Tourism Australia Creates World's Longest Selfie Stick for Japanese Tourists

Japanese tourists, like virtually every other nationality of tourists, love their selfies.

A case could be made that the Japanese developed the first selfie stick, based on this post showing a photo of a homemade selfie contraption from 20 years ago. This year, "kissing selfies" are all the rage among Japanese teenagers.

Tapping into that obsession, Tourism Australia launched a new travel product and promotion called GIGA Selfie last week aimed at the Japanese market, which allows users to create a long-range "destination selfie."

Tourists first download the GIGA app, and then they stand on a designated spot facing a specific way, located at a number of iconic Australian destinations. By clicking the shutter button on the app, that triggers a camera positioned as much as a thousand feet away.

At first, the resulting imagery is an upclose portrait of the tourist(s), but then the camera pans back to show the entire scope of the destination. The virtual selfie photo/video is then emailed to the user's account.

In 2014, Japan represented Australia’s sixth largest number of inbound arrivals, fifth largest market for total visitor expenditure, and eighth for overall visitor nights. According to Tourism Australia, the Japanese market is anticipated to grow 15-20% in 2016.

Tourism Australia developed this initiative as part of its ‘There's Nothing Like Australia’ campaign in conjunction with partner airlines, travel agencies and state tourism offices. The promotional video below stars Ren Ishikawa, one of Japan's top models and media personalities.