Wine 2.0 — Today, March 8

Mar 8gregoire
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Mar 8gregoire
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Mar 8Michael M.
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Mar 8Michael M.
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Mar 8Bill W.
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Bill W.
Just in case the message didn\\47t get to Tim via
the blog comment, I have a conflict in my
calendar tonight and can\\47t make it. If anything
changes, I\\47ll be here, but I wouldn\\47t count on
it. Hopefully a transcript will be posted. Thanks!
Bill W.
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Bill W.
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Mar 8Bill W.
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Mar 8Paul
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Mar 8Paul
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Mar 8Tim E.
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Hugo (.
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Tim E.
hi hugo
Hugo (.
Hi Tim, i made it but i might be a bit hee and there as i\\47m at work currently.
ROB B.
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Tim E.
that\\47s fine... how\\47s friday morning going
Tim E.
hi rob
ROB B.
Hi all!
Jasper
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Mar 8Hugo (.
Great. I\\47m again at a Zinc mine located overshould be thankful for internet =)
Tim E.
hi jasper
Jasper
Hi there
Hugo (.
Hi Rob, Jasper
ROB B.
Hello...
ROB B.
Once everyone\\47s here, I\\47ll get into my 2004 Jacob\\47s Creek Reserve Riesling!
Philip J.
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Tim E.
sounds nice... we\\47ll start in 5 min or so...
Philip J.
hi all!
Jasper
I just finished a Culraithin Syrah and an Etim
Syrah. It\\47s 1 am. here. Hope I\\47m sober enough to contribute ;-)
WineQ M.
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WineQ M.
hey peeps
Tim E.
hi marshall
WineQ M.
howdy Tim
el j.
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WineQ M.
snowy there
Mar 8Tim E.
we\\47ll start in 4 or 5 minutes
Tim E.
yes we have 18 inches on the ground now... but it is starting to melt
WineQ M.
wow 18 inches
Tim E.
el jefe!
WineQ M.
hey jefe
WineQ M.
he must have passed out at the computer again
Michael M.
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el j.
uuuunnnnnhhhh
WineQ M.
hehe
el j.
look who\\47s talking about passing out....
WineQ M.
hehehe
WineQ M.
shhhh
el j.
\\47l
el j.
\\47k
WineQ M.
the people in chat are supposed to think i\\47m respectable
WineQ M.
and responsible
Ted M.
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Tim E.
we all know better, jefe ;-)
WineQ M.
:)
Jasper
Hi Ted!
WineQ M.
Anyone try that 2004 Escafeld Petit Verdot yet I
saw it available on some website...
Ted M.
Hey Jasper
el j.
:)
Tim E.
let\\47s wait a couple more minutes before we start...
Mar 8WineQ M.
yeah josh is trying to come, but hes having DNS issues
Mar 8WineQ M.
he can ping, but not browse here...
Tim E.
ok let\\47s get started...
Tim E.
first let\\47s introduce everyone...
Tim E.
...i\\47m tim from winecast
Tim E.
anyone
Jasper
I\\47m Jasper from FreeWineSearcher.com
WineQ M.
<-- Marshall from WineQ.com, where you create your own wine club! ;-)
Hugo (.
Hugo from The Oz Wine Show (oz wine podcast)
Philip J.
Philip James - Wine Messenger - eretailer
Ted M.
I\\47m Ted Malone, Vino2Vino.com
ROB B.
Hi, I\\47m Rob from San Diego...no snow here!
Ted M.
my CTO (and brother) Mike just got booted out. He\\47s re-booting his Mac :)
ward
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Mar 8WineQ M.
hello ward
Tim E.
the format is each person on the chat will have
the floor for a question and the group will
weight in until i think we are done with the
point, then we\\47ll go to the next person... who wants to go first
WineQ M.
introduce yourself!
ward
Hello, all!
Tim E.
marshall, do you want to lead off with your question
el j.
jeff from twisted oak as the Interested User
Tim E.
is there a lag tonight with campfire
WineQ M.
it seems fine to me
el j.
no, its just me
Tim E.
ok, who wants to post the first question for the group
WineQ M.
sorry Tim, no question, just here to watch and learn
james
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Tim E.
alright, then, i\\47ll start with my geeky microformats question then...
Philip J.
anyone mind if i go its almost a prelude to tim\\47s question anyway
Michael S.
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Tim E.
...i\\47m working on integrating hreview into my
blog and have come up with the following fields to collect...
Tim E.
View paste

producer
designation
vineyard
country
region
varietal
retail_price
alcohol
bottle_size
notes
rating
tags

