Google Maps to Share Horror Stories - "Sod Abroad" Promotion

Times journalist and aspiring author Michael Moran is promoting his new book Sod Abroad through his blog (natch), as well as through an interactive map where users can add their own holiday stories.

True to the spirit of the book, which apparently promotes the idea of staying back in Blighty, as opposed to frequenting nasty foreign hell-holes, visitors to his Google Maps-powered whinge-a-thon have obliged by posting tales of holiday woe… often in excruciatingly graphic detail.

Particular highlights include Amsterdam ("Don’t do shrooms alone in AMS"), Riva del Garda, Italy ("got Scabies") and Sharm El Sheik, Egypt ("squee").

I don’t know how successful this particular Web 2.0 scheme will be at selling the book - it’s eminently possible that some of the stories added (genuine or not) are rather better than Moran’s efforts.

Still, kudos for a genuinely interesting and entertaining web mashup (Google + Yahoo Pipes) - and it’s got to be better than videos of cats and bad virals.