[Fiend]

Say you're purchasing a guidebook to a more minor - but somewhat appealing - area, that's at most semi-local to you (i.e. not on your doorstep, but not at the other end of the country), or that you might be passing through, as a customer, how do you like it??

I.e. Do you like a full fat, full sugar, girthy beast of a book that covers absolutely everything including all the minor / esoteric local stuff and all the stuff that's outside your grade range, with an according price tag?? Or do you like the streamlined zero calorie diet soda water semi-selected guide that has anything and everything a typical visitor might want, but misses out on definitively recording local gems and every possible bit of rock (which can of course be detailed online)??

Given that on one hand you've got something like North Wales Bouldering which is fairly definitive, but it is almost all the good stuff anyway.....but comes with a size and price tag that makes a typical boulderer go aghast with shock and spend money on some £90 Prana trousers instead. And on the other hand you've got things like Churnet Bouldering or Lancashire Bouldering which have a mixture of great stuff for outsiders and not so great (or occasionally dire) stuff for locals, but are are slimmer and more affordable books....

No doubt locals would prefer the pricier true definitive guides, and I suspect this might work in areas with a vast local scene (i.e. Bristol Area Esoteric Bouldering, which can detail all the god awful shite down there because it's all roadside and it's in / near a major climbing city). But for outsiders / visitors / the wider market (i.e. you guys/girls and anyone you know), what do you think works best??

Ta!

[teestub]

Lakes guide is my benchmark comparator for all others, seems to have a great balance of comprehensiveness without getting lost in the weeds. I guess it helps that there are not a lot of eliminate/link up venues there, although since it’s been published there’s been a lot of links climbed at the stone which I assume would be left out.

Surely the actual size will depend on the volume of bouldering in a given area as much as a thing else? As such somewhere minor is likely to come in as a slimmer and therefore cheaper offering.

[Will Hunt]

Let the guide you want to make lead the page count, not the other way around.

[andy moles]

NWB is too fat.

And I say that as someone who contributed things that deserve to be casualties of its weight loss programme.

[remus]

Disclaimer: I'm a guidebook geek and will almost certainly buy the book whatever size, shape and price.

I quite like the BMC approach where the major venues are covered in detail, then the proper esoteric stuff gets a very brief write up at the end of the book with some pointers about where to go for more info.

For me the previous edition of NWB was too big and sacrificed a lot by trying to cram everything in to one volume.

[andy moles]

My hot takes for paper saving in a bouldering tome are:

No wordy descriptions about how you will feel when you top out etc. Most boulder problems don't need any description at all, a line and a grade will do, perhaps a word or two for any rules.

Don't bother with FAs (maybe a mention for main developers in the crag intro). No one gives a shit who made the first ascent of every one star problem.

Make the action photos count - not too many, just really inspiring ones.

[sxrxg]

For large areas that have long walk ins (North Wales, Lakes) I would like the areas split up into volumes that could be bought individually or as a set that come in a nice box (got to look good on the bookshelf!). This would save me having to photocopy pages as I currently do to save weight on the walk in to longer crags.

[bolehillbilly]

I'm a full fat, granular detail nerd. Include the link ups, specify start holds where relevant, FA details, all the random off piste bits, a good flavour of history, decent photos of less well known stuff, decent notes on approaches and conditions and a clear descriptions interspersed with a few more fully spiced accounts. Not much to ask of a guidebook author/team.
My favourite example of this is in BMC Froggatt to Black Rocks.
'Starting 2m right of the arete, use a black pocket to make nice up moves to scratchier rock and a top move that can't but help remind you of that bit at the end of Jaws where the captain guy with the beard was bitten in half by the shark'.
It's in inconsequential no star 6A on an unfrequented bit of rock at a very popular venue. (Prize if you can guess it without looking it up).

