Vineyard owners please look Re: Everyvine

WINE TALK
1

Once in a great while I come across a new technology that truly excites me. OK, I’m a little geeky, but I love maps. Last month a new vineyard and winery mapping website launched called Everyvinehttp://www.everyvine.com. For the sake of disclosure, I have no interest in, or connection with Everyvine, I’m just a fan that sees how immensely powerful and interesting the site could be, if we can get thought leaders in each AVA, and ultimately vineyard and winery owners to perfect the data that already exists. For those of you who have been around a while you may remember the Ovid project – in many ways this will do that and much more.

Everyvine is a very simple tool to map your vineyard or winery using GIS geo-referenced photography on the Bing Maps website. I’m a long-time Google Maps user and was surprised to find how good the aerial imagery is on the Bing site. It’s actually quite thrilling and beautiful, and I’ve yet to find a cloud-obscured image – it’s as if Bing (Microsoft) flew the entire west coast on a clear sunny summer’s day.

Everyvine lets you hone in on your site, which, quite likely, is already in their database of 2,500 vineyards in California, Oregon, Washington and Idaho. Most likely you will find a single “block” outline of your entire property. To truly unleash the power of the Everyvine tool, you must go to your vineyard, put in the descriptive and contact information, and then delete that one big block and create the true block map of your planted acreage.

If you look at my site, Zenith Vineyard, located in the Eola-Amity Hills AVA, you can see that I have broken my 133 acre property down into 56 blocks totaling 73 planted acres, in the specific blocks the way I manage them and contract them. For each block, I input the varietal name, the clone, the rootstock, the row and vine spacing, the trellis system, and the certifications (LIVE & Salmon Safe) which apply to my vineyard. Then Everyvine contributes some database information including the specific acreage that I have drawn for the block (which is remarkably close to actual) the topography, including elevation slope and aspect, soil and climatic Indices including a lot of details that I believe will be improved-upon later (the soil maps for one).

This site is clearly a work in progress. It is shown as “Beta” version and I have noticed meaningful improvements in just the past couple of weeks that I have been using it. There are some bugs and glitches – it doesn’t seem to run well on Internet Explorer for instance. But even as it is, it allowed some highly interesting observations.

• It allows you to easily calculate the acreage of any parcel of land. I have a large fallow and irregularly-shaped block that I plan to plant. With a few clicks I learned with high precision the plantable area.
• It is interesting to compare vineyards and even blocks. I compared my vineyard to vineyards in the Occidental area of the Sonoma Coast AVA – thought to be one of the coolest areas in all of California. It was still 22% warmer than my Oregon site.
• Comparing blocks in my vineyard just got easier. A winemaker can click on my vineyard and know the average elevation of the block (not the vineyard) and how warm or cool it is versus other vineyard sites.
• If I were looking at property to buy or grapes to buy I would find this tool very powerful. The imagery is so good that one can easily tell which blocks may have phylloxera or other problems, and at a minimum, how even the vine development is. I would know a lot about the vineyard block before I ever set foot in the vineyard.
• I’d love to know who else has Tempranillo in my AVA, I have a little planted; who else is working on the cutting edge with this grape? Everyvine could provide that database
The Data is good, but it is not Great. I’m excited about the potential for Everyvine. But to unlock that potential each vineyard owner must input their data. It is a relatively short and painless job, the interface is not difficult, and it is quite intuitive. But knowing human nature, people are busy and this will happen only if thought leaders of the AVAs and vineyard groups teach others how to do this. And not every vineyard owner is even computer-literate.
I plan to present this tool to my AVA group and I have a personal goal of getting the Eola-Amity Hills AVA data correct. This will pay particular dividends the next time we revise the AVA map that our group produces.

Here are some specific hints to updating your information.
• The basis for the map is an aerial photo of your vineyard, and the resolution is quite good. I was able to break down sub-blocks in my vineyard by consulting my records and counting rows. If the block has 49 rows you should be able to count rows and delineate it from a contiguous block.
• Draw the blocks using the highest magnification. If you do that it will be very easy to tell where the edge of the vine row is.
• Eliminate headlands and alleys. You know the planted acres of your vineyard. The acreage that Everyvine calculates should be very close to that number. If it’s not, go back and delete the block and draw it again. It’s not hard, kinda fun actually.
• Take the time to put in the granular data for each block. I won’t know who else has Tempranillo in the Willamette Valley unless someone took the time to enter the data.

So please:

  1. Update your own vineyard information, being as complete and as detailed as you can.
  2. Take a look to see if your neighbor’s vineyard is updated. You might not know the sub-blocks or varieties, but you can re-draw the blocks and eliminate headlands and non-vineyard space.
  3. Mention Everyvine to your neighbors and ask them to update their info.
  4. Make this presentation at your AVA or grower group meeting. If each AVA had one or two people who were passionate about getting this tool right, it would be done quickly.
  5. Forward this email to your AVA group or other growers.
  6. Encourage representatives from your AVA to contact Jordan Thomas, the creator of Everyvine.
  7. Give me feedback if you have problems, or better, contact Jordan at Jordan@everyvine.com
    Thanks! Tim Ramey, Zenith Vineyard, tim@zenithvineyard.com 503.991.1119
2

I looked at Eaglepoint (vineyard I used to run) and all the data is wrong.

3

Change it?

I have found many undocumented such as Kiser, Bearwallow, Baker Ranch, Halcon, Hawks Butte in Anderson Valley and a whole slew in the RRV but it’s a start and having a few folks adjust what they know would be very useful. Pretty cool site.

4

Yep, the data does not magically get to the site. Someone who knows needs to put it in. Most often that is the owner, maybe the vineyard manager, but maybe you know your neighbor is a luddite and will never update their info so you do it for them.

