Digital detox mode: ‘Unrating Vienna’ urges travellers to seek beyond ratings

On the back of its popular ‘Unhashtag Vienna’ digital detox campaign, the Vienna Tourist Board has now launched ‘Unrating Vienna’ that tackles the online rating obsession by asking the question ‘who decides what you like?’.

The issue the company is taking on this time is online ratings — the collaborative online jury that determines the popularity of an attraction. According to the Vienna Tourist Board, 95% of holidaymakers read at least seven reviews before they book a holiday, which implies people trust the opinion of total strangers.

Thus, the campaign aims to humorously suggest that subjectively, online ratings are not always right, and tourists should try to break free from their digital bubble to stumble upon chance encounters.

In a series of ads erected across the London underground, Waterloo station and digital bus stops, the Vienna Tourist Board has portrayed five fun and beautiful Viennese moments, places and objects, including Schönbrunn Palace, Prater Park and a wine tavern called Heuriger Schübel-Auer.

To highlight how bad ratings or polarising comments can drag an experience down, real comments and ratings from online are printed on top of the images.

In one, a romantic boat ride on the Danube got branded ‘boooring’ by one unhappy customer who smacked the experience with one star. Another critical reviewer found the lawn outside the front of the Schönbrunn Palace ‘messy’. In a similar vein to the Klimt stunt, the Vienna Tourist Board has brought Unrating Vienna to life for three days at the Leopold Museum and Museums Quartier in Vienna.