Insight6 min read
AI reimagines world-famous landmarks from one-star tourist reviews
Tue Mar 21 2023 | Edward Hayhurst
- Insight
- Performance
- PR
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Artificial intelligence is growing in popularity across various industries, including digital marketing. The fascinating AI technology can be used to create high-quality unique visuals using text prompts and we were interested in testing its capabilities.
Our Digital PR team have reimagined seven famous landmarks popular with tourists to find out what they would look like based on the one-star reviews the attractions have received.
To create the AI-generated visuals we used a combination of one-star reviews from Trip Advisor for each landmark and asked the AI tool Midjourney to visualise what the disappointed visitors would be sending back on a postcard!
Instead of ‘wish you were here’, these tourists would be sending postcards home saying, ‘wish you weren’t here’.
Each famous landmark gets millions of tourists per year but what do the landmarks look like from the perspective of their unhappy visitors?
Eiffel Tower
One of the most renowned landmarks in the world, the hashtag #eiffeltower has an astonishing 7.2m Instagram posts and over 140,000 tourists have left reviews on TripAdvisor. It has an impressive average of 4.5 out of 5 stars but has still generated 1,300 one-star reviews.
The monument’s harshest criticisms were not happy by the waiting times, long queues, and large crowds, whilst the waste that was dumped in the areas surrounding the landmark left tourists far from impressed.
Rome Colosseum
The Colosseum, a must-see for many when visiting Rome, was built by the Roman Empire and is the largest amphitheatre in the world. Situated in the centre of the city, 72% of its trip advisor reviews are five-star, with only 853 terrible (one-star) reviews. But what did the unimpressed tourists have to say?
Filthy and rubbish everywhere was the consensus of the one-star reviews, with one review going as far to say, ‘The most TRASH place on the planet!’. A few unhappy visitors wanted more explanatory plaques around the landmark and the queues and bad weather also ruined the experience for some.
Christ the Redeemer
Overlooking the Brazilian city of Rio De Janeiro, the statue of Jesus Christ is a popular landmark for tourists visiting the South American city. Voted as one of the seven New Wonders of the World, the landmark offers a 360-degree view of the whole city.
A common theme among the 400 one-star TripAdvisor reviews and other visitor comments was that the amazing views were being ruined by uncontrolled crowds and tourists eager to get a selfie next to the impressive landmark. Showcasing incredible views of the city on a clear day, understandably visitors were left disappointed when they took the trip on a foggy day, leaving one tourist saying, ‘Christ the invisible, due to fog, we were not able to see it’.
Statue of Liberty
Situated on Liberty Island, the Statue of Liberty was a copper statue gifted to the US from the people of France. One of the more popular tourist destinations in New York City, there is no surprise that the hashtag #statueofliberty has had nearly 400 million views on TikTok.
With over 4 million people visiting the landmark every year, it is bound to leave some visitors unimpressed. The majority of tourists’ complaints revolved around rude security, long queues and the destination being overcrowded.
Great Wall of China
Across the Northern border of China, the wall stretches for thousands of miles previously built to protect their territory. A popular destination for tourists with over 400K Instagram posts with the hashtag #greatwallofchina.
Frustrated tourists were disappointed with crowds and litter, and those who visited on a snowy and icy day wouldn’t rush back due to worrying conditions underfoot.
Taj Mahal
Taj Mahal, the Indian landmark located in the city of Agra boasts an impressive five-star rating on TripAdvisor with only 137 one-star reviews from nearly 32,000. One of the seven wonders of the world, the beautiful mausoleum is a popular tourist destination. But what did the critical visitors have to say about it?
Too crowded was the main complaint, whilst some visitors were disappointed with the haze covering the magnificent landmark. Although hard to visualise, corrupt guides and photographers ruined the trip to the impressive landmark for plenty of tourists.
Pyramids of Giza
The largest of the three pyramids is the Great Pyramid of Giza. Built more than 4,000 years ago, it is the only Great Wonder still standing.
The touts and scammers left visitors leaving one-star reviews, whilst many were upset by the amount of rubbish at the landmark.
All these world-famous landmarks have TripAdvisor reviews of over 4.0, so don’t let these AI-generated images deter you from visiting them in the future, we know some visitors love a moan.
Our Digital PR team are skilled in executing innovative and creative PR campaigns that capture the imagination to help support search engine rankings and increase brand awareness. If you think this is something we can help you with, please get in touch.
Sources & Methodology:
- AI-generated imagery created through MidJourney. Midjourney Bot is an artificial intelligence tool that generates art. It works by taking written prompts and then ‘thinks’ about how best to visualise these, referring to billions of relevant, publicly available image sources to produce new designs
- Instagram hashtag data generated via Instagram
- Review data and comments via TripAdvisor
- Tiktok view data generated via TikTok
