Resources

RESOURCES


RESOURCES: PAPERS & PRESENTATIONS

Author : Alan A. Lew
School/Work Place : Northern Arizona University, USA
Contact : alan.lew@nau.edu
Year : 2007

"Web 2.0" is a term used to refer to the emerging new wave of innovation on the Internet. Some see it as a second high-tech wave, marking the recovery from the technology and Internet "bust" at the end of the 1990s (O'Reilly 2005). Characteristics of Web 2.0 are:

  1. data, information and technology are open source, rather than hidden under proprietary ownership;
  2. new applications and web sites are making the global marketplace of ideas and products open to everyone, which is allowing new businesses can be established without the huge start up funds from venture capitalists that were common in the 1990s; and
  3. these new applications and web sites are democratizing the tools of production, enabling greater diversity, allowing more customized streams of information and sales, and fostering the emergence of “a billion niche markets.”

These concepts resonate in trends that have taken place in travel and tourism, and the related term “Travel 2.0” is coming into increasing use.

Social software (sometime referred to as Social Media and New Media) are computer mediated forms of communication that can provide opportunities for collaboration, social networking, social learning, and community building. There are many different types of social software, and more are emerging all the time. Some social software is closely integrated with face-to-face socializing and professional networking, such as in a social club. The following are examples of the major types of social software currently in use:

  • Blogs and Podcasts
  • Collaborative software - Cooperative work environments / systems
  • Instant Messaging
  • Internet Relay Chat (chat rooms)
  • Internet forums (bulletin boards)
  • Folskonomy / Tagging
  • Social network services (centralized)
  • Social network search engines (decentralized)
  • Social guides (recommend real world places/services)
  • Social bookmarking (posting lists of favorites for others to see – furl, del.icio.us)
  • Social Citations (sharing article references - for academics)
  • Peer-to-peer social networks (file sharing – photos, blogs, instant messages,)
  • Virtual presence (meeting in virtual/online worlds)
  • Virtual worlds and Massively-Multiplayer Online Games (MMOGs)
  • Wikis / Collaborative real-time editing

It is unclear as yet what the best business models may be for using the new open source Web 2.0 technology. However, from the many examples cited above, that is not stopping people from trying. Some areas in which social software may be used to leverage long tail markets for business purposes include:

  • Listening to markets and consumers. By providing a public sounding board or forum for consumers of a company's products, a company can demonstrate its transparency and trustworthiness. Businesses need to be open to being trashed by consumers, in order to both learn from them and to build their trust.
  • Creating user communities. Social networks can be created through open source Web sites. Such a Web site would include reasons for people to feel a part of the community of other users. Users would need to feel that they are benefiting from belonging to the website.
  • Creating business alliances. This is similar to creating a user community, but involves a community of businesses who are working together either formally or informally. This approach is also known as the “distributed business model.” Most social software is not only conducive to internet-base marketing, but can also be readilyapplied to teaching tourism concepts. Social software continuously evolving in exciting ways thatoffer considerable opportunity to enhance online and hybrid classes.

The first part of this presentation will review how social software are being used in higher education teaching today. The second part of the presentation will describe my experience in using social software tools (with some focus on blogs, podcasts and wikis) for the last three semesters, culminating in a Spring 2007 course on “Sustainable Tourism Planning.” That course immersed the students in social media and sustainable tourism in a fully online class environment. Student challenges, successes and overall opinions of this experience will be discussed.


List of Articles
No. Subject Viewssort Date
374 Think Tank XI What Do Tourism Students Know About Sustainability and... file 15204 Oct 14, 2013

The topic of sustainable tourism education has only recently started to emerge in the tourism literature. A few tourism scholars have raised concerns about the need to prepare future tourism professionals for real life planning and manageme...

Author: Blanca A. Camargo & Ulrike Gretzel 

Year: 2011 

373 Think Tank V Knowledge Management for Tourism Crises and Disasters file 15147 Oct 13, 2013

Tourism is especially vulnerable to disasters and, being fragmented, often its response is difficult to initiate and coordinate. It is also information intensive and when in chaos its information needs are exacerbated. The paper aims to deve...

Author: Nina Mistilis & Pauline Sheldon 

Year: 2005 

372 Think Tank XVI Sustainable Tourism Managment on Small Island Destinat... file 15058 Jul 02, 2016

On December 11th, 2015 climate change negotiations came to a close after the COP21 – 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris. Across media channels and climate protests the event was referred to as “the last chance summit”, w...

Author: Bonnie Lewtas & René Schmidpeter 

Year: 2016 

371 Think Tank XIII Using Tourism to Build Social Capital in Communities: ... file 14883 Nov 06, 2013

Despite considerable discussion about how tourism could or should contribute to sustainable destination development, there is little evidence that the practice of tourism planning or development has altered in any significant way in the last...

Author: Gianna Moscardo, Andrea Schurmann, Elena Konovalov & Nancy G. McGehee 

Year: 2013 

370 Think Tank VI Testing Clarkson’s Typical Corporate and Stakeholder I... file 14685 Oct 13, 2013

In today’s world of growing concern over the social and environmental effect of tourism, the responsibility for the future of our society is moving from simply relying on our political leaders and interest groups towards the concept that cor...