I want a guide I can sit and read and get inspired by, especially if it's a less classic, less well known area. If thats a bigger book or  more volumes and more cost I wouldn't mind. I don't recall ever regretting spending money on a guide.
It's easy enough to take a photo of the pages you need and leave the full tome in the car or at home if weight is an issue.

[mrjonathanr]

IMO it's obvious. Bigger book = better kneebars. Go for it.

[remus]

Don't bother with FAs (maybe a mention for main developers in the crag intro). No one gives a shit who made the first ascent of every one star problem..

Personally I think it's a shame not to record this info where it exists. So much bouldering history is already lost and guidebooks have traditionally been the place where the work is done to find.out who's done what. Maybe it's the wrong medium in the long term though?

[andy moles]

Fair enough, just proposing some potential sacrifices in the interest of girth limitation other than leaving out climbs.

[Bonjoy]

Don't bother with FAs (maybe a mention for main developers in the crag intro). No one gives a shit who made the first ascent of every one star problem..

Personally I think it's a shame not to record this info where it exists. So much bouldering history is already lost and guidebooks have traditionally been the place where the work is done to find.out who's done what. Maybe it's the wrong medium in the long term though?

Perhaps predictably, I agree wholeheartedly.
Such a shame if the history of bouldering is lost to save a few inches of page space. Most peoples names aren't actually that long.

[andy moles]

Perhaps predictably, I agree wholeheartedly.
Such a shame if the history of bouldering is lost to save a few inches of page space. Most peoples names aren't actually that long.

But printing them each three hundred times on separate lines adds considerable vertical millimetres.

I'm not suggesting not recording them anywhere, just that in terms of information I want to take with me to the crag, it's far less of a priority than how to find all the climbs.

[Bonjoy]

They’re generally in small font and don’t necessarily have to be on a separate line. If there was a realistic prospect of the information/history being faithfully recorded elsewhere (hello BMC), there’d be no need to clutter guides with it, I just don’t see any prospect of that happening currently though, which leaves guides as the de facto history books.
With most/all bouldering guides being commercially produced I expect the loss of FA records, ostensibly as a space saving measure, but more realistically as an effort saving measure. Like I say, I think that’s a shame. It would be less likely to happen if boulderers where more full throated in their support of retaining the records. J Fullwood, May 2022

[remus]

If there was a realistic prospect of the information/history being faithfully recorded elsewhere (hello BMC), there’d be no need to clutter guides with it, I just don’t see any prospect of that happening currently though, which leaves guides as the de facto history books.

UKC would seem the natural place for it given they've already got a list of ~all the climbs in the UK. Persuading people that it's useful info to record seems to be tricky though (going on the occasional 'we should fill in the FA details for things' threads that pop up over there).

[andy moles]

UKC would seem the natural place for it given they've already got a list of ~all the climbs in the UK. Persuading people that it's useful info to record seems to be tricky though (going on the occasional 'we should fill in the FA details for things' threads that pop up over there).

I don't think UKC is the best place for it, if only because UKC is a private company. I'm willing to put a lot of information on UKC and spend time moderating crags because it's such a useful resource, but there's a slightly uncomfortable tension there because all that data is not actually public property.

Hello BMC, indeed.

[Bonjoy]

I’m increasingly coming to the view that we’re collectively letting the perfect be the enemy of the good with regard to the UKC database. At this point I think it might be time to take stock of the prospect of the BMC ever setting up a rival database and accept it isn’t going to happen, that ship has sailed, and get on with using the resource that is already available. As per history in guidebooks though, I do wonder how much concerns about data ownership are mostly a (subconscious?) fig leaf for a general lack of appetite for data entry.
We tried the grass roots rival database thing with peakbouldering.info and that turned out to be a near total waste of a lot of time and effort for the few people who made an effort to populate it. It disappeared without warning and is now only partially accessible via a third party archive site. At least UKC has the size and scale to be relevant, stable, well maintained, and durable.

