There was a time when Lonely Planet was the definitive travel guide when you would travel to a new city or country. The company has lost some of their luster as many people are using online services like Expedia and other travel websites to read reviews and find out the local scoops. Still, in the last few years Lonely Planet has been undergoing a resonance in the digital world, with the company remaining profitable. Today, Lonely Planet has announced they their entire travel guide library is now available via eBook subscription service Scribd.
Scribd first started out as a document sharing service that many journalists employed to embed content into posts. Due it its open nature, there were many pirated eBooks on the site, which gave it some negative press. Scribd hoped to turn things around by inking deals with publishers and launching a eBook subscription service. Now, readers can signup for around $8.95 a month, to download unlimited books.
The Lonely Planet deal is the first travel service that Scribd has signed and it should give new users a reason to signup. Now, instead of having to purchase a book every time you want to travel, you can just open a subscription and get full access to all of the travel guides and 300,000 other titles.
Michael Kozlowski is the editor-in-chief at Good e-Reader and has written about audiobooks and e-readers for the past fifteen years. Newspapers and websites such as the CBC, CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and the New York Times have picked up his articles. He Lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
