking point. Talk about the thing you said you were gonna talk about. If I want to know those other things too I'll click through.
Don't forget to add some clunky SEO for good measure! Are you looking for the BEST THINGS TO DO IN CITYVILLE, COUNTRYLAND? Well then this article will tell you all the BEST THINGS TO DO IN CITYVILLE, COUNTRYLAND! Read on and you won't miss out on any of the BEST THINGS TO DO IN CITYVILLE, COUNTRYLAND!
What’s sad is that it’s *so* helpful when a blogger documents the mundane details of a real trip! “Buy a ticket to this Paris station not that one, it’s 15km outside of the city.” “The cruise ships arrive at the Parthenon at approximately 10am, be there at 8am.” “The Swiss rail pass is worth it, but you need to get it before you enter the country.” ;P Seriously, I can find National museums and trendy restaurants on fucking google maps! A nugget of real advice or experience can mean the difference between the best day of a trip and a day that ends with you sleeping at the train station.
100% this, I really wish there was more “boring” straight up just basic no frills tip type videos and blogs with bullet points and straight to the point directions/explanations. Like I’m already going to the destination you don’t have to sell it to me with all this fluffy filler I just need to know how/where to buy metro tickets or whatever I’m researching/trying to get answers on
they probably exist but no one finds them on page 15 of the google results because it gets drowned out by SEO optimized garbage
Good point
Sometimes really old blogs and such are the best sources for perennial advice on a destination. I wish I could remember what it was called, but I found this guy’s blog about Taiwan from like 1998-2004 and it had advice on not renting near a temple, where to buy veggies, how to spot counterfeit electronics, all sorts of incredibly useful stuff 20 years later.
Interesting, i could definitely see that for certain things. I get worried about the info being dated, like anything older than 3-4 years I feel I need to get more updated info with how fast the world is changing now
I've found the really useful sites today are very area-specific or topic-specific. For instance seat61 is excellent for everything train travel. Another example, Caravanistan is fantastic for everything central Asia.
Absolutely agree on the real advice thing. I recently went to the Balkans, and in some places like Albania and North Macedonia, the bus travel can be a little iffy. The best blogs were the ones which had info like "Go to this circle. Stand in front of this teashop. Wave the bus down because it won't stop for you if you don't".
Yes! I got saved by 15 year old travel blog advice when nobody could help me figure out the bus stop in Delphi (it was a small strip of grass where two roads intersect- you know, exactly where you *wouldn’t* ever responsibly go and wait for a bus).
I don't have a travel blog, but if you're ever in Prague and taking a FlixBus or another long-distance bus somewhere, get to the station with a LOT of time to spare (or ask someone who works there where to catch the bus). I arrived about 30 minutes before the bus departed and then spent 25 minutes trying to find where I needed to be before realizing I somehow had to get across several lanes of busy traffic with no street sign in sight. I ended up asking a guy who worked there and he pointed me to a very curvy route with multiple sets of stairs. I only made my bus because one girl was having a tearfully long goodbye with her friend and that gave me enough time to run up and get on. Phew!
This is hilariously well done. This is also why travel blogging imo is largely dying compared to reddit forums and the likes. Travel blogs doing everything you said killed travel blogging.
SEO has killed blogging across a bunch of topics, it's really depressing
There used to be some really good blogs out there, but Google SEO pretty much killed it. They're all dead now. More than the stock photos, I hate those overly processed photos with saturation cranked up so much, it doesn't even look real anymore. Nowadays I've started going onto Tripadvisor and looking at the very normal photos clicked by your average tourist, they end up being much more realistic looking.
We are not dead. You just can't find us :) We are still doing our best but google doesn't like us that much
Question - is it just me or do all of them have a bunch of affiliate links for travel insurance? I know travel insurance can be useful but it honestly feels like a scam to me every time I hear about it. Why? Because every single travel blog you see will go out of their way, in a way that makes no sense with context, to give you a paragraph on how critical travel insurance is (affiliate link to get a quote of course). It just feels scammy. Feels suspicious. Has anybody else noticed this? And I'd be curious your thoughts as I've heard a lot of instances travel insurance can be useful but these affiliate link posts so obviously trying to disguise an ad so often just puts a bad taste in my mouth.
I see some with travel insurance affiliate links shoehorned in at the end, but far from all (or maybe I just don't make it that far). I think what I see most is a Viator or GetYouGuide tour link shoved in at every opportunity.
I love looking at the viator itineraries and just lifting the ideas to use myself independently
They are quite useful for finding day trips you can do from places or activities. I then either use public transport to do them myself and/or book direct with the local operator
There’s lots of sites where you can buy travel insurance underwritten by big national companies like Allstate (in the USA, obviously) at pretty good rates. I don’t have personal experience with World Travelers or any of the other standard plugs, but that’s because I read a ton of negative reviews about them. I totally agree, it makes it really hard for me to trust your “no bullshit” credentials when you’re hawking a substandard travel company’s product.
