Amusing View of the Wine Bloggers Convention

KyleSchlachter’s ColoradoWinePress has a very amusing take on the recent WineBlogger’sConvention:
OldmanOnWBC

HarryOldman is Kyle’s extern who occasionally contributes humorous viewpoints on what’s exciting in the wine blogosphere. I suspect Harry is intended to be a caricature of some important personage in the wine world, but danged if I can figure out who.

Anyway, it’s Harry’s best piece yet.
Tom

HILARIOUS!!!

I loved this part:

The moment that every blogger held their breath for was the announcement of the Wine Blog Awards winners. The organizers really knew how to make this year’s awards anticipated. No one knew when the finalists were going to be announced > or who the judges were> , so the suspense was almost too much to handle.

Then this gem:

Seven bottles of wine will actually be sold because of all the blog posts.

Lol at the last comment. So true

That post could have been written about 2010 or 2012 (based on my experiences at the WBC), or I suspect, any WBC. Bloggers who know next to nothing about wine extolling the virtues of what is mostly average-to-mediocre plonk directed into their glasses. These same bloggers loudly and proudly proclaim that they don’t spit and take offense when you (sic) suggest not wearing cologne or perfume into tasting rooms. Sure, there are good, educated palates among the population, but even half that group can’t call out a wine for fear of stopping the supply of free samples.

LOL with one particular winery reference… :wink:
Never did understand who would want to goto a bloggers conference - surely much more interesting to go to a tasting!

I was there. More than happy to pipe in with specifics from what I saw and experienced…

Please do Larry.

Tom

I’ve been shocked as to the lack of traction for most wine bloggers. some are great, some good, some awful, but you think at least some consensus would form among a few. outside the trade, and other bloggers however, we almost never have a client ask us about a particular blogger or tell us about something they read on a blog. maybe content overload? unclear agenda of the bloggers?

we get 100:1 comments about this forum, newspapers, ebob and even eater and food blogs. very odd, but I think the heyday of wine blogs if there ever was one, has passed

Tom,

What would you like to know? Specifics please?

Thanks!

But you left out the best part… The obligatory Ray Walker jab.

“No one knew when the finalists were going to be announced or who the judges were, so the suspense was almost too much to handle. I guess it is kind of like ordering wine from Maison Ilan.

Maybe I’m alone here, but I find the whole thing pretty douchey, in a trying-to-be-cute/funny-at-someone-else’s-expense kind of way. I like a good joke as much as the next guy, but to do it at someone else’s expense, poor taste. Do some of the blobbers set themselves up? sure. But no more than the elite publications.

Low-hanging fruit, much?

Larry, you referred to ZAP as a drunkfest. I used to like ZAP to get exposure to new Zin producers. You must feel the WBC has more merit than ZAP. I was hoping you could explain what you think makes WBC worthwhile from your perspective. Thanks.

Tom

In my experience in the late '90s at the consumer portion of the event, ZAP was a drunk fest amid some serious people who tasted some serious wines and learned and grew from the event. I’d like to think I was one of the latter.

I went to the WBC in 2012 in Portland and it was similar, maybe not as much of a drunk fest as a mix of total amateurs in both the best and worst senses, amid some REALLY serious people on the blogger side and the more established industry side. I learned and grew from the event, but yeah, it’s an easy target for the sample whores and some people who are greener than vine leaves in May. We all started somewhere, I’m just glad most of my beginnings aren’t archived on the net.

The article linked here is as bad as bad blogging. Who hasn’t read this kind of thing many times before? If you haven’t, fine. But it’s original… NOT. Irony fully intended with a quip that’s just as tired and played out.

I think a better perspective of blogging is found here:

Parker was essentially a blogger at his start, which is terrific because of his choice criticism of today’s upstarts and muckrakers. The difference now is that there are more people, but serious writers have emerged from blogging:

Elaine
Jeremy at Do Bianchi
Bertrand at Wine Terroirs
Alder at vinography
Jamie Goode
Dr. Vino
Jim’s Loire
etc
etc
etc

Shit on blogging all you want. Crap on the conference, it was mixed in my experience, true. But have some perspective. Even at a ZAP drunk bus type tasting, good things result. See the bigger picture. Be gracious.

This.

It’s true. In fact I kept toying with the idea of attending but at the last minute didn’t feel like making the drive through LA. Plus, I don’t have a blog.

The Wakawaka link? Straight from Lake Wobegon.

