Virtual tourism in the age of COVID-19: A case study of the Faroe Islands' 'Remote Tourism' campaign

Abstract

Since the 1990s there has been a growing attention, both within the industry and academia, to tourism applications of immersive digital technologies, such as Virtual Reality (VR). Recently, a number of scholars have pointed out how technological advances in the field of VR can provide tourists with both a 'taste' of the tourism experience and a set of rich and trustworthy information (Rainoldi et al. 2018; Beck et al. 2019). From this point of view, VR has proven to have significant potential in terms of the marketing and promotion of tourism destinations and experiences. The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the global tourism industry throughout 2020 generated even further interest in tourism applications of VR. During the COVID-19 pandemic many Destination Management Organisations (DMOs) deployed VR as a marketing tool in efforts to plan for the gradual recovery of their tourism industries. However, most of these initiatives failed to get the striking international media visibility achieved by the Faroe Islands with their 'Remote Tourism' campaign. Shortly after the beginning of the global pandemic crisis in April 2020, the Faroe Islands Tourism Board launched a new virtual travel tool called Remote Tourism, which allowed prospective visitors to control a local guide via a live video stream. The Remote Tourism campaign made the headlines of news providers around the globe and was considered a major success as 700,000 online visitors participated in a live stream tour of the islands between April and June 2020 (Visit Faroe Islands 2020). This chapter will discuss the aesthetic, cultural, and technological factors responsible for the global success of the Remote Tourism campaign. The examination of the Remote Tourism virtual tours illustrates the way in which immersive digital technologies can be effectively deployed to market certain destinations. This chapter will also discuss how the specific characteristics of the Faroe Remote Tourism campaign problematise existing definitions and understandings of virtual tourism.