BBC buys Lonely Planet

Being a bit of a travel guidebook junkie, I was intrigued to hear that the BBC just plunked down an undisclosed amount (though there are whispers) for a 75 percent stake in the Lonely Planet universe of books, Web sites, and TV travel programs.

LP sells about 7 million books a year (several of them to me) and its main site garners more than 4 million viewers a month. But the Beeb is apparently after LP's vast store of content - content that's ripe for spinning into related TV and Web programs in the very lucrative travel market. What's more, Lonely Planet is a trusted brand with a 30-year history. I imagine it's a good deal for them.

Hearing the news about the purchase reminded me of this great recent post on the blog of the Far Eastern Economic Review. According to a FEER correspondent, Chinese authorities apparently consider Lonely Planet China's version of recent history 'inconvenient.' Copies of the travel guide in Shanghai bookshops were thus the target of some very clumsy censorship. As in, medical-tape-over-passages clumsy. They must have been out of Sharpies that day.