Archive for the ‘English’ Category

Job: Online Redakteur(in) / Lektor(in) – freie Mitarbeit, Teilzeitjob (20-30 Std.), Arbeit von zu Hause, München

Sunday, June 5th, 2011

Wir suchen zur inhaltlichen Steuerung unserer Reise-Community eine(n) engagierte(n) und flexible(n) Online Redakteur(in)/Lektor(in). Ihre Aufgabe ist die Pflege unserer Community und die Betreuung (Rekrutierung, Kontaktpflege, Abrechnung) unserer Reiseredakteure.

Ihre Arbeit kann zum überwiegenden Teil von zu Hause aus erledigt werden. Zudem sind Sie in Ihrer Zeiteinteilung weitestgehend flexibel – mit Ausnahme einiger Terminsachen.  Sie sollten in München oder Umgebung wohnen, damit wir unkompliziert mit ihnen vor Ort Kontakt halten können.

Sie sind ein offener und kommunikativer Mensch, bringen ein Faible für Internet-Themen und Sprache mit und besitzen einen ehrlichen, lebensbejahenden Charakter. Dann passen Sie in unser kleines Team, das mit viel Herzblut unsere Reisecommunity vorantreibt.

Fühlen Sie sich angesprochen? Dann schicken Sie uns Ihre aussagekräftige Bewerbung an gf@cosmotourist.net.

Google testet – und breitet sich weiter aus!

Thursday, October 28th, 2010

Heute Abend ist uns ein massiver Test in den Google Suchergebnissen aufgefallen. Die Lokalen Sucherergebnisse im Rahmen der Universal Search wurden dabei anders z.T auch massiver eingebunden.

Variante 1:

Die Map verdrängt rechts die Adsenseergebnisse und ein massiver Block in der Mitte verdrängt die organischen Ergebnisse. Links ist „places“ als Quernavigation ausgeklappt.

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Top 10 Städte in Europa

Thursday, October 7th, 2010

In London sind Hotels extrem teuer und gleichzeitig schmutzig, alt und renovierungsbedürftig.

Diese Einschätzung dürfte nichts neues sein und ist bei so ziemlich jedem London Besucher fest im Kopf verankert. Wir wollten es aber genauer Wissen und uns nicht nur auf Erzählungen bzw. unser eigenes Gefühl verlassen und haben in den letzten Tagen mehr als 90% aller Hotelbewertungen im deutsch und englischsprachigem Internet analysiert. Ergebnis ist eine Auswertung über alle wichtigen europäischen Städte nach Preis/Leistung, Service und Qualität der Zimmer:

Die Gewinner nach Service & Qualität sind:

1. Warschau
2. Dresden
3. Prag
4. Bremen
5. Istanbul
6. Salzburg
7. Berlin
8. Stuttgart
9. Budapest
10. Hannover

Wie wir finden sehr beachtlich, dass Deutschland so gut positioniert ist!

Die schlechtesten 10 Städte in Europa sind:

1. Birmingham
2. Manchester
3.  London
4. York
5. Kopenhagen
6. Paris
7. Brüssel
8. Amsterdam
9. Lyon
10. Mailand

Sicherlich bildet diese Auswertung nur Durchschnittswerte ab, gibt aber in unseren Augen doch ein interessantes Bild und gute Entscheidungshilfe für Städtereisende auf der Suche nach einem Reiseziel ab.

p.s. ein kleines Trostpflaster für Reisende, die in eine der Flop 10 Städte reisen “müssen”: Auch hier kann man durchaus gute Hotels finden, man muss nur etwas Glück haben oder die richtige Hotelsuchmaschine verwenden ;)

p.p.s. Wir würden gerne eine Top / Flop Serie mit weiteren Auswertungen starten, haben hier auch schon einige Ideen, sind aber für Input (z.B. in den Kommentaren) immer dankbar!

Best Hotels in Thailand

Monday, July 26th, 2010

The last six months have been rather busy here at Cosmotourist. We wanted to semantically analyse nearly all hotel reviews available on the web and generate useful summaries for our users. This means that users need not work their way through all 2k reviews that might exist for one hotel alone.

As you can imagine this was no easy task. We have analysed more than 28 million reviews on more than 100k hotels world-wide and from this we have produced more than 16k variables which can be used to describe a hotel.

All this data now lets us aggregate variables over various parameters. Countries are the first set of parameters which we are going to share with you:

Hotel Room Quality:

In terms of room quality Thailand is the winner, the United States is just average (almost 10 points behind Thailand) and the United Kingdom, France and Denmark are the losers.

Hotel Service:

In terms of service Japan, Germany and Poland have the top 3 spots in our rankings. The United States and the United Kingdom are again just average. Bulgaria and Morocco occupy the last two places.

Let us know what other rankings you might find interesting and we will try to generate some more in the coming weeks.

Das Sommer-Gewinnspiel:

Friday, June 4th, 2010

UPDATE: HIER SIND DIE GEWINNER


Ja Wahnsinn: Mit so einer zahlreichen Teilnahme hätten wir nie im Leben gerechnet und jetzt ist auch noch wirklich Sommer! Wir möchten uns bei allen, die dabei waren ganz herzlich bedanken. Wir haben derweil die Gewinner gezogen. Und die Glücklichen sind:

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Volcanic Times!

