How long can travel journalism survive when commercial partnerships dictate whose voice is allowed to be heard

There is a moment many journalists know well. You supply everything. The copy is clean. The facts are accurate. The story is good. Rates checked. Imagery cleared. You answer follow-up questions quickly and professionally. Then the piece appears with no credit. No link. No mention of the platform that did the work.

It feels personal. It is not. It is commercial.

Travel journalism no longer sits purely in the editorial camp. It lives uncomfortably alongside revenue targets, affiliate deals and performance metrics. Once you understand this, the behaviour of editors starts to make sense. Not morally. Practically.

Large publications now operate within commercial ecosystems. Many have deep relationships with booking platforms. Booking engines drive revenue. Links matter. Traffic matters. Control matters. Crediting an independent voice sends readers elsewhere. From a commercial point of view, it doesn’t make sense for them.

So the credit disappears.

Editors rarely explain this. Instead, they fall back on vague responses. Editorial policy. Space constraints. Layout changes. The truth is simpler. Attribution interferes with the business model.

This is especially visible when the source is a trusted editorial platform rather than a brand press office. Independent hotel experts bring judgement, taste and experience. They are not neutral inventory feeds. They are voices. And voices are harder to control.

There is also a power imbalance at play. Big titles assume access is the reward. Exposure is positioned as enough. Credit becomes optional. For those of us who have spent decades building credibility, this is not just frustrating. It is dismissive.

Another layer sits beneath this. Editors are stretched thinner than ever. Teams are smaller. Deadlines are tighter. Content is lifted quickly and reshaped to fit house style. Follow-ups fall away. Courtesy slips. Speed replaces rigour.

None of this excuses the behaviour. Using supplied material without credit erodes trust. It discourages expertise. It weakens journalism. When experienced voices stop contributing, the quality drops. Readers lose context. Stories lose depth.

Independent travel platforms exist because booking sites do not tell the full story. They do not judge. They do not edit with taste. They do not care about atmosphere, service or soul. Removing that layer leaves content thin and transactional.

So what is the answer.

You state expectations clearly. You document what you supply. You follow up once. You remember who respected your work and who did not. Most importantly, you invest in your own channels. Your audience. Your authority. Your voice.

When your platform stands strong, credit matters less. Influence shifts.

The real issue is not one publication or one editor. It’s a system that blurs journalism and commerce while pretending they’re separate. Until that’s addressed, this will keep happening.

The uncomfortable question remains. How long can travel journalism survive when commercial interests decide whose expertise is allowed to be visible?

That is the conversation the industry needs to have.