by editor’s office, vir
VIRCamp 2009 – exciting theses, provocative topics and a lot of fun discussion
An unconventional supporting conference to ‘Sprungbrett 2009′ organized by the participants themselves, the VIRCamp provided an open forum to some 60 attendants for addressing hot topics on eTourism by means of spontaneous contributions. Held in bar camp style, the very conference style that has made a name for itself in blogging circles for its creatively chaotic fashion, the event allowed its participants to listen to things of interest, give lectures on burning issues and discuss the day away. While the style of this meeting was somewhat unfamiliar in the beginning, and certainly not without risk for the organizers, it amazingly quickly made for highly creative discussions that not only provided the participants with new insights, but apparently also a lot of fun – something that many stated to have missed in conventional conferences.
Tools for Tourism 3.0, crowd sourcing, idea camp and own Wiki
The topics ranged from concepts to proactive holiday counseling and the first public presentation of the theses developed by a group of experts organized on Tenerife in May 2009 by the Institute for eTourism and Thomas Cook eCommerce. It was this diversity, the informal tone and the casual structure that made this first VIRCamp so appealing. The fact that the eTourism community was the first in the tourism industry to sail the uncharted waters of this new event concept by VIR was widely regarded as both, refreshing and groundbreaking – ideal conditions for a sequel.
Information on VIRCamp are also available at: www.vircamp.de and http://search.twitter.com/search?q=vircamp09
“Verband Internet Reisevertrieb e.V.” (VIR – Internet Travel Marketing Association):
Organ of the tourism-related Internet economy
VIR pursues the core issues of Internet security, trust, transparency and quality standards. The association acts as the organ of the tourism-related Internet economy and as contact partner for consumers, the media and the industry itself. Among its members are seven of Germany’s leading on-line travel portals (ebookers.de, expedia.de, holidaycheck.de, gratistours.com, lastminute.de, opodo.de and travel24.com), which generate turnovers of close to one billion euros and together employ more than 500 people. In the second half of 2008, these travel portals were visited by an average of 3 million people each month.
