Community guidelines

The rules we'll shake hands on

General stuff you need to know

These guidelines are designed to ensure the Lonely Planet experience is an enjoyable, inspiring and safe one for all our users. They boil down to common sense, basic courtesy and respect (for your hosts and the rest of the community).

If you don’t agree with them, we won’t take it personally, and nor should you when we suggest www.lonelyplanet.com might not be for you.

When we say we, we mean Lonely Planet Publications Pty Ltd. When we say community we mean all of the places on www.lonelyplanet.com where users hang out and can contribute.

We may update these guidelines and recommend you check back once in a while. We'll also continue to introduce new community features which will fall under these guidelines.

Important things to remember:

  • Certain communities within www.lonelyplanet.com may have their own guidelines posted (such as Groups and Thorn Tree). Please read these carefully and respect them.
  • You are permitted to create multiple accounts on www.lonelyplanet.com, but they must have separate email addresses associated with them. Lonely Planet reserves the right to discipline and terminate multiple accounts from the same user if the user has infringed our Terms of use or the spirit of these guidelines via any one of their accounts.
  • You are responsible for your interactions with other users. We reserve the right, but have no obligation, to monitor disputes between you and other users.
  • These guidelines apply to all content you contribute as part of the Lonely Planet community, including your profile.
  • User content on www.lonelyplanet.com reflects the opinions and experience of those users, not Lonely Planet.

Community dos and don'ts

DO:

  • Be sincere in your contributions. Post with purpose - to inspire, enable or share with fellow travellers.
  • Respect that other people have different points of view, travel journeys, styles, budgets and confidence levels. Don’t take things personally and get to the ‘must look at pictures of kittens to calm down’ stage.
  • Welcome newcomers. We love it when another person catches the travel bug.
  • Give feedback, to your fellow travellers, and us, in a helpful and constructive manner.
  • Lead by example Use the report abuse function to alert us to problem content or members.
  • Look for the best place to do your thing. If you’re posting on the Thorn Tree Travel Forum, look around to make sure you’re in the right branch to get your question answered.
  • Keep it legal. Don’t get yourself into trouble by defaming others, posting porn, ticket scalping, plotting illegal activities, or posting other people’s private information.
  • Use Common Sense and balance when seeking advice. Make your own inquiries, especially around subjects like health and safety.
  • Be safe and smart when arranging rides, homestays and travel companions. We’d hate to hear of anything bad happening when people meet up, but we can’t be responsible for the actions of each person in the community.

DON'T:

  • Create content of a discriminatory or derogatory nature. Rich debate is wonderful, and you can do it without being offensive, humiliating or intimidating based on:
    • race, colour, ethnicity, nationality or physical characteristics
    • gender or sexual orientation
    • religion or non-religious viewpoints (i.e. secular humanism, atheism)
    • political opinion
    • socio-economic status
    • age
    • physical, mental or intellectual disability/impairment
    • the ways people express themselves (this is a global travel community, with different written cultures)
  • Create content which would be reasonably classified as exclusively 'adult' and restricted accordingly (such as pornography or graphic violence).
  • Defame, harass, flame or hold grudges. You’ll travel lighter without the chip on your shoulder.
  • Post personal details or private information about any other person (or anything contrary to our Privacy policy).
  • Impersonate another person, including Lonely Planet staff or authors.
  • Advertise commercial products or services – or openly accuse others of the same. We don’t mind if you include links to your travel blogs or websites in your profiles. But commercial solicitation, or contributions solely designed to plug your traffic, aren’t acceptable. If you think you spot someone breaking the rules, use the report abuse function. Don’t start discussions about them, it won’t get it removed, and wastes moderator time.
  • Conduct formal research without telling people. Lonely Planet is open to cooperation with professional researchers, but you need to contact us with details about your needs and interests. Studying our community members without their – and our – permission is not cool.
  • Be - or - feed a Troll. Trolls post messages or content deliberately designed to get the blood boiling. Replying to or arguing with a Troll is feeding. The best pest-control is to ignore, and use report abuse to alert us to them.
  • Use excessively coarse language. Humans swear. But go easy on the sailor speak or we’ll have to tone you down. Remember, even if it’s not offensive to you, it might be to other people.
  • Discuss how to commit illegal activity (like buying drugs, avoiding visa restrictions, ticket scalping). It’s OK to talk about the existence of these things, but don’t advise how and where to do them.
  • Be a know-it-all. Having a full passport doesn’t mean the rules don’t apply to you. Show off your insights, not your attitude.
  • Don't hide behind handles. We respect the right of travellers to be anonymous, which leads some people to say things they wouldn’t face to face. Don’t be one of those people. If you’re tempted, remember, we can see who you are, even if other members can’t.

Groups

Group owners and administrators are responsible for setting the tone of their group, and ensuring that our website terms and these guidelines are honoured. We ask and expect that group administrators will manage their groups legally, responsibly and good naturedly.

Group administrators can moderate group content and promote and demote other members to administrator status. We ask and expect that they do so with care, and in accordance with these guidelines.

Group administrators are prohibited from conducting commercial activity within their group without our consent (such as charging fees to members or advertising).

Remember that Groups content is public and searchable on the web (unless you are joining or creating a group specifically marked as Private).

Reviews

Travellers – We provide a rating and review platform so travellers can share their genuine experiences and opinions. We do not permit businesses to create fake reviews and will not allow them to rebut or contact travellers. For fellow travellers to get maximum benefit, remember to make your review constructive and balanced.

Businesses – Travellers might review you on our website. We ask that you embrace the good with the bad, as not everyone will have the experience you plan or hope for.   Please don’t try and reply to a traveller review on our website. Resolve issues on your own time, through your own channels.

If you think a review genuinely constitutes defamation please use our report abuse function and it will be brought to the attention of our moderation team.

Looking after the community

We have an internal, specialist moderation team who monitor our community to ensure activity is in the spirit of these guidelines and everyone gets the most out of their experience.

Reporting abuse

All over our website you’ll see ‘Report’ buttons that let you notify us of stuff that breaches the rules. This helps you look after the community too. We do ask that you log in to report things – we think it’s the best way to avoid abuse of the abuse function.