Could Television Streaming Sites Lead the Charge for Film-Induced Tourism Post COVID? Seeking the “Sites/Sights” Seen on the Small Screen!

By focusing on television film-induced tourists, this chapter will contribute to a better understanding of tourist behaviour in relation to motivations for travel to filming locations. The chapter combines, analyses, and critiques the main debates raised by key authors in relation to identifying the motivational factors that prompt site-specific film tourism as well as providing contributions from this author’s 2016 research on television film-induced tourism in Ireland. The chapter is divided into the following sections: a brief history of film and television and a review and discussion on film tourism, a breakdown of the different categories of film tourist and a summation of the various motivations for television induced film tourism, followed by an insight into the concept of authenticity in film tourism studies and the use of technologies such as virtual reality and augmented reality as a means to provide a more immersive experience post COVID-19.