[andy moles]

To a large extent I agree, and I've walked that talk a lot over the years (though not specifically for FA info). Wholesale acceptance that UKC will now be the central authority of climbing history seems potentially short-sighted though, without some kind of clause that ensures free public access to that data in perpetuity.

[scragrock]

I used UKC for years thinking it was a free platform for skint folk like me to access info, i deleted most of what i put up and stepped away from it when i found out they struck a deal with Rockfax and now any info/Topo's/descriptions will be monetised.
I do however see the point made that it seems to be the only system that works long term

[Duma]

Given the other channel's laissez-faire attitude to data ownership wrt other guides, I'm surprised anyone is worried about using their database.
A real shame that the BMC hasn't taken this on IMO.

On topic, I'd rather a decent history section than fa details for every problem tbh.

[abarro81]

Given that on one hand you've got something like North Wales Bouldering which is fairly definitive, but it is almost all the good stuff anyway...... And on the other hand you've got things like Churnet Bouldering or Lancashire Bouldering which have a mixture of great stuff for outsiders and not so great (or occasionally dire) stuff for locals, but are are slimmer and more affordable books....

This is just a function of the area though surely, rather than a different cut-off. Or is there really loads of stuff in the Churnet that they didn't put in the guide because it didn't make the cut?

[remus]

What bonjoy said. In theory a BMC run database would be amazing, but in practice i don't think they have the time, money or expertise to do it. Rockfax do and have been doing so very successfully for many years.

Bonjoy, if you know who I can speak to to get access to the database behind peakbouldering.info I'd be psyched to try and rescue the data with a view to making a read only copy available somehow.

[andy moles]

Given the other channel's laissez-faire attitude to data ownership wrt other guides, I'm surprised anyone is worried about using their database.

I wasn't so much worrying about using it, as worrying about having unrestricted access to it.

It would obviously be a total dick move to limit access when the data has been supplied to a large extent by volunteers, but it's a limited company that can ultimately do whatever it wants.

Not that I doubt the integrity of the incumbent regime    

[Dac]

With regard to recording first ascents of boulder problems I feel the ship has already sailed. Bouldering had been practiced, principally unrecorded, for decades, prior to bouldering guides being developed; and as such any first ascensionist detailed will be fragmentary at best.

Any problem of moderate difficulty near to a roped climb has probably been played on for decades, even with a bouldering only venue seemingly just discovered and freed from the dirt and foliage there is every chance that some keen climber who used to live down the hill was climbing there in the 60’s or 70’s.

I feel a good guide should credit the initial developers of any newer venues, and detail the first ascents of the more classic or significant problems, but wholesale recording of every problems first ascent is simply not possible to achieve, it’s hard enough to be consistent with the naming of problems!

[Will Hunt]

There is a database that the clubs built, and there was talk about the BMC taking it on. I don't know the history of it but I think it was a CC thing that was backed by various other Wired members. It's been used as an engine to build Lake District Rock and Lakes Sport & Slate (and maybe some other guides). However, it has been frustrated by a few things. Firstly, it wasn't publicly accessible and, by extension, there was no wider crowd-sourcing of information. This was done to try and protect the data but in reality I'd say the ship has sailed. Because it was primarily intended as an engine for building books and an app then it was also wholly club-centric. There's nothing that would have stopped it becoming broader but it was only being added to by club people. You've then got all the usual nonsense about internal politics and fallings-out that seem to plague this sort of thing - I think the database is currently on ice because of this.

At least UKC has the size and scale to be relevant, stable, well maintained, and durable.

I agree that the UKC database is the best thing out there at the moment and it would be incredibly difficult (impossible?) now to build anything to rival it given the head start it has. However, Alan said something very similar to me in an email a few years ago; a short while later there was a pandemic and the begging bowl was being passed around to prop up the site (UKC Supporter membership). The UKC database, particularly since it is now the engine of the app as well as all the books, is a hugely valuable asset and it's naive of us to assume that it won't become less open in future. All it takes is a change of circumstance, inclination, or ownership in the future. At least two of those things are actually guaranteed. I can see a future where it becomes the DCD (Dior Climbing Database); 15 years ago who'd have thought they'd ever be wearing Adidas Anasazis?



