Offbeat Guides: Build your own travel books

David Sifry, founder and former CEO of Technorati, has apparently had enough of new media and of blogs. His new venture is attacking a traditional business: printed travel guides. As of this writing, the site is in private beta.

Offbeat Guides is a service for printing customized travel books. When you go to the site, it asks you five basic questions: Your name, your destination, your trip’s dates, where you live, and where you’re staying (if you know). With that information, it scours various open sources (like Wikipedia, Wikitravel, and Eventful) as well as some licensed content providers, and builds a custom file for you about your destination.

Users can tweak the content: If you don’t know where you’re staying you can be sure the hotels section is included; if you already have a place, you can remove it and save some paper. You can include, or not, sections on food, events, history, transportation, etc. Books will always be customized for your travel dates and will be printed with the most recent weather forecasts (or historical weather data), exchange rates, and other relevant and timely information like fairs and festivals happening when you’re there.

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