Thanks for taking a few minutes to do this!

5

This is f’in cool!

6

Am I missing something?

“everyvine.com” is a commercial site, right?!?

And who is “Jordan Thomas”?

http://whois.domaintools.com/everyvine.com

http://www.linkedin.com/in/jordandesign

Who knows, maybe he’s the nicest guy in the world.

But I have never understood this urge on some peoples’ parts to rush into 21st-Century serfdom by giving away invaluable intellectual property for free, and, in the process, turning guys like Jordan Thomas or Eric Levine [or Mark Zuckerberg, for that matter] into internet millionaires who never had to leave the comfort of their own kitchens [or dress in anything more than pajamas] in order to strike it big.

At least with Amway or Mary Kay or Tupperware, there was always the hope that your wife might see a little return on her investment.

Yet we’re now passing the 150th anniversary of The War of Abraham Lincoln’s insatiable lunatic solipsism, and it’s as though 99.9% of the college-educated population of the United States are stumbling over one another in a mad, headlong rush to re-enslave themselves in service of their new Silicon Valley overlords.

Sheesh.

If the guy wants all of this intellectual property, THEN MAKE HIM PAY FOR IT.

7

This is one very cool site.
I added all the Halcon vineyard data. Just need to work out how to add the related wine info.
I have been encouraging all the local Yorkville Highlands vineyard owners to also add info.

8

First thought that popped into my head was “hey, this would be a nice feature for CT to link to at the vineyard level”. Click on the dropped down arrow for vineyard at the wine details and the vineyard map pops up.

Why does it bother you that Eric might be an internet millionaire? Heck, it’s even worse that you think. Not only is he sitting in his kitchen counting the money, I’m paying Eric every year for the privilege of making him rich and providing content for free. That son of a… [tease.gif]

9

I think its every vineyard operators decision whether or not to contribute to a site like this. I have no reason to provide the info for a ranch that I no longer work at, and don’t think its right to give out that stuff either.

10

Wow. Maybe try the decaf. I guess I think of putting my vineyard data out there as helping the world better understand my vineyard - which serves the interests of my vineyard as it would yours, unless your vineyard looks crappy from the air, has phyloxera, etc. If Jordan Thomas can make money from this, great, but I know he provided a valuable tool for me that cost me nothing.

11

Casey, you are right, you may have a duty to your previous employer not to update that info. However, if you did not have that relationship I wouldn’t think twice. I have updated maybe 30 vineyards in my AVA. I didn’t know all the data but I could make the map more accurate. There is a community interest in having accurate maps. We have one vineyard in our AVA that was/is mad at the AVA and didn’t want his vineyard included in the AVA map. The AVA chose to ignore his wishes in favor of accuracy. By the same token, I abhor maps that are “pay to play” like the Willamette Valley Wineries Association. Ridiculous that a property does not exist if it doesn’t pay.

12

It is actually LeVine, thanks.

I struck it sort of big once at Microsoft and my wife also at Expedia. Bernie Madoff took all of that on 12/11/2008.

I am sorry that you view me as some sort of lazy Internet opportunist. CellarTracker started as a hobby in 2003 as something I built for myself and then let a few friends use. And then I saw an opportunity to try and create something that would hopefully get better for everyone using it each time some new person chose to use it. Now some nine years later it does seem to be working. One might think that working 8 years fulltime, 80+ years a week on a site with a voluntary payment policy and no ads for registered users might qualify as not entirely crass. Would it have been better in your book if I had never built it?

Also for the record, I have been approached about acquisition many times and even had 4-5 very serious sets of conversations in 2006-2007 before I realized how violently opposed I am to the topic. I think my little rant here captures how I feel and what (de)motivates me: https://www.cellartracker.com/forum/fb.asp?m=187758

13

I’m trying to remember a single post from Nathan that had anything positive to say. He is good for the overheated rant. If I see one, I’ll probably try to sell it for my profit so I can become an Internet millionaire. But I think the odds are against me.

Can someone help me out by defining insatiable lunatic solipsism? I’m a pretty smart guy, and that’s got me stumped. Possibly because I majored in something useful that would get me a job when I graduated from college.

14

insatiable - incapable of being satisfied
lunatic - insane, crazy person
solipism - self absorbed, unaware of others needs


I bet Nathan is a ton of fun at a party. Often, people’s criticisms of others are actually descriptions of themselves.

15

Yeah, the words themselves I understand, the implication left me puzzled. It almost sounds like he thinks the Civil War was a vanity exercise by Lincoln. I can think if another recent conflict which that applies to, but have trouble wrapping my head around the concept for the Civil War.

16

I do not use CT (I don’t really have a cellar) and I’ve only met Eric once for MAYBE five minutes but he sure seems like a stand up guy to me. Painting him and Zuck with the same brush is simplistic, wrong and mean spirited.

17

Full disclosure-Eric is a good friend of mine. Whether or not he says the same of me…

He works his ass off on CT and deserves all the success in the world. And if my paltry $150/year and lame tasting notes help him reap untold millions, well kudos to him. I’m paying for a service I use. Synergistic, and capitalistic even.

18

Thanks Adam. You know what I would say about you, and it is all positive.

Back to the OP, good for Jordan. Five minutes on the site tells you this is a passion play first and foremost. http://www.everyvine.com/author/admin/

19

Wow, Nathan. Intellectual property? Aren’t you the guy who’s nicknamed himself “Vulgar Little Monkey”? If so, I get it.

20

No, that is a different Nathan. (Thank goodness. I had lunch with that Nathan once, and I briefly made the same mistake and was wondering why he was attacking me.)