Comments for The Sociology of Intimate Tourism http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com A sociologist's look at the changing face of travel, friendship and the quest for intensity and closeness Wed, 04 Nov 2009 09:41:46 +0000 http://wordpress.com/ hourly 1 Comment on About the Author by Doreen Chen http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/about-the-author/#comment-112 Doreen Chen Wed, 04 Nov 2009 09:41:46 +0000 http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/about-the-author/#comment-112 Hi Paula, I am Doreen Chen, a PhD student in National Taiwan University. I am interested in the idea of CouchSurfing and trying to make a research proposal about it. In my opinion, hospitality exchange in tourism is great, but still a quite “Western” idea; even it is a global network. So, as an Asian researcher, I am interested in how this new type of travelling to be practiced for Asian Surfers and hosts, and how it influences the idea of “tourism” and “home” for them. In the process of searching the literature, I found that you have written a book about hospitality exchange. However, it is difficult to get the book here. So I would like to ask you that, if it is possible to ask you a copy through email? Or, could you give me a suggestion about how to get the book in Taiwan? Thank you very much! I am looking forward to your reply!! Ps.BTW, I also listen to your music…it is great! I love it. Actually I also have my own band (I am the vocal and play the folk guitar also). I am sure that we could be friends ‘cause we have much in common! Regards, Doreen Hi Paula,

I am Doreen Chen, a PhD student in National Taiwan University. I am interested in the idea of CouchSurfing and trying to make a research proposal about it. In my opinion, hospitality exchange in tourism is great, but still a quite “Western” idea; even it is a global network. So, as an Asian researcher, I am interested in how this new type of travelling to be practiced for Asian Surfers and hosts, and how it influences the idea of “tourism” and “home” for them.
In the process of searching the literature, I found that you have written a book about hospitality exchange. However, it is difficult to get the book here. So I would like to ask you that, if it is possible to ask you a copy through email? Or, could you give me a suggestion about how to get the book in Taiwan? Thank you very much! I am looking forward to your reply!!

Ps.BTW, I also listen to your music…it is great! I love it. Actually I also have my own band (I am the vocal and play the folk guitar also). I am sure that we could be friends ‘cause we have much in common!

Regards,
Doreen

]]> Comment on About the Author by paulabialski http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/about-the-author/#comment-104 paulabialski Tue, 06 Oct 2009 09:04:38 +0000 http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/about-the-author/#comment-104 Hey there Sonja! Sorry for not replying! How is your research going? Perhaps you'd be interested in this conference: http://researcher.royalroads.ca/moodle/course/view.php?id=1029 There will be a panel on Couchsurfing which is being organized by by Jennie Germann-Molz. Cheers! Paula Hey there Sonja! Sorry for not replying! How is your research going? Perhaps you’d be interested in this conference:
http://researcher.royalroads.ca/moodle/course/view.php?id=1029

There will be a panel on Couchsurfing which is being organized by by Jennie Germann-Molz.

Cheers!

Paula

]]> Comment on About the Author by Alayne http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/about-the-author/#comment-103 Alayne Mon, 05 Oct 2009 23:13:39 +0000 http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/about-the-author/#comment-103 Hi Paula I am organizing a session about Anthropology and CS for the Society for Applied Anthropology (SfAA) meetings in Merida Mexico in March 2010. I would love for you to present on the panel. If you are interested, write me back or you can find me on CS or Facebook. I am one of the CS Ambassadors for Tampa and if you ever want to visit Florida just say the word! A Hi Paula
I am organizing a session about Anthropology and CS for the Society for Applied Anthropology (SfAA) meetings in Merida Mexico in March 2010.

I would love for you to present on the panel. If you are interested, write me back or you can find me on CS or Facebook.

I am one of the CS Ambassadors for Tampa and if you ever want to visit Florida just say the word!
A

]]> Comment on Recent Work by italianstudent http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/recent-work/#comment-96 italianstudent Thu, 02 Jul 2009 18:11:10 +0000 http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/recent-work/#comment-96 Hi Paula I just stumbled across your website (from your CS page). Your research looks amazing! I wish you well with it. Am I right in thinking your PhD was on CS? I would love to read it if you have anything published in English. Best wishes Jody Hi Paula

I just stumbled across your website (from your CS page). Your research looks amazing! I wish you well with it. Am I right in thinking your PhD was on CS? I would love to read it if you have anything published in English.

