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| Page Views: 1,672 | Newspaper and Magazine Articles about VT by Geoff_Wright - last update: Jan 12, 2004 |
USA Today - Friday October 10, 2003 | Phid (Phildeni) in his 'Office' |
Online haunts lead travellers to cross paths
The peripatetic find sites for friendship, community and even accidental romance
By Jayne Clark USA TODAY
When Phil Kaiser learned that a British acquaintance would be flying into Los Angeles to begin a West Coast sightseeing trip, the retired aerospance industry worker offered to pick him up at the airport.
The thing is, Kaiser lives in Portland, Ore.
"It's only 900-and-some miles," he says
Actually, it's more like double that when you consider the trip back up the coast with stops in Seattle, Mount St. Helen's and elsewhere.
Kaiser's largess is all the more stunning considering he'd never before laid eyes on the British visitor. The two struck up a friendship via the Web site Virtual Tourist.com, which invites members to post accounts, photos and reviews of their travels. While in L.A., they had dinner with seven fellow VTers - as site regulars call themselves - before heading north.
Gatherings of this sort are becoming not only more common but also more structured as travelers seek a sense of community as well as nuts-and-bolts information from their favorite Web sites. Online forums (also valled bulletin boards or message boards) on these sites foster online interaction. Regulars take it from there to meet face to face.
(More)
"Travel is a very low conversational demominator," says J.R. Johnson, cofounder of VirtualTourist.com.
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Barry Haynes, a federal employee from Oceanside, Calif., figures he has met 30 to 40 members of VirtualTourist.com at social events. Those occasions included a surprise party thrown by a fellow VTer in honor of his marriage this year to piano teacher Laurie-Jeanne Haynes, whom he met on the site.
She had gone online looking for a map of Germany. He'd never been to Europe. She'd lived there. She built a Web page highlighting her travels. He critiqued it. One thing led to another and, despite Haynes' assertion that the site is strictly " a friendly thing - you don't go on looking for someone to marry or hook up with," 15 months later they got married.
Says Laurie-Jeanne, "I never did find that map of Germany, but look what I picked up along the way."
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|  | Newsweek, issue dated January 19, 2004 Newsweek InternationalJan. 19 issue - Travel:
Writing As You Roam
By Malcolm Beith
While working as a photojournalist in Africa during the summer of 2000, Joseph Kultgen ran into problems sending out mass e-mails to his friends and family back home. For one, he was limited in the number of people he could include on each list. Sometimes, messages bounced back because intended recipients didn't have enough space in their inboxes. And some of his photo attachments simply didn't get opened for fear of viruses. So he decided to set up his own travel Web site, uploading his photos himself, posting updates as he pleased and editing all the content. Then he had an epiphany: "I thought, 'If everyone could do this, we could create a community'," he says. And so, with the help of cofounder Jeremy Ahrens, Kultgen launched trekshare.com in October 2000.
Over the past few years, self-publishing Web sites that allow travelers to do everything while on the road?from uploading photos to posting "Hi Mom" notes to writing actual travelogues?have become increasingly popular. Trekshare.com's membership has grown at a rate of 20 percent a month and now totals more than 10,000. (Ninety percent of users opt for the free package; 10 percent pay $7.95 a year for the privilege of using an advanced search engine and uploading digital video.) It now boasts 75,000 photos and 15,000 travelogues, which anyone can view after they've logged in. But Web sites like trekshare.com aren't only for aspiring photojournalists or Paul Theroux wanna-bes. For sheer practicality, they can't be beat. If you don't want to clog your friends' inboxes with silly pictures of you in scuba gear in Aruba, or waste valuable Himalayan-trekking time trying to resend e-mails, use one of the following sites to keep in touch with your loved ones while you're away: |
virtualtourist.com: When 57-year-old Geoff Wright from Cornwall, England, left for Los Angeles in May last year, he knew he wouldn't be logging on for a day or so. "But my dear wife posted a message on [VT's] forum [saying], 'Where's Geoff?' " says Wright. "Several members replied, all saying that I was perfectly well, and for my wife not to worry." That capacity for comfort through an online network, coupled with an extensive database of travelogues and handy traveling tips (broken down by region and including everything from health warnings to nightlife advice) makes virtualtourist.com a real find. It's free as well. No wonder 400,000 people from 219 countries have signed up. |
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londonlover Fri Jul 11, 2008 23:50 UTC
Thanks for the b-day wishes Sir Geoff! :) It does seem weird how often it comes around, doesn't it? Glad you enjoyed your sailing trip! | hayward68 Mon Jun 23, 2008 17:51 UTC
Thanks Geoff! Hugs to you and Mary. I had a wonderful (rain free) weekend at Niagara Falls :-) Won some money at the casino too! | flyme2rio Thu Jun 19, 2008 02:46 UTC
I am remiss in not thanking you earlier for your birthday wishes. I do not visit this site as often as i should but if you are ever in the Seattle area, please let me know | sim1 Sat Jun 14, 2008 09:50 UTC
Thank you so much for the birthday wishes Geoff! The day was so so, as I had to work all day. BUT the evening was great, celebrated with a great big piece of strawberry cake and a long weekend to Prague next week as a birthday present :-))) |
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