On topic: please do continue to include FA details. It adds a lot of richness. One of my favourite sightings in the Yorkshire Grit book is that Crucifix Arete is a Don Whillans problem - who'd have thought?! If it makes the book a bit bigger then so be it - if it gets too big then split into two volumes. I don't understand why people moan about big books for stuff that isn't multipitch. If weight is that much of a problem maybe drop the portable fan, fingerboard, pointless sit-start pad, CBD gummies, 5th 4K camera and tripod, armada of toothbrushes etc etc etc.

[Fiend]

I don't understand why people moan about big books for stuff that isn't multipitch.

Price??

[Will Hunt]

I don't understand why people moan about big books for stuff that isn't multipitch.

Price??

Look at the price of various books and their size. The relationship is non-linear. Adding on an extra x pages makes relatively little difference to the unit cost.

[andy moles]

If weight is that much of a problem maybe drop the portable fan, fingerboard, pointless sit-start pad, CBD gummies, 5th 4K camera and tripod, armada of toothbrushes etc etc etc.

I've never carried any of that (OK maybe two brushes once) but I still reserve the right to complain a small bit about having to carry a guidebook that could anchor a small boat up a mile of heathery hillside.

Yes, I can and do take photos. But it rather defeats the purpose of a printed guidebook.

[bolehillbilly]

Given that on one hand you've got something like North Wales Bouldering which is fairly definitive, but it is almost all the good stuff anyway...... And on the other hand you've got things like Churnet Bouldering or Lancashire Bouldering which have a mixture of great stuff for outsiders and not so great (or occasionally dire) stuff for locals, but are are slimmer and more affordable books....

This is just a function of the area though surely, rather than a different cut-off. Or is there really loads of stuff in the Churnet that they didn't put in the guide because it didn't make the cut?

Everything in the sectors covered went in the Churnet guide including  projects and some suggested link ups so it's a real mixture of quality and more local value problems. It's still one of my favourite guidebooks partly for this reason   Some areas were completely cut at a late stage, Ousel and Lion etc due to access concerns but there is still info on UKC in the photos section.

[Will Hunt]

Each to their own. In my view, in a world where physical guidebooks are becoming less relevant they have to do something that allows them to stand apart from the apps and the online databases. FA details, anecdotes about the FA (the YMC guides are full of gold, especially the 2005 limestone brick), etc etc are all part of that. There are passive things in the world that are purely functional and bring no pleasure in the use of them - sandpaper, toothpicks, the yellow pages; then there are things that people love to use - cars, particular items of clothing, a really good kitchen knife. If guidebooks are more the former than the latter then they become replaceable.

[andy moles]

anecdotes about the FA (the YMC guides are full of gold, especially the 2005 limestone brick)

To be fair, in a guidebook I'm way more psyched for the flecks of gold than a comprehensive listing of who climbed every problem.

Back to my comment about action photos - make them count.

[Bonjoy]

With regard to recording first ascents of boulder problems I feel the ship has already sailed. Bouldering had been practiced, principally unrecorded, for decades, prior to bouldering guides being developed; and as such any first ascensionist detailed will be fragmentary at best.

Any problem of moderate difficulty near to a roped climb has probably been played on for decades, even with a bouldering only venue seemingly just discovered and freed from the dirt and foliage there is every chance that some keen climber who used to live down the hill was climbing there in the 60’s or 70’s.

I feel a good guide should credit the initial developers of any newer venues, and detail the first ascents of the more classic or significant problems, but wholesale recording of every problems first ascent is simply not possible to achieve, it’s hard enough to be consistent with the naming of problems!

You're presenting three fairly common arguments there which could be summarized as:
1.The record is incomplete, therefore not worth maintaining.
2.Everything’s been done years ago anyway, therefore the record is inaccurate, therefore not worth maintaining.
3. It’s not possible to maintain a complete record, therefore only the briefest of overviews should be retained.