One of the best tasters I’ve ever met and someone who’s been in the wine business for many years and knows more about wine than just about anyone else I’ve ever met was at the conference. He’s recently started a blog, not to write about wine but to promote his brokerage business, and figured he’d go. But guys like him are overwhelmed and drowned out by the girl who had a Merlot and decided to teach the world all about wine and has posted pics of her cat or puppy all over her Facebook page, or the guy who tries to strike a no-nonsense man’s man tone and writes about whatever he bought at the supermarket that week.

In other words, loads and loads and loads of crap. Since most people have so little actual knowledge, they try to coast on personae.

It’s unfortunate because those blogs, written for the writer and his or her three or four friends, have tarnished the whole category. There is indeed a lot of good info out there, although I’m not sure you’ll find it at the Wakawaka links. But I absolutely agree with your central thesis.

The irony is that while the internet has realized the ideal of Thomas Jefferson and Tom Paine and removed barriers to free speech, the fact is that not many people are Thomas Jefferson or Tom Paine. I wonder what the Toms would think of the situation.

IPOB, serious people can be a bore. Without the ability to laugh at ourselves we become people that few want to be around. Without people taking a walk on the lighter side now and then wine appreciation becomes that snobbish thing that the masses think it is.

My 2¢, YMMV

This.

I think that the piece as written was pretty funny, and yes, it does hit ‘low lying fruit’ as someone else says.

Tom, I never said or implied per se that this event was ‘better’ than ZAP at all - I just referred to the fact that that event has now become synonymous with more folks getting drunk at than most other wine festivals. That is not to say that that event does not have its merits - it obviously does and the organization has done a fantastic job of keeping it relevant and vibrant all of these years . . .

It’s just too easy to brush as broad a stroke over the Blogger’s Conference as many do. As Vincent and Beau have pointed out, the post certainly does strike true in limited ways here and there, but not in its entirety.

Are there bloggers out there who seem to write simple, ‘uneducated’ pieces about wine? Heck yeah - just as their are posters here who do the same thing - and that’s okay. Some posters here are truly and honestly trying to learn about about the craft and choose to do so by exploring and writing about their journey, and this is what some bloggers do as well.

Are there plenty of ‘serious writers’ as bloggers out there? Heck yeah - plenty of folks who have now ‘had impacts’ and have been mentioned above and continue to write either provocative stuff or just interesting stuff.

The event itself was far from a drunkfest to me. Yep, there was drinking involved. Yep, there were plenty of bottle shots taken and praise for wines that perhaps did not deserve the praise that they received.

I went as a blogger myself, but also poured my wines at a few different events, and was a moderator for a panel on ‘pioneering winemakers of the region’ that included Richard Sanford, Ken Brown, Rick Longoria, and Bob Lindquist (holy crap was I intimidated!!!). I therefore saw the event from many sides indeed. There was a lot of drinking going on for sure - just as there is at ANY convention. There was a lot of money thrown around by larger companies wanting more exposure - pretty much all of whom were from outside the Santa Barbara area interestingly enough. There were ‘cliques’ for some bloggers have been coming to this event know for all 7 years and get together regularly to do tastings etc.

To me, the important thing about the event was to ‘craft’ the story of Santa Barbara County in a way that we wanted it to be - not have it crafted for us. It was important and imperative for me to show the diversity of what is going on here varietally speaking, to show that many of our pioneering winemakers are still out there doing it - and producing some of their best wines now, and to show the down-to-earth nature of our winemaking community, something that sets us apart in many ways. I think that was achieved.

Was wine sold this weekend around here? Yes. Will there be additional wine sales based on folks attending writing about the region? I believe there will be. Will this turn out to be a ‘game changer’ for our region? No. Are some of these bloggers really good at storytelling? Yes. Are some not? Yes . . .

The event is far from perfect, and there are many ways I believe to make it more interesting. That said, the seminar that Michael Larner gave on the geology of Santa Barbara County viticulture would have been fascinating for anyone on this board to experience; the panel on Ballard Canyon syrahs, moderated by Patrick Comiskey and featuring Beckmen, Stolpman, Jonata, Larner and more would have been right up WB’s alley; the panel on Sta Rita Hills would have been enjoyed by many here as well . . . .

Again, not as simple as ‘bloggers suck’ or ‘bloggers have no impact’ - at least to me . . .

Cheers!

Thank you for the perspective Larry.

Tom

Anytime - just wanted to offer a differing viewpoint . . . not better, not worse . . . just differing.

And I apologize if it appeared I was bagging ZAP - it was and continues to be a very important event for many to attend, both on the producer and consumer side. And perhaps with the change of format and venue, it will change how it is viewed moving forth - I guess time will tell . . .

Cheers!