Schmap and Schmapplets: Better than Zagats

Posted by Cyndy Aleo-Carreira on November 27th, 2007

A few months ago I stumbled on a web site called Schmap. At the time, I had just reviewed Schmedley, wasn't super-impressed , and somehow lumped the two sites together in my mind. I'd forgotten all about Schmap until recently, when I learned how they solicit some of the information for their site.

Schmap is an online travel guide, which doesn't sound all that unique at first. Then you hit their home page, and notice raves from Time, The Washington Post, the Interntional Herald Tribune, and PC World, and you start to wonder if these people just might know something that you don't.

Schmap goes above and beyond the usual user-contributed travel information by assembling comprehensive guides. You can access real-time updated information for virtually anywhere in the world, as well as download desktop guides for over 200 destinations throughout the world. Available in single-destintion guides or World, Europe, or America MegaPacks, the desktop guides provide users with offline virtual tours as well as full-color travel guides you can use during your travel without dragging along your laptop. The guides contain information about virtually anything you can think of needing regarding a destination, from hotel information to attractions to historial information about the area.

Schmap takes full advantage of other Web 2.0 information as well, using Flickr's API to find photos of destinations from hotels to restaurants to attractions. Flickr users are contacted if their shots are shortlisted for a guide. Images are used only with permission, and full credit is given to the photographer.

Schmap's guides are provided free of charge, with plans to keep it so in the future as well.

In addition to the guides, Schmap also runs Schmapplets.com, where users can create their own guides to any destination they wish, from their own neighborhood to points of interest around town. Users can create everything from city guides for out-of-town guests to guides to favorite places, to a Schmapplet commemorating a honeymoon. One of the favorite Schmapplets that I've found is a Literary Tour of London by user Rob Parker, and it highlights every single place the English Lit major in me has been dying to see. Each Schmapplet, like the Guides, allow you to view information about locations noted on the interactive map, read information about each location from the creator, and view each location on a map that zooms in and out and can also show satellite images, courtesy of the Google Earth API.

From the features to the customization abilities to the incredible number of images you can view in most of the guides (I saw at LEAST 8 of my very favorite hotel in Ottawa, the Chateau Laurier) to the little running feet that show the guide or Schmapplet is loading, I LOVE this site. Where once families got TripTiks and TourBooks from AAA, Schmap and their Schmapplets are the next wave of travel guide, as personal as the users who need them.

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