Best wishes

Jody

]]> Comment on About the Author by Sonja Buchberger http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/about-the-author/#comment-57 Sonja Buchberger Fri, 13 Mar 2009 15:00:17 +0000 http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/about-the-author/#comment-57 Hi Paula, I have recently bought your publication ‘Intimate Tourism’. I have not finished reading it, but what I have read so far is really remarkable. I am a PhD student in Leeds (Centre for Tourism and Cultural Change) and I am also working on hospitality exchange networks. My geographical focus is on the Maghreb region (especially Tunisia and Morocco). Unfortunately we cannot meet up that easily since you are in Poland at the moment – as I was informed on your blog. Still I hope that there will be a possibility to meet up and exchange thoughts at one point or another. I am currently trying to connect (the few) people researching hospitality exchange networks and would like to ask if you are interested in participating. For the start, a mailing list would be helpful to spread information on what others are working on exactly, which articles they are publishing etc. Later on, this exchange will hopefully also lead to further (common) projects. At the moment, I know only of a few people doing research on hospitality exchange: Apart from you and me there are Dennis Zuev (sociologist at the Siberian Federal Univ.) and Jennie Germann-Molz (Assistant Professorin Worcester/US). Do you happen to know any other people working in this field? Before I forget: You can (of course) also have a look at my CS profile to get an impression of me. I am looking forward to hearing from you! Regards, Sonja Hi Paula,

I have recently bought your publication ‘Intimate Tourism’. I have not finished reading it, but what I have read so far is really remarkable.

I am a PhD student in Leeds (Centre for Tourism and Cultural Change) and I am also working on hospitality exchange networks. My geographical focus is on the Maghreb region (especially Tunisia and Morocco).

Unfortunately we cannot meet up that easily since you are in Poland at the moment – as I was informed on your blog. Still I hope that there will be a possibility to meet up and exchange thoughts at one point or another.

I am currently trying to connect (the few) people researching hospitality exchange networks and would like to ask if you are interested in participating. For the start, a mailing list would be helpful to spread information on what others are working on exactly, which articles they are publishing etc. Later on, this exchange will hopefully also lead to further (common) projects.

At the moment, I know only of a few people doing research on hospitality exchange: Apart from you and me there are Dennis Zuev (sociologist at the Siberian Federal Univ.) and Jennie Germann-Molz (Assistant Professorin Worcester/US). Do you happen to know any other people working in this field?

Before I forget: You can (of course) also have a look at my CS profile to get an impression of me.

I am looking forward to hearing from you!

Regards,
Sonja

]]> Comment on Doing More means Doing More. by Malcolm http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/2009/02/25/doing-more-means-doing-more/#comment-56 Malcolm Tue, 03 Mar 2009 15:08:34 +0000 http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/?p=61#comment-56 First blog I read after wakeup from sleep today! ---------------------------- <a href="http://www.google.com/url?q=http://rosezy.panicaway.hop.clickbank.net/%3Ftid%3DPANIC&sa=X&ct=targetlink&ust=1236093308612693&usg=AFQjCNEOXPwQzGqCH1QN6wBBkbkOvoHFuA" rel="nofollow">Are you tension? panic?</a> First blog I read after wakeup from sleep today!

—————————-
Are you tension? panic?

]]> Comment on Intimate Tourism – back in French by Emilie http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/2008/12/10/intimate-tourism-back-in-french/#comment-54 Emilie Sun, 11 Jan 2009 23:07:03 +0000 http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/?p=51#comment-54 Hello Paula, My name is Emilie and I'm currently completing a dissertation on the implication of travellers'comunities that aggregate around consensual practices for destination stakeholders and more particularly in terms of destination branding. I did 2 years ago an exploratory work on the Interrailers, but this time i also focus on the Couchsurfers (mainly because of the availibility of secondary data online, and also because i'm a couchsurfer myself). My work is only an applied research, and I relate my findings to industry stakes; nevertheless I apply some ethnographical mehtods and my literature review is based on sociology mainly. Therefore I would be interested in reading some parts of your work, and especially the ones cited at the end of this message. Can you please indicate me how I can have an access to these papers? I know there will be soon a French publication but i won't be in France by the time it'll be in bookstores... Thank you very much in advance for your help! Regards, Emilie # Intimate Tourism: Changing the relationship between the tourist and the other through the online hospitality network. The 6th International Symposium on Aspects of Tourism: "Gazing, Glancing, Glimpsing: Tourists and Tourism in a Visual World. Eastbourne, England. June, 2007. # Intimate Tourism: The process of verbal exchange in intimate spaces through the online hospitality network. Social Aspects of the Internet Conference, Warsaw, Poland. December, 2006. # Intimate Tourism: Intensity, meaning, and offline friendship within the online hospitality network. General Online Research conference, Leipzig, Germany. February, 2007. # No More Cold Researchers: Engagement and bias as characteristics of the modern interdisciplinary minds. Work in Progress: Research Spaces, Research Journeys, University of Warwick, December, 2007. Hello Paula,

My name is Emilie and I’m currently completing a dissertation on the implication of travellers’comunities that aggregate around consensual practices for destination stakeholders and more particularly in terms of destination branding. I did 2 years ago an exploratory work on the Interrailers, but this time i also focus on the Couchsurfers (mainly because of the availibility of secondary data online, and also because i’m a couchsurfer myself).