To 1. I’d say, all historical records are incomplete. That’s an argument for better record keeping IMO, not an argument for throwing our hands up in the air and declaring it a lost cause. Incomplete is preferable to non-existent.

To 2. I’d say this is an almost total fallacy. There are grains of truth to it, but in the main it’s just some self-serving BS that old giffers come out with because they don’t understand what has actually been done and they overestimate the depth and scope of what their generation actually did. I’m old enough to have experienced the olden days and the rose tinted reimaginings of it. Recording of FA info is our best and only defense against this tiresome self-indulgent wankery.

I agree, up to a point with 3. In the absence of definitive info about the past it isn’t necessary or desirable to know who did what and when about every single line. I’m generally in favour of more knowledge rather than less though, especially online where space doesn’t matter. My main gripe with brief historical summaries is that they are inherently biased and skewed by the knowledge, opinions, and preferences of the writer. They will always overrepresent the guy who shouts loudest, or knows the writer, or has the most photographer mates.

[User deactivated.]

If weight is that much of a problem maybe drop the portable fan, fingerboard, pointless sit-start pad, CBD gummies, 5th 4K camera and tripod, armada of toothbrushes etc etc etc.

Phew! At least I don't have to leave my ladder at home!

[steveri]

I’m increasingly coming to the view that we’re collectively letting the perfect be the enemy of the good with regard to the UKC database. At this point I think it might be time to take stock of the prospect of the BMC ever setting up a rival database and accept it isn’t going to happen...

Mm. Given that the BMC now seems to be out of guidebooks, where there's at least a sniff of a return, I can't see much prospect of them throwing a ton of resource at a data project simply for the greater good. I know the UKC/Rockfax empire arouses sniffiness, but I'd rather the data were somewhere rather than nowhere. The BMC is pretty small, smaller still when you cut out HR, finance, team and everyone else this couldn't possibly sit with. It's a Big Job.

[Dac]

In reply to Bonjoy:

I agree that a complete, accurate record of bouldering first ascents is both a noble aim and a worthwhile historical document. However my viewpoint is shaped principally by pragmatism: any potential author(s) have only so much time and enthusiasm to dedicate to the rather herculean task of creating a guide. I believe that their limited resources would be better dedicated to ensuring accurate route descriptions, grades, and approach information (and yes good action photos) than to the minutiae of who first climbed that nondescript wall left of the arête and when, or if when climber x first climbed ‘Roof problem LH low (without break)’ in 1983 if it was from the ground or stood on that rock.

As for biased brief historical summaries: any modern record of historical events is biased and skewed by the knowledge, opinions, and preferences of the writer, no matter how lengthy it may be

So yes, recording first ascent information is a fundamentally worthwhile objective, it is more whether a guidebook produced by a team possessed of finite time and motivation is the best place for it. As you say yourself: online, space does not matter, and the guy who shouts loudest, the friend of the guidebook writer and the old giffer who think it all got climbed years ago can all argue the toss until the rocks crumble to dust (or an accurate first ascent record is established).

Another quick note on historical accuracy: climbers and guidebook writers are rarely scholars. When ‘Esoteric area bouldering guide (2nd edition)’ is written 15 years down the line it’s unlikely that the authors will revisit any source material as far as dimly recalled first ascent details are concerned, so if shouty photographer mate of the author, or the old giffer who thinks it all got climbed years ago have gotten they way with the information recorded in the first edition of the guide then it’s likely there in perpetuity, correct or not. Better to have less first ascent information than inaccurate information, and this information is likely to be easier to establish for the classic lines and significant additions.

[Wellsy]

I would personally always spend more to get little anecdotes, quotes, descriptions, poems, drawings etc in a guidebook. It's culture innit. And besides I buy the guidebook when I want to get a nice physical copy, if I just want to look up a problem I usually go online.

