Smart destinations and the evolution of ICTs: a new scenario for destination management?

Abstract

Landeta, J. (1999). El método Delphi: Una técnica de previsión del futuro [The Delphi method: a technique for forecasting the future]. Barcelona, Ariel

Towards a conceptualisation of smart tourists and their role within the smart destination scenario

“…Irrespective of the context of smartness and its actors or 'species', one concern always remains the same: to provide tourists with higher satisfaction, improved experiences and a better achievement of their individual preferences (Liberato, Alen, & Liberato, 2018;X. Wang et al, 2016), through varied 'smart solutions' (Ivars-Baidal, Celdrán-Bernabeu, Mazón, & Perles-Ivars, 2017). Gretzel (2011) argues that intelligent systems can provide better tourist experiences thanks to a superior management of information and a higher support in decision making.…”

“…This growing interest is evident in the great attention smart destinations are receiving in countries such as China (Li, Hu, Huang, & Duan, 2016;Ryan et al, 2016;D. Wang, Li, & Li, 2013), South Korea (Koo, Shin, Kim, Kim, & Chung, 2013;Park, Lee, Yoo, & Nam, 2016) or Spain (Ivars-Baidal et al, 2017;López de Ávila & García, 2013).…”

Smart destinations and tech-savvy millennial tourists: hype versus reality

“…However, the adoption of some ICTs may rapidly accelerate in the next years and change even more the panorama for destinations management. Still, it seems clear that the impact of technologies is already drawing a new scenario for destinations, a shift which has been captured by the new smart destination concept (Gretzel, Sigala, et al, 2015;Ivars et al, 2016Ivars et al, , 2017Jovicic, 2016).…”

“…Hence, the conceptualisation of destinations has evolved, and the SD has positioned itself as an adaptation of the destination notion to the revolution of the latest ICTs (Jovicic, 2016) and has emerged as a novel destination management approach (Ivars-Baidal et al, 2017). In this smart management approach, tourists occupy a central place and their relationship with the destination is articulated around some critical scopes in which their attitudes and behaviours are essential and several expectations are held, namely in:  Mobile technologies use (Gretzel, Sigala et al, 2015)  Data sharing for personalised experiences (Buhalis & Amaranggana, 2015;D.…”

Smart Urban Tourism Destinations at a Crossroads

“…In many ways, smartness, like many related concepts, remains an elusive notion today as it is often domain dependent, referring to anything from smart TV sets and smart cars to smart systems and devices (Alter, 2019), urban energy management (Battarra et al, 2016), the environmental sustainability of cities (Balducci and Ferrara, 2018) or cross-agency information-sharing for better decision-making (Gil-Garcia et al, 2019), or urban governance (Gil-Garcia et al, 2016), among others. Regardless, in essence, the concept has often been used to refer to the impact that information and communication technologies (ICTs) have had on society and the economy (see, for instance, Dameri, 2017), with ICTs often used as an umbrella term to denote a wide array of technologies and advances in communication and connectivity (see, for instance, Rutherford, 2011; or, for a recent tourismfocused review on this topic, see Ivars-Baidal et al, 2019). The speed of innovation in this field, often referred to as 'disruptive technologies' -a term first coined by Bower and Christensen (1995) to denote technologies able to displace current incumbents due to their high level of innovation -has led some thinkers to claim that humanity is, in effect, facing a fourth industrial revolution (Schwab, 2017) exemplified by major advances in robotics, artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, quantum computing, biotechnology, the internet of things (IoT), the industrial internet of things (IIoT), decentralized consensus, fifth-generation wireless technologies (5G), 3D printing and fully autonomous vehicles (World Economic Forum, 2016), to mention but a few examples, and their huge impacts on the challenge of educating future generations (Peters, 2017).…”