Author: Catrina Papaleo & Sue Beeton 

Year: 2006 

369 Think Tank VII Tourism Resource Teams: Innovation with and for touris... file 14401 Oct 13, 2013

Communities have a variety of interest levels in tourism overall, including sustainable tourism (WTO, 2002). While we have witnessed increased awareness and discussions about sustainability and sustainable tourism, there is often a lack of s...

Author: Cynthia Messer, Ingrid Schneider & Okechukwu Ukaga 

Year: 2007 

368 Think Tank IX Cross-Cultural Interaction, Capacity Building and Sust... file 14337 Oct 13, 2013

This paper reports on findings which are part of a broader research conducted under the Learning and Teaching Fellowship Award 2007/08, aimed at the assessment of innovative blended learning techniques and applied learning in alternative st...

Author: Marina Novelli 

Year: 2009 

367 Think Tank XVIII Visitor management in protected areas file 14280 Jan 07, 2019

Key words: tourism management, tourism planning, visitor management, protected areas, New Zealand

Author: Julia Nina Albrecht 

Year: 2018 

366 Think Tank V Reflecting or Directing Perceptions? Fox Media’s Respo... file 14177 Oct 13, 2013

Disasters at tourism destinations often receive extensive reporting in the news media, particularly when one or more of their own nationals are affected. From terrorism to natural disasters, the stories of tourists and, more recently, their ...

Author: Sue Beeton 

Year: 2005 

365 Think Tank V Understanding Tourism Crisis: Case Study of Bali and P... file 13977 Oct 13, 2013

In an era of considerable disaster and uncertainty, many destinations have been made alarmingly aware of the fickle nature of tourism. While peak industry bodies, academics and professionals advocate the introduction of risk/crisis managemen...

Author: Yetta Gurtner 

Year: 2005 

364 Think Tank VII There's No Such Thing as Sustainable Tourism: Innovati... file 13570 Oct 13, 2013

Innovation can come in many forms but all of these share three common elements - creativity, a problem solving approach and a new way of thinking. This paper proposes that current approaches to tourism and sustainable regional development h...

Author: Gianna Moscardo 

Year: 2007 

363 Think Tank XIV Sustainable tourism, market failures and the challenge... file 13520 Jul 07, 2014

David's presentation outlines the major market failures in tourism production and consumption and questions the changing role of (public sector) governments in market regulation and ‘economic’ development. The presentation focuses specifical...

Author: David G. Simmons 

Year: 2014 

362 Think Tank VII The Community of Communicators and the Communication o... file 13219 Oct 13, 2013

In spite of the trend towards business as a key element in society and tourism, governments still play an important role in the sustainable development debate. Like any social institution, governments and related organizations do not always ...

Author: Keith Henning 

Year: 2007 

361 Think Tank X Rather Together? Network Effects among Students file 13211 Oct 13, 2013

Being faced with global trends that challenge the way tourism is conducted at present (Dwyer, Edwards, Mistilis, Roman and Scott, 2009; Dwyer, Edwards, Mistilis, Scott, Roman and C., 2008), educators worldwide have recognized the need to ad...

Author: Florian Aubke, Ivo Ponocny & Anja Hergesell 

Year: 2010 

360 Think Tank X Is Ecotourism a Strategy for Regional Economic Develop... file 13088 Oct 13, 2013

The state of Uttarakhand (in the Himalayas) in which the two case studies were conducted is trying to expand its already existing strength in the tourism sector as well. Tourism is estimated to make up for about 20% of GDP in Uttarakhand in...

Author: Harald Pechlaner & Christopher Reuter 

Year: 2010 

359 Think Tank IX Sustainable Tourism Development Plan for the Old City ... file 13027 Oct 13, 2013

This research aims to propose a sustainable tourism development plan for the City of Nan. Since the year 2000, Nan civil society leaders, national and international stakeholders have tried to develop Nan into a world heritage destination. I...

Author: Donruetai Kovathanakul 

Year: 2009 

358 Think Tank X Drowning with Tourism? Stakeholder Perspectives from T... file 12895 Oct 13, 2013

Climate change and its impacts on nations, regions and populations as well as its anthropogenic causes have become one of the prevailing issues of global society and, hence, subject to ongoing debates among e.g. the natural, political and s...

Author: Anna Huebner 

Year: 2010 

357 Think Tank VII Learning as Prerequisite for Innovations in Tourism - ... file 12661 Oct 13, 2013

This article reports on an ongoing project that focuses on learning and innovation as prerequisites for sustainable tourism in a transnational environment defined by the European North Sea Region. According to Buhalis (2000: 113) providing i...

Author: Janne Liburd & Anja Hergesell 

Year: 2007 

356 Think Tank IX The Role of Values in Sustainable Tourism Education file 12650 Oct 13, 2013

This presentation discusses the role of values in the context of sustainable tourism education. However, it does not seek to engage in the debate about the definition of Sustainable Tourism nor the differences between this concept and Sustai...

Author: Christian Schott 

Year: 2009 

355 Think Tank XIV Values in Tourism Higher Education: the Case of Europe... file 12578 Jun 26, 2014

The primary rationale for embedding values-based learning in tourism higher education is to engage students’ learning-to-learn and learning-to-be, rather than simply learning about a topic, such as tourism management or sustainability (Libur...

Author: Tanja Mihalič, Janne J. Liburd & Jaume Guia 

Year: 2014 

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