Peakbouldering.info was great for me when I was just starting. I wish it was still around. But yeah FA name and date, descriptions, little photos with lines, the lot please!

[SA Chris]

I would personally always spend more to get little anecdotes, quotes, descriptions, poems, drawings etc in a guidebook. It's culture innit. And besides I buy the guidebook when I want to get a nice physical copy, if I just want to look up a problem I usually go online.

I'd agree with this, i love all the extra stuff like the top 5s and quotes in the old Stanage Guide, The craziness of the Nick White South Devon and Dartmoor and Ted Collins' recent Divie Gorge online topo. Extra weight to carry to the crag is just good training, and guides are like bigger LEGO sets, the bigger the book the better the value.

[fatneck]

Give me ALL the detail please.

I want the Maccies of guidebooks and I want to get fat on them....

I collect them, I like to read them, I want to know about all the chossy roadside crags in the Bristol area AND who climbed them all (most recently) and I want to know who shouted the loudest and knew the best photographers despite the fact that I will hardly ever visit.

Also lols @ SA Chris

Extra weight to carry to the crag is just good training

 

[hongkongstuey]

For large areas that have long walk ins (North Wales, Lakes) I would like the areas split up into volumes that could be bought individually or as a set that come in a nice box (got to look good on the bookshelf!). This would save me having to photocopy pages as I currently do to save weight on the walk in to longer crags.

i thought about this for the HK Guide once it started hitting the 500 page mark - but it just upped the production cost and effort into the 'too much hassle' category. In the end i settled for the easier option of adding QR codes at the start of each main area in the guide that link to back to the free online stuff on www.hongkongclimbing.com so people can just scan and have easy to access / use info for their days out (probably a bit of a rarity in having free online stuff though as it drives down sales a bit, but i figured the people that want a guide will get one regardless).

Also makes it nice and easy for people to check for updated info on an area too that way.

[Fiend]

It's worth noting that when I'm talking about the girth, I guess I'm mostly assuming that there would be a fairly modern non-RF format with a decent balance of some history, FAs, some colour text, but not too much and not padding the book out with that. In terms of size the aspect I'm curious about is to what extent is having something that is very fully definitive (including a lot of likely locals-only stuff) palatable and desirable to the wider climbing market.

i thought about this for the HK Guide once it started hitting the 500 page mark - but it just upped the production cost and effort into the 'too much hassle' category. In the end i settled for the easier option of adding QR codes at the start of each main area in the guide that link to back to the free online stuff on www.hongkongclimbing.com so people can just scan and have easy to access / use info for their days out (probably a bit of a rarity in having free online stuff though as it drives down sales a bit, but i figured the people that want a guide will get one regardless).

This is an interesting comparison and definitely seems like the logical alternative to fully definitive (very select with no other information around seems like the worst option). Especially if it keeps a guidebook to a more manageable size and price (stuff like NWB proves there is an increase in price, and an increase in customers grumbling (maybe before buying it anyway)).

[Alan James, Rockfax]

I used UKC for years thinking it was a free platform for skint folk like me to access info, i deleted most of what i put up and stepped away from it when i found out they struck a deal with Rockfax and now any info/Topo's/descriptions will be monetised.
I do however see the point made that it seems to be the only system that works long term

For the record, the databases on UKC and Rockfax have the same root. Nick Smith and myself set up the Rockfax route database in 2002. This was then used as the basis for UKC Logbook which we set up in 2005 using a data-dump from Rockfax. I became sole owner of UKClimbing.com Limited in 2008 and at that point I joined my two companies into one called UKClimbing Limited. So any 'deal' would had to have been between me and me.

I do recognise people's concerns about what happens to their voluntary contributions to UKC/Rockfax. Up to now (17 years into UKC Logbooks, 14 years in to the current company configuration and 30 years into Rockfax) UKC Logbooks are still free to use and being improved all the time, not least by the amazing contributions of the users but also from our technical additions. We certainly have no plans to change this.

