Ana Alacovska
Copenhagen Business School

‘A Pot of Gold at the End of the Rainbow’ Travel Guidebooks at the Intersection of Print and Digital Culture

The main aim of the paper is to examine the implications of digitalization for travel guidebook production, distribution and consumption as a model and a distinct case of the dynamics of the shift from print to digital cultures in the cultural/creative industries. Based on ethnographic research and blending political economy with cultural studies and genre analysis with social theory, the paper tries to resist the production-consumption binarism of media studies, and not least, to critically go beyond the ecstatic hype of participatory convergence culture. Therefore, the nexus between the infrastructure of the industry, the output and the audiences/consumers has been examined through labour relations, systems of copyright ownership and genre’s idiosyncrasy.