Ask, and Frommer still has the answers
— -- More than 50 years after he first published Europe on $5 a Day, Arthur Frommer is still dispensing practical advice to travelers. The travel icon, who turns 80 in July, has just written Ask Arthur Frommer & Travel Better, Cheaper, Smarter (Wiley Publishing, $19.99), in stores this week. USA TODAY's Jayne Clark caught up with him in Washington, D.C.
Q:You call this possibly the most important — and certainly the most ambitious — book you've ever written. How so?
A: It was an attempt to set forth everything I know about travel, along with a snapshot of everything that's new this year.
Q: But can guidebooks — even encyclopedic ones — keep up with the Internet?
A: This is such a turbulent time, you have to expect that things are going to change and things changed radically after I wrote the book. Oil prices plummeted and the dollar strengthened. I warn that prices could change by 5% to 10% of what's in the book.
Q: You find some aspects of travel websites disappointing. What don't you like?
A: The whole emphasis on user-generated content is foolish. I was the first person to use it with the "readers' selections" in Europe on $5 A Day, in which I printed verbatim letters from readers. I was so proud of it. I even said they were better than mine because I was going to 40 or 50 hotels and a reader would remember one place that stands out. Then we realized it was being massively manipulated. Hotel (operators) were getting friends to send in recommendations. About 25 years ago we dropped it.
Q: So you think those sort of shenanigans are happening on Trip Advisor and other popular user-generated travel sites?
A: I've heard of hotels generating massive entries. It's impossible to guard against it. And that goes to the heart of the matter. Plus, there's sponsored content on some sites and it's hard to know if someone paid for the content. And then there are sites that aren't user-generated but look like they are.
Q: But shouldn't Joe from Sheboygan's opinion about the No Tell Motel, or whatever, count?
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