Not like today, though.
Travel is always social. You're always meeting people and sharing with friends about the trip when you return. But this week The Guardian (UK) has launched a feature that lends itself well as an example of really new media.
The premise: Send two English reporters on a road trip down the Pacific Coast of the U.S., Seattle to L.A., who write about their trials/travails.
The twist: Start without any itinerary or specific plan. Rather, rely on readers tweeting suggestions for things they should do, places to visit and eat at. The reporters gather all the Twitter suggestions, decide what's possible, then do them and report (text and images) on a blog posted back to the newspaper's website.
The technology: Pretty simple. Digital imaging (likely lots of phone-camera snaps), blogs and Twitter.
What makes it so innovative is not some code-intensive fancy gizmo or app, but the pulling together of lots of individual pieces that hadn't yet been pulled together. This lives up to its billing as a "crowdsourced tour," taking up the socialness of travel and the commonplace act of friends suggesting to other friends where to go and what to see/do one step further, into the realm of digital/social media.
My hat's off to The Guardian--some mighty fine really-new-media thinking!
