Tourism and travel recommendations

The obvious reason is that a friend has nothing to sell. An advert will show you an empty beach at sunrise, whereas a friend will tell you the beach is lovely but the only road in is jammed by ten o'clock, and it's that kind of unflattering detail that makes the rest believable. A friend also knows your tastes, so a recommendation from someone who shares my dislike of crowds is worth more than a thousand anonymous five-star reviews. On the effect of mass tourism, I think it's a mixed blessing that tips towards harm once a certain threshold is passed. Hoi An is a good example: tourism rescued the old town from decay and gave thousands of families a living, but nowadays many of the original residents have rented out their houses as souvenir shops and moved elsewhere, so visitors are photographing a stage set rather than a community. That said, I wouldn't blame the tourists themselves; the real failure is usually a local authority that keeps issuing licences because the revenue is too tempting. As for the future, I suspect short videos will go on steering people towards the same handful of photogenic spots, which will only worsen the crowding. At the same time, I can see a counter-trend among more experienced travellers, who will deliberately seek out places that haven't gone viral. So destinations may split into two kinds: the famous ones you queue for, and the quiet ones people keep to themselves.