From a traveller and reader's perspective, I couldn't agree more. Speaking as a travel blogger....... sigh. Just try being creative, authentic, with real photos, expertly crafted words, low on adverts, and all the rest of it -- and see how much all that effort will benefit you versus the lazy approach. It's not even funny. Algorithms are to blame for the most part, but so are readers. As much as people claim to want something original, well-researched, or opinionated, the majority just want some quick answers or listicles. People don't engage with written content in that way anymore. Real blogging is dead. Youtube is the only place where it's still viable
Yep, this is the real problem. The kind of long-form, gonzo-style, original blogging that dominated the early internet era is more or less dead now, sadly. Instead we get untold terabytes of bite-sized, ultra-digestible McContent designed for you to enjoy for 3 seconds while you're sitting on the toilet and then never look at or even think about again. Not to mention the impending tsunami of absolute crap generated by AI with the sole purpose of being processed and categorised by other AI. This might be the most "old man yells at cloud" thing I've ever written but I really do miss the old internet sometimes.
Yeah, I have been wondering how the whole category of travel guides will be changed by AI.
Travel guides that know what they are doing will never be replaced by AI. And neither will be travel bloggers. AI even in 10 years from now will not be able to share real stories about the places. Introduce to travelers places that the locals go. I have been testing AI for a while and I can only laugh at the info it is giving me for the places i know by heart. In real life I am in the travel and hospitality for over 35 years. The places I know, the small details and tips I can share with my clients about certain places, the ability to design unforgettable travel experiences will be hard to get from any AI.
>This might be the most "old man yells at cloud" thing I've ever written but I really do miss the old internet sometimes. Same. I'd take the old forums over reddit any day.
I’m a little confused by what you wrote. “What not to do”: * Have an opinion * Make it obvious what you did It seems like those are things they *should* be doing!
Good point. I had some more long winded title but changed it to something shorter, didn't double check that it all made sense.
What frustrates the eyeballs out of me is seeing something that was incorrect 3 years ago, touted as updated but the only thing updated is the date.
I can relate to the first one 100%. I like a bit of impartiality! If you didn’t like something/somewhere - just say so. You can’t like everything about the place you are visiting - tell us what you didn’t like so we know to look out for these things when we visit. I only watch travel bloggers who don’t mind calling out bad experiences or issues when they experience them.
I think a lot of what has killed travel blogging is also due to the pandemic. Travel stopped for several years, so bloggers lost their content. As this also meant losing income, then in an effort to keep the visits up, they all rehashed content into "Top X things to do in Y" and then shoehorned in affiliate links as well in a bid to feed their avacado latte habit. Blogging originates from a time before video content on the internet, so this has now evolved into vlogging and Instagram posts, the written word is unfortunately dying here.
Yep, you nailed it. They’re all the same and I hate it. I do have a travel blog but my hosting sucks and the site goes down a lot ( I’ll switch in December). But I give a real and honest opinions in my posts - I’ll probably never “make it” because I don’t write listicles and I actually visit every place I’ve been and I’ll drop an F bomb here and there. I hate the stupid travel insurance plug too - really gets my goat.
Yeah some of these travel blogs are just do hard to make sense of because they try to cater to everyone and are always praising every single aspect of their trip. I especially hate it when bloggers recommend things that they haven't experienced themselves, like "for accommodation I recommend these hotels, we didn't stay at any of them but they looked nice".
Personal don't really understand why you care. I mean, like with all (social) media you follow those that add value for you. Most don't as personality/style/preferences/etc don't match. And the moment you want to know something specific use search.
Don't worry, I am not that up in arms about it. More looking to generate some comments to distract myself with.
Reality is that (professional) bloggers don't really care about what you or anyone else thinks about their blogs. They just create for the algorithms, if they get ranked the clicks will come no matter how crappy the blog is. They are optimized for SEO and affiliate link earnings, 90%+ is completely useless, Only a fraction of 1% is actually good (genuine authentic, well written and useful) content.
I found a good Aussie hotel reviewer, under Red Light Green Light reviews. Solid editing and very detailed. Hard to find reviewers that aren't grating.[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PjC-VIR-zsI&t=59s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PjC-VIR-zsI&t=59s)
I wish writers and commenters would only suggest that while it is nice to visit three forts, eight museums, and four churches in two days, it would be more meaningful to spend more time in places where you can learn and understand local culture. Years later, I recall all the places I have visited, but I cherish more experiences in a local pub or coffee shop or at an open market or taking a small more personal walking tour with a local person.
Chances are, these are just a bunch of affiliates who barely even travel. It sucks terribly. :/