A Traveler's Library » poll

Questions and Winners

pen4hire — Fri, 20 May 2011 08:09:55 +0000

QUESTIONS

I would really appreciate your answers to a few questions, to help me plan for the next few months.

Where should we go?

I have gone through spells of concentrating for a week on one country. Did it with Greece. Did it with Italy. I did a series of France on Friday, and that title still pops up once in a while. Most recently, because of current events, I’ve been talking about books that take you to the Middle East and Arab countries.

I sense that you may be getting tired of that area–although I still maintain that it is important. Am I sensing right? Do you want to move on? Where do you want to go next?

If you have a particular country you want to learn about, check the Destinations tab and see what we already have. [A reader has pointed out that is not a good way to check, because it just delivers a long list of posts--if you are looking for a specific place, type in the name of the country, city, region in the search box, OR go to the Search by Category list if you just want to check a list of everything we've covered--most posts are categorized by post.] Want more? Let me know? Something missing entirely? Let me know that, too. You can choose more than one.

NOW THE QUESTIONS

WINNERS

Congratulations to the latest winners of books from A Traveler’s Library.

Rosemary Carstens of the wonderful Feast online magazine, wins Cara Black’sMurder in the Latin Quarter.

Donna Hull, famous diva of baby boomer travel, wins the new book Mothers and Daughters.

In case you are wondering why I am not giving away every book I talk about

1. Some of the books come from the library. The librarians would frown upon my giving them away instead of returning them.

2. Some of the books are ones that I buy with the intention of adding them to my own Traveler’s Library. Those are the somewhat tatty, dog-eared ones that you would not want anyhow.

3. And I am occasionally reading a book in electronic form. Try as I may, I can’t figure out how to give you those electrons. I now have both a (Free) Kindle app for my netbook and I have set up my brand new Sony e-reader that I recently won in a contest at Wandering Educators. (The Sony is similar to Kindle’s latest,smallest reader, but without Wi-Fi to download books). It is helpful when I can let you know when books are available in digital form, because I notice that more of the readers of A Traveler’s Library are using Kindles, Nooks, etc.

The very appropriate illustration above–locations of famous stories around the world, comes from Flickr, and from an equally appropriate place for this post. It comes from South America–an area we have not covered a lot. As usual, I urge you to click on the picture and see more of the photographer’s work.

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Protected: New Poll–What Kind of Book

pen4hire — Tue, 15 Mar 2011 17:00:57 +0000

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Final Week to Add to Map

pen4hire — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 16:02:10 +0000

Final Week: Put Your Place on the Map

You have just THREE MORE DAYS to suggest a movie or book that you would recommend to someone who wants to learn about the place you live.

Four places outside the U.S. have been added: Nova Scotia India, London England and New Zealand. Want to see how many U. S. states have been added? Here’s a map, with added states in blue.

This makes a crazy road map! Because several states have been mentioned numerous times, there are still a lot of empty spaces. True I can hopscotch across the west, but how can I get to South Dakota and Iowa? Or from Tenessee to Ohio?

Don’t be left out. Add your place to the road trip by answering the VERY SHORT survey and give us a book or movie that represents YOUR place.

To keep track of how the results are coming in, subscribe by RSS or e-mail. All new e-mail subscribers this month have a chance to win a copy of The Last Aloha or An Irreverent Curiosity (both reviewed here).

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The Travel Insights 100 and Twitter

pen4hire — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 08:00:35 +0000

Travel Insights 100 Travel Expert's Badge

Today we are reading poll results.

Since we read anything that inspires and informs travel, it seems appropriate to read what the Travel Insights 100–travel writers and bloggers, including moi--have to say.

The Travel Insights 100, officially launched yesterday. Participants have permission to discuss the results of a poll regarding Twitter, but only if you (yes, I’m talkin’ to you) promise that you will join the discussion of Twitter. Members of Travel Insight 100 are travel writers, travel industry professionals, advisors and analysts, and travel bloggers. Questions did not draw 100 answers because the travel writers were, well, traveling–or maybe writing. Okay, here are just a few of the things that I found most interesting in this poll.

Twitter

First, since 97% of the respondents are on twitter, and 56% checked Twitter more than four times a day, it is safe to say that this is a very social-networking-kind-of-group. And as I drilled down into the replies to other questions, I began to get a picture of why these travel writers and travel professionals find twitter important and useful.

