Are travel guides worthwhile in this day and age? I'm going abroad next month for the first time in quite a while and I was considering getting either a Lonely Planet or Eyewitness Travel guide to keep handy in the apartment, but I wasn't sure if I'd be wasting me money (albeit less than a tenner) and I'd be better predominantly relying on the internet instead.
They can be handy even though all the info may not be up to date, but you can find almost anything you'd want to know about the country you're visiting online now anyway.
Just get them for free from the library. Though they added to the weight of my luggage considerably when I last went Interrailing (mainly because I brought a guide for each city we were visiting, which I regret).
I think they're useful as a baseline to work from. A good travel guide should cover all the tourist highlights, and fill you in on any practical or cultural issues you should know. The internet can be really useful for finding places off the beaten track or that have niche appeal, but guidebooks generally do a better job of the basics. They're written by professionals who have spent a good amount of time in the country and are at least trying to be impartial.
I tend to cut the spine off my guidebooks and keep the loose pages in a plastic wallet, chucking out things that I'm not interested in or don't need any more. I'll print stuff out from the internet and stick that in the folder as well.