Thursday, April 22nd, 2010

We live not in rocky, but in volcanic times at the moment! Thousands of people are stranded around the world, unable to reach their destinations, unsure of when they will be able to get home. No one would have imagined this time last week, that a volcano in Iceland would lead to almost all of the main airports in Europe coming to a standstill. Since Friday the 16th of April, nearly all flights across central and northern Europe have been cancelled and the back log of people waiting to travel is building by the day….my mother is one of these people! Because of this I have had full insight into the predicament passengers have found themselves in. My mother was set to start back at work in England today and there is absolutely nothing she can do to get home. She was meant to fly with Lufthansa last Friday and since then she has had to check the internet 3 to 4 times a day to keep abreast of developments. The Lufthansa hotline is permanently engaged, (one queries whether they too have simply stopped accepting calls because they also have no idea when normal flights will resume?!) so there is absolutely no way of getting any information or feedback. And when the airports do finally open up again, how on earth will the airlines prioritise which passengers fly first? Will passengers simply be told that there is no room? And how will the airport staff cope with the number of people rushing in demanding immediate flights? I will be following the developments with great interest…something like this has never occurred in the history of aviation and will indeed spark off a whole new debate.

At the end of the day, us humans are not quite as important as we sometimes think we are, we are still subject to the whims of nature and who knows what natural disasters the future may bring…Incidentally in this volcanic crisis, most of us have quite forgotten that hundreds have people have died in an earthquake in China…where are our priorities? Is it really all that bad that the rat race may have slowed down a little for a few days with the restrictions placed on travelling? Perhaps those who are stuck should simply try and make the best of their predicament and count their lucky stars that they aren’t in Iceland or in China…And as for the pressure the airlines are now putting on the government, I can only pray that people ultimately remember that safety comes first…

Please share your experiences of the volcanic crisis with us, wherever you may be.

Merry christmas!

Wednesday, December 23rd, 2009

Chritstmas TreeDear Cosmotourists,

Yet again another year has zoomed by and Christmas and New Year are only a matter of days away. This is the time of year to take a moment to reflect back on all that has happened. In the last year you have posted many lovely travel tips, photos and advice, and we would like to thank you for this! Thank you for contributing to the community, without you Cosmotourist would be all the poorer!

Your efforts have not been in vain as your travel tips do get read! We are right up there with the best in the google search rankings and the community is growing by the day. We have also made leaps and bounds in the improvements we have made to the layout and functionality of the website. However we can of course only get better, so if you have made suggestions then simply send us an email to editorial@cosmotourist.net so that we can put these into effect too.

We look forward to reading more from you in 2010 and in the meantime we would like to take this opportunity to wish you a very merry Christmas and an eventful and travel filled year to come!

Your Cosmotourist Team

Morgen, Cosmotouristen, wirds was geben

Wednesday, December 23rd, 2009

Chritstmas TreeLiebe Cosmotouristen,

und wieder stehen Weihnachten und Jahreswechsel vor der Tür. Es ist also Zeit, ein wenig innezuhalten, zurückzublicken und vor allem: uns bei euch allen zu bedanken! Danke für eure Reiseerinnerungen und -empfehlungen, für die zahlreichen Fotos, Informationen und Erlebnisse aus der ganzen Welt. Danke für eure Neugier, eure Abenteuerlust und Hilfsbereitschaft anderen Reisenden gegenüber! In den google-Ergebnislisten stehen eure Tipps mittlerweile ganz oben, die Community wächst stetig und wir haben im vergangenen Jahr erfolgreich an Seitenaufbau und -layout gearbeitet – es lohnt sich also, auf cosmotourist.de zu posten. Aber wie immer gilt: wenn ihr Verbesserungsvorschläge habt, schreibt uns gerne an editorial@cosmotourist.net

Wir freuen uns, weiterhin von euch zu lesen und wünschen allen schöne Weihnachtstage und ein glückliches, reisefreudiges Jahr 2010!

Euer Cosmotourist-Team

Season’s Greetings!

Friday, December 11th, 2009

Just hear those sleighbells jinglin’, ring ting tinglin’ to. Come on it’s lovely weather for a sleigh ride together with you



Oh the excitement mounts as the countdown to Christmas commences. Before we know it Christmas Eve will be upon us! So it’s time to make the most of the Advent season now. Have you made it to a Christmas market this year or do you still plan to do so? The smell of mulled wine and roasting chestnuts-bliss! If you have stories to share about your trips to Christmas markets with the community then please do so. Additionally if you have any seasonal photos of Christmas lights, Christmas markets and the like then please spread the joy by uploading these too.

Have any of you already sighted Father Christmas this year out and about gathering wish lists from children? Perhaps you have even been lucky enough to spy one or two of his loyal reindeer?! Do any of you have any insider tips about where we can glimpse him before Christmas? I have always wanted to make it to Lapland before Christmas to give him my wish list in person.  From what I gather this is a trip not to be missed!

Are any of you going to be celebrating Christmas in a far flung country this year? Perhaps you will be barbequing your Christmas turkey on the beach in the blazing sun in Australia?! If so please do let us know what it turns out to be like. As for myself I will be celebrating in the traditional manner in Germany, roast goose, mince pies, stockings by the fireplace- I can’t wait!

From us all at Cosmotourist we would like to wish you a very merry Christmas and a prosperous and happy New Year! We look forward to sharing 2010 with you!

Genuine User Feedback on Cosmotourist!

Friday, August 21st, 2009

It is becoming increasingly obvious that users are using www.cosmotourist.com as a vehicle to let off steam or to rave about places they have been to. More and more people are dropping by to share their experiences with our community. Travel guides are all and well, but they outdate quickly and here at Cosmotourist you can really take advantage of genuine up-to-date information about restaurants, hotels, clubs, bars, attractions and much more. If you experience really bad service at a restaurant why not warn other people not to make the same mistake as you did? Don’t good hotels deserve to be recommended on to others? If you have discovered a hidden gem of a bar, why not let others know about it too?

For those planning a night out on the tiles or a short break away to an unknown town this information can prove invaluable. So if you too have genuine and useful feedback to share-please do so! Simply log in to www.cosmotourist.com