When deciding what they would tweet, the answers varied widely. To me this underscores one of the most endearing qualities of Twitter–the many different voices. The most important consideration to this group was being of interest to their followers, and next came caution about how they were representing themselves or their business. 1/3 talked travel only, and 28% said they tweeted “whatever came into their mind.”

When asked how they decide who to follow, NO ONE said they follow only those that they know. Twitter is a place to break new ground and find out about new things. Less than 1/4 follow only those who are tweeting about travel. Many, many comments stressed that this group checks out the people who follow them and are “picky” about who they follow. They are looking for intelligent people with interesting posts.

However, if you want these picky people to pick you, here are some clues. They like people who find a mix of professional or business tweets with personal. Top no-nos are sending so many tweets that you flood my account or spend all your time tweeting self-promotion. In a related vein, being “too corporate” is looked down upon. Do try to be clever because this crew does not like “mundane.”

The travel experts suggested so many links to articles about Twitter and travel, that I think I’ll save that list for another day.

Now, your turn. Are you on Twitter? If so, how do you decide who to follow? How do you decide what to tweet? Do you get travel info from Twitter? Let’s talk.

P.S. I am writing this on the 17th, and I just noticed that my French word of the day is editeur, meaning ‘publisher.’ How appropriate.

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How Our Road Trip Looks This Week

pen4hire — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 07:28:32 +0000

Second Week: Put Your Place on the Map

You have some more time to suggest a movie or book that you would recommend to someone who wants to learn about the place you live.

Three places outside the U.S. have been added so far: India, London England and New Zealand. Want to see how many U. S. states have been added? Here’s a map, with added states in gray/blue.

Week Two Road Trip

Because several states have been mentioned numerous times, there are still a lot of empty spaces. Don’t be left out. Erase those yellow spaces.

Add your place to the road trip by answering the VERY SHORT survey and give us a book or movie that represents YOUR place.

To keep track of how the results are coming in, subscribe by RSS or e-mail. All new subscribers this month have a chance to win a copy of The Last Aloha or An Irreverent Curiosity (both reviewed here).

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Our Road Trip So Far

pen4hire — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 08:00:49 +0000

First Week: Put Your Place on the Map

Three places outside the U.S. have been added: India, London England and New Zealand. Want to see how many U. S. states have been added? Here’s a map, with added states in maroon.

Week One Road Trip Places on the Map

Don’t be left out.

Add your place to the road trip by answering the VERY SHORT survey and give us a book or movie that represents YOUR place.

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Put Your Place on the Map

pen4hire — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 08:00:34 +0000

Running on the Map

Click on this link to take a two-minute survey. I’m about to launch a virtual road trip, and you can help by answering a question about the place you live.

BONUS: I’ll be giving away two popular books, An Irreverent Curiosity, and The Last Aloha, to randomly drawn NEW e-mail subscribers during this survey month. Stay tuned for something to go to present e-mail subscribers who complete the survey.

THANKS!

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What Book or Movie Best Represents YOUR Home State?

pen4hire — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 08:34:12 +0000

Running on the Map

Put Your Place on the Map

Have you read a book or movie that really nailed your state, your region, your country? The place where you live? What reading or viewing do you recommend to people who want to see what your territory is like? Add your choices to A Traveler’s Library.

TAKE TWO MINUTES–TAKE A SURVEY

Please click here to take this brief survey and make suggestions of books and movies that best represent your state, region, or country.

Of course, you can leave comments as usual, but it is much easier for me to keep track of your replies to this question if you actually fill in the very short survey. Let me know in the comments section if you have any problems with the poll.

THANKS for your help.

Photograph by Archibald Jude

http://www.flickr.com/photos/archibaldjude/ / CC BY-ND 2.0

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Does the Flu Mean You Are Staying Home?

pen4hire — Sun, 03 May 2009 06:34:35 +0000

Okay, Vice President Biden says HE’s not taking planes or subways!

Travel writer Peter Greenberg says Biden was sending the wrong message, and he, personally, is going to Mexico on those nice empty planes and stay in those nice empty hotels. A couple of days ago I wrote a post about a book for travelers to Mexico and I called the post ” Can’t Go? Read About Mexico.” Was I wrong? I got curious. Where do the readers of A Traveler’s Library come down on this debate?

Are you traveling? Are you staying home? Please take the poll and let everyone know where you stand, sit or lie down with a cold compress on your head.

(NOTE: Poll is CLOSED)

Get your friends to vote, too.

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