You might be surprised, but over the last few years I’ve noticed that once people get stuffed with Thanksgiving food and early morning shopping, a lot of folks often get online to hang out and visit with friends.

At my Tourism Currents learning community with Becky McCray, we thought we’d have some fun, throw open our own doors and invite people to chat and get smarter about tourism, hospitality and social media.

Here’s the scoop on our Black Friday tourism learning event….fun stuff we’ve planned just for you….

***  We’re going to have an Open House starting late in the day on Thanksgiving, November 25. That means anyone can view our dynamite course material (yep, all of it) without any pay wall restrictions, but only until Sunday night, November 28. Now is the time to see for yourself how much our lessons, instructional videos and Forum can help your destination marketing.

(Update:  Well, clearly I’ve lost control over Becky, because we’re keeping the Open House and sale going through today for Cyber Monday. Drop by!)

***  Inspired by Liz Strauss’ world-famous Open Mic and Open Comments nights on her Successful Blog, we’re going to have a Black Friday Open Mic (Nov 26 at 7 pm Central Time.)  It will happen either on our Tourism Currents Facebook Page or we’ll open up a blog post on the Newsletter section of the Tourism Currents website to talk about your most pressing concerns in tourism and tech/social media. Ever wanted to chat with us and your peers about those nagging questions? Come on DOWN! We’ll try not to get too rowdy.  :)

(Update:  want to see how it went? People dropped in from all over the globe! Here is the link to our Black Friday tourism open mic chat.)

***  Here’s the biggie – save 20% on the cost of our course if you sign up during Open House weekend. That’s a great deal, especially since our prices are going to increase on January 1, 2011. Details and the discount code to follow, during Open Mic.

Update:  The code for 20% off is OK1 – apply during checkout, now through Cyber Monday!

***  Share Your Pics - Show us what you’re thankful for by sharing your own tourism and hospitality pics in our Tourism Currents Flickr photo Group. We’re so grateful to all of our tourism and travel friends and supporters, so come spend a little time with us and let’s see how we can help you make sense of tech and social media.

Hope to see you sometime this weekend, even if you can “only stay for a minute.”

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Such a deal we have for you….

My business partner Becky McCray and I are very proud of the content we’ve pulled together on our Tourism Currents membership site – tons of resources in our first, introductory lesson focused on social media for tourism professionals.

However, only our paid members can see most of it  –  access to our monthly Newsletter and the option to join our Flickr Group Pool are free with sign-up, but everything else is reserved for paying members.

While we think that our insights are well worth US$45 or US$75 a month (at the two least expensive membership levels) for such detailed, specific content spread over six months of lessons, we understand that budgets are tight and people want to ensure that they’ll get their money’s worth for their investment.

So, we decided to throw open the doors, lift the pay firewall starting right NOW (just after 11:45 CST on Tuesday, September 29) and as long as you register for the free Newsletter-level membership, you’ll have access to ALL of our content, including the stuff you’d normally pay for, until 12 midnight on Friday, October 2.

Here’s how you get in:

Right now, you’ll see the full Introductory lesson, with three huge text lessons, three video interviews, tons of examples specifically for tourism and extras in the Resources section….without paying a cent!

But wait, there’s more. A blender! Ginsu Knives!

Sorry, not really, but as another bonus during the Open House, you can also upgrade to a Regular membership for the Just the Basics price.

Here is what you get at the Regular level, normally $75 per month:

• Access (along with other members) to a monthly one-hour live video Q&A/round table discussion with Becky and me,  concentrating on the lesson topic for the month. You want to “pick our brain?” Here ya go!
• Access to all lessons – a new one each month – including video interviews and takeaways/checklists.
• Access to the Tourism Currents Member Forum.
• Monthly newsletter and access to full newsletter archives.

During the Open House only, you’ll get this for US$45 per month instead of US$75 per month.

Simply register at the paid “Just the Basics” level during the Open House timeframe, and we’ll manually upgrade you to “Regular” level on our site’s back end.  (Almost as nerdy as it sounds.)

This offer is strictly limited, and ends midnight CST on Friday, October 2, 2009. Period. Finito.

We think we have good stuff. We want you to check it out. It’s that simple.

Thanks very much for your interest and support.