I think the reason it works is because we have continually invested in it. As a resource, it is an incredibly useful tool for guidebook writing. It has always been public and that is its major strength so it would be stupid to change this. Being public means that any guidebook company can use it and we very much welcome this.

Happy to answer any other questions if people have them.

Alan

[scragrock]

I used UKC for years thinking it was a free platform for skint folk like me to access info, i deleted most of what i put up and stepped away from it when i found out they struck a deal with Rockfax and now any info/Topo's/descriptions will be monetised.
I do however see the point made that it seems to be the only system that works long term

For the record, the databases on UKC and Rockfax have the same root. Nick Smith and myself set up the Rockfax route database in 2002. This was then used as the basis for UKC Logbook which we set up in 2005 using a data-dump from Rockfax. I became sole owner of UKClimbing.com Limited in 2008 and at that point I joined my two companies into one called UKClimbing Limited. So any 'deal' would had to have been between me and me.

I do recognise people's concerns about what happens to their voluntary contributions to UKC/Rockfax. Up to now (17 years into UKC Logbooks, 14 years in to the current company configuration and 30 years into Rockfax) UKC Logbooks are still free to use and being improved all the time, not least by the amazing contributions of the users but also from our technical additions. We certainly have no plans to change this.

I think the reason it works is because we have continually invested in it. As a resource, it is an incredibly useful tool for guidebook writing. It has always been public and that is its major strength so it would be stupid to change this. Being public means that any guidebook company can use it and we very much welcome this.

Happy to answer any other questions if people have them.

Alan

Hi Alan
Thanks for your response and if what you say is entirely accurate then my apologies i have clearly got my facts wrong.
I have used UKC database/system for years in order to document the areas i have developed up here in the Highlands because its free to everyone and easy to use. My fear{and others} is that the info we put in when adding new lines will somehow be piggybacked on to a Rockfax guide from UKC, is this the case?

I have No argument about the usefulness of UKC logbooks/moderation etc, as far as i am concerned its the best system out there and i would happily return to the fold if my worries are unfounded.

Cheers

Rob
 

[Alan James, Rockfax]

My fear{and others} is that the info we put in when adding new lines will somehow be piggybacked on to a Rockfax guide from UKC, is this the case?

Thanks Rob for those comments.

It is certainly not the case in the Highlands since we are now working with the SMC to digitise their data for Rockfax Digital. This has been a very mutually beneficial relationship. I can't vouch for how much the SMC use the feedback uploaded to UKC Logbooks in their books, but I doubt people would see that as a problem. We have no plans for a 'Scotfax'.

In other areas where we have our own books, it is the feedback and grade/star votes that are most useful. Where route descriptions are uploaded by users, we would only ever use those after contacting the person in question. There have been instances in the past where route descriptions from other guidebook publishers have been typed in verbatim by users, almost always innocently thinking they were just being helpful. We have tried to remove these and have now put a system in place that makes it pretty difficult to do this accidentally.

Alan

[fatneck]

Kind of OT but i just took delivery of this beauty.

It's a really lovely guide. A bit unusual and full of nice quirks. I'm looking forward to using it in anger and seeing whether directions etc are up to scratch.

My esoteric companion has the other one and I'm keen to match them against each other in terms of usefulness as an actual guide but in terms of aesthetics, I really like this one!

[rginns]

Kind of OT but i just took delivery of this beauty.

It's a really lovely guide. A bit unusual and full of nice quirks. I'm looking forward to using it in anger and seeing whether directions etc are up to scratch.

My esoteric companion has the other one and I'm keen to match them against each other in terms of usefulness as an actual guide but in terms of aesthetics, I really like this one!

It's fascinating how those two guides to the same area are completely different, Elliot's guide being much more of the standard well produced guide and the one you've bought being more of a journal style guide - plenty of great illustrations and quirks.
It's almost impossible to compare the two objectively..