Sustainable Tourism and Innovation in Mobile Tourism Services

This article examines some promising perspectives from a research project that is driven by an innovative research agenda to combine sustainable tourism and mobile information technology in rural and peripheral areas of Southern Denmark. Most technologically based innovation projects tend to focus on the hardware, but the present project is concerned only with the content offered on the mobile platform. The frame of analysis and project objectives is presented through an outline of the defining characteristics of tourism innovation and sustainable tourism development. Addressing the much neglected issues of equity, scale, and implementation, it is argued that the principles of sustainable tourism should be exercised in those metropolitan centers that generate the largest shares of international tourist arrivals and gross receipts. Also concerned with stakeholder participation and ultimately quality of life in a mass tourism destination, a profile of the project team is provided. Finally, a sample will illustrate the expected outcome in a user scenario.