I first read about Earth.org on the TravelBlogExchange site. I though that the idea of a non profit travel wiki sounded interesting. Otto Stricker, the founder, tells Europe a la Carte about the site.

1 What is the aim of Earth.org?

Imagine a destination with free and trustworthy travel information. Imagine that all this information comes from YOU and your fellow travellers from all over the world. Now there is a destination for you to find travel information and share your knowledge: Earth.org is a newly launched, collaboratively written online travel guide with a non-profit-approach. With Earth.org, we all write travel guides, together.

2 Why did you start Earth.org?

Our wish is to provide responsible travel information that travellers can trust. Reliable and trustworthy travel information can be difficult to find on the Internet. At the same time, we have always had one overwhelming thought: Can we build a house if everyone brings one brick, contributing one little piece at a time? It is a beautiful idea to all work together to build this house. Just like the house, the collaborative editing of articles is a perfect way to assemble knowledge. This is also called a Wiki. So, the collaborative process of assembling information online is the perfect way to provide reliable and trustworthy travel information.

We also want a project that gives back – selfishly for our lives and holistically for our beautiful planet earth. This refers to our non-profit approach. Our only interest is the Earth.org traveller!

3 What has been the hardest aspect of setting up the site?

Earth.org is built from a 100% remote team. Remote work is new. Remote work is independent in respect to the workers location. It is working together from remote locations through the Internet. Be it a bedroom in San Francisco or a beach in Bali. Most of the team members have never seen each other. That’s somehow strange. Some have seen others, some have seen only few, many have also seen no one, but no one has seen all! And we are 100% remote- which means: No one is sitting next to anyone. We have no office, but it works! That also means that we have to cope with different time zones and even different seasons. Imagine, Justin in the US, Otto in Australia and Anne in France. At least one person has to be prepared for a late-night chat :-). As we have grown, we have found communication tools that allow us to work more efficiently. It certainly has been a learning process with ups and downs!

Remote work has had its challenges, but we are pleased to work with the best from all over our beautiful planet earth. So, whomever works for Earth.org can work from anywhere, and in anyway. The only thing required: A positive attitude.

4 What is the funniest thing that has happened while working on the site?

A part of the team started working for Earth.org in the beautiful country of India; just some people sitting together in an office in Bangalore. Aside from the frequent powercuts (once we had higher voltage and a computer burst into flames…), we had to face a few uniquely “Indian” incidents. Flooding in front of the office and the scantily clad prayer who sacrificed our computers and scattered flowers in the elevator are examples that come to mind. We all enjoyed the time in India and team members became good friends. Now, as we are spread all over the world, our time in India works to keep our relationship strong. We live differently, we have different languages and cultures, but we are tied together through our wonderful project Earth.org.

5 Is there anything you would do differently with the benefit of hindsight?

In the very beginning we tried out work situations with programmers from India and volunteer interns from all over the world. Most of the interns eventually returned to their home countries or (as those of us in this line of work tend to do!) went travelling, and we frequently had to search for new team members to replace those who left. The turnover prevented the stable and steady progress of our project. With the benefit of hindsight we would select a team of professional remote workers from the first day on.

In general and without reservation, we would not hesitate to start this project again, giving Earth.org the chance to grow and giving people all over the world the chance to be part of a very special project.

My comments – I totally agree about it being hard to find reliable travel information on the interent, there’s certainly plenty of information but how to differentiate between the wheat and the chaff is the challenge. I can relate to remote working as my partner on the recently launched travel aggregation site, Top Travel Content Europe, is a new Zealander and with a thirteen hour time difference you have plan times for communication.