My work is only an applied research, and I relate my findings to industry stakes; nevertheless I apply some ethnographical mehtods and my literature review is based on sociology mainly.

Therefore I would be interested in reading some parts of your work, and especially the ones cited at the end of this message.

Can you please indicate me how I can have an access to these papers?

I know there will be soon a French publication but i won’t be in France by the time it’ll be in bookstores…

Thank you very much in advance for your help!

Regards,

Emilie

# Intimate Tourism: Changing the relationship between the tourist and the other through the online hospitality network. The 6th International Symposium on Aspects of Tourism: “Gazing, Glancing, Glimpsing: Tourists and Tourism in a Visual World. Eastbourne, England. June, 2007.

# Intimate Tourism: The process of verbal exchange in intimate spaces through the online hospitality network. Social Aspects of the Internet Conference, Warsaw, Poland. December, 2006.

# Intimate Tourism: Intensity, meaning, and offline friendship within the online hospitality network. General Online Research conference, Leipzig, Germany. February, 2007.

# No More Cold Researchers: Engagement and bias as characteristics of the modern interdisciplinary minds. Work in Progress: Research Spaces, Research Journeys, University of Warwick, December, 2007.

]]> Comment on Recent Work by paulabialski http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/recent-work/#comment-52 paulabialski Sun, 23 Nov 2008 07:58:22 +0000 http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/recent-work/#comment-52 Greetings! So nice to hear that my work found you. As an interest to you ... the work on Intimate Tourism is now being published into a book in French! Assuming you speak French, you will be able to read through the book then! It is currently in production and will be published before Christmas. Please email me at p.bialski@lancs.ac.uk if you have some more questions! All the best! Paula Greetings!

So nice to hear that my work found you. As an interest to you … the work on Intimate Tourism is now being published into a book in French! Assuming you speak French, you will be able to read through the book then! It is currently in production and will be published before Christmas.

Please email me at p.bialski@lancs.ac.uk if you have some more questions!

All the best!
Paula

]]> Comment on Recent Work by liviou http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/recent-work/#comment-51 liviou Sat, 22 Nov 2008 10:24:20 +0000 http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/recent-work/#comment-51 Hello, your work seems really interesting. I am a student at the university in Belgium and I wondered whether it were possible to read your whole study on Emotional Tourism realised in 2006, or many reports of your conferences on this subject. The subject which interests to me particularly is the couchsurfing. Sincerely yours Hello,
your work seems really interesting. I am a student at the university in Belgium and I wondered whether it were possible to read your whole study on Emotional Tourism realised in 2006, or many reports of your conferences on this subject. The subject which interests to me particularly is the couchsurfing.

Sincerely yours

]]> Comment on A brainstorm on friendship by Michael http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/2007/10/23/a-brainstorm-on-friendship/#comment-29 Michael Thu, 08 Nov 2007 15:22:23 +0000 http://intimatetourism.wordpress.com/2007/10/23/a-brainstorm-on-friendship/#comment-29 paulabialski-thesisma-intimatetourism-final-engl.pdf By using simple common sense, a user will come to the conclusion that somebody with many friends is, in fact, more likely to be trustworthy. This is the exact reason why people add everyone they even say hello to offline (not difficult in a meet up of 50 people not much time invested also ) .To give the false sense to being trustworthy and by incidents which have happened on couchsurfing this definitely shows they were not trustworthy. Also in the past year peoples online actions have changed the trust levels but online and offline .A good person to verify this would be chris. In a community where people meet online more than offline (travel community). Peoples online actions show how trustable they are and this may or may not translate to a different in real life meeting. But the distrust build up by actions online do change the trust levels for ever. "the website system forced users to rate each other on a scale of 1-10, 10 being most trustworthy)." forcing people to quantify their friendships on a scale of 1-10 is what made friendship on couchsurfing look like a commodity which are just numbers. Also the forcing caused users to just randomly fill in the information . paulabialski-thesisma-intimatetourism-final-engl.pdf
By using simple common sense, a user will come to the conclusion that
somebody with many friends is, in fact, more likely to be trustworthy.

This is the exact reason why people add everyone they even say hello to offline (not difficult in a meet up of 50 people not much time invested also ) .To give the false sense to being trustworthy and by incidents which have happened on couchsurfing this definitely shows they were not trustworthy.

Also in the past year peoples online actions have changed the trust levels but online and offline .A good person to verify this would be chris. In a community where people meet online more than offline (travel community). Peoples online actions show how trustable they are and this may or may not translate to a different in real life meeting. But the distrust build up by actions online do change the trust levels for ever.

“the website system forced users to rate each other on a scale of 1-10, 10 being most trustworthy).”
forcing people to quantify their friendships on a scale of 1-10 is what made friendship on couchsurfing look like a commodity which are just numbers. Also the forcing caused users to just randomly fill in the information .

]]>