Tim E.
and i\\47ll embed an hcard for "reviewed by" data
Tim E.
reaction comments
Mar 8el j.
\\47brand\\47 may be different than producer
Ted M.
what about release_price
WineQ J.
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el j.
or is that designation
Philip J.
tim - maybe you should explain WHY youre doing this
WineQ J.
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WineQ J.
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Tim E.
to make it easier for wine 2.0 sites to harvest
my reviews... i will not cross post every wine to
all the sites so i think this will be the best route...
Philip J.
and to follow up on some of the points -
designation, region, vineyard mean different
things with wines from different places
Michael S.
I think for properly normalized data, you need to
store the wine brand, name, label info separate
from the rating info. One database of wine names
with an ID# for each wine, then each review listed by ID#.
el j.
what about blends
Philip J.
with a negociant - who\\47s the producer the
grower the vintner or the brand that brings the
two together or is it simply the name on the label
Tim E.
does anyone think there will be such as site with
all the normalized wine data in a database
Philip J.
ha! thats my question!
ROB B.
not anytime soon
Jasper
Yes, where is that database
Philip J.
the answer is yes, eventually...
Hugo (.
tim why not add "vintage" and "tasting date" for differences in age
Ted M.
agreed
Tim E.
good points philip but i think i can work with
designation, region, vineyard and producer for most wines
Michael S.
There is no such db yet, but think of the power
of all these sites creating a master database as on open source project.
Philip J.
if i build it, will you contribute ... i have a
side project, that i\\47ll announce next chat
Michael S.
You are each building your own database anyway -
why not contribute to a master database.
Jason C.
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Ted M.
exactly
Tim E.
right, i didn\\47t copy and paste correctly...
vintage was there but tasting_date was not; thanks
Jason C.
Hi, guys. Sorry I\\47m late. Don\\47t let me interrupt. I\\47ll catch up.
Jasper
Problem is that when everyone uses different
(meta)data, it\\47s not going to integrate very well
ward
How meaningful is price
Tim E.
yes i think an open source database would be a great resouce for the industry
Mar 8Philip J.
michael - i remember reading your blog post about
the master DB. as you said - no one wants to give up their \\47asset\\47
Michael S.
True - we have spent several years and many $$
building our db. But, if there was a project that
would help me avoid the costs of maintaining my
db, I would consider contributing.
Jason C.
Ward, I\\47m finding that some of my users are more
interested in the "price I paid" rather than "the
going price". Something to think about.
Jasper
There must be a good reason why ISWN did not get off the ground as a central DB
Michael M.
what is really needed is an accurate way to do
record linking between databases, which doesn\\47t
necessarily require a master DB... you just need
a good way of uniquely identifying a particular wine
Tim E.
if someone setup some kind of non-profit website
to collect this data would the industry support
it by entering their data or do we need to go
down the user generated data route
WineQ J.
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Joshua
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Philip J.
user generated data gets messy - bordeaux will get entered as a varietal
Philip J.
etc
Ted M.
the "industry" may be too large to expect that kind of co-operation
Jason C.
If you count me as industry, I would support it.
Support from the wineries/producers themselves would be great.
el j.
you may be able to get large associations to drive, e.g. the wine institute
Jason C.
(btw, I\\47ve got openwinedatabase.org registered ;)
Hugo (.
Michael, where is that post re DB maintenance and asset
Philip J.
the problem is there\\47s no clean data anywhere.
even at the winery or distributor level. i\\47ve
seen diagio, southern, charmers and many other
distributor databases and they are all messy
el j.
you would have to demonstrate the benefits to the industry of course
Michael S.
you can id a wine with 3 fields: producer, label,
varietal. Add some other basic information
(country, appelation). Leave every other piece of
information for the people using the database.
Philip J.
either with holes, or worse factually incorrect
el j.
VARIETAL DOES NOT WORK FOR BLENDS
james
or for old world
Michael S.
I agree Philip, it would have to be an edited
process. Anyone can submit, but qualified editors include/exclude.
WineQ M.
sorry jef, i couldn\\47t hear you
james
sort of a wiki concept then
Tim E.
so maybe we could agree on normalizing the data
in all the wine 2.0 sites as a starting point
Ted M.
wikipedia style would be more effective
Ted M.
rather than having editors
Michael S.
hugo - http://allmovie4u.com/…
ROB B.
good idea Tim
Mar 8Tim E.
do you think the wine industry would support a wiki format, ted
Hugo (.
thanks
Jason C.
At WineLog, I am considering the idea of "locking
off wines" for the wineries/producers. So for
instance, I can lock Twisted Oak wines so that only el jefe can edit them.
WineQ M.
winewiki.org
Tim E.
wiki markup is not the easiest to master, etc.
WineQ M.
(name suggestion)
Philip J.
sure its taken...
Michael S.
then, the consortium can develop an xml standard
for data exchange built on top of the db.
Michael M.
Tim: there are wysiwig editors for wikitext
Ted M.
problem is, locking things off flies in the face of "2.0"
WineQ M.
not necessarily
el j.
wikiwino.org
WineQ M.
even at wikipedia there is some measure of locking
james
do we want wiki features for content or for data
Hugo (.
it\\47s a thin line
Philip J.
problem with the wiki is that only 1% of the
people contribute. i dont know if 1% of the
online wine market is sufficient to build something this complex
el j.
Ted: As producer I should have ultimate control
over the basic product factual data
WineQ M.
but that 1% are enthusiasts
Jason C.
Ted, right. So users can still tag and comment on
the wines. Users can create new wines, but if it
has "Twisted Oak" in the name field, only Jefe
would be able to edit it. Perhaps we can send him
emails when other folks want to edit his wine ;)
Ted M.
agreed on that
Tim E.
someone already has winewiki.org
el j.
but of course not the discussion, ratings, etc.
Philip J.
and...a bit problem is that many of the varietals
and regions dont fit properly. is zinfandel the
same as negromaro regions overlap, its very messy
james
so for producers that are "engaged" in the
project, they maintain full control over their
data. otherwise, it\\47s community controlled
Jason C.
For the most part Jefe does a much better job at
entering a name, varietal, region, etc for his wines.
Ted M.
as long as the Twisted Oak person has
demonstrated the ability to enter the factual
data in a way that is consistent with the core system
Ted M.
they have to earn the right to "own" the data
Jason C.
Yes, James.
Philip J.
classically its been easier to lock these topics
up to avoid people debating them. openeing them
up is very interesting, i just dont know what we\\47d yeild
Michael S.
I would suggest a wiki with full wine details is
too broad. Just build a database of basic wine
names. That would enable each of us to pursue our
own content based businesses and exchange data more easily.
Tim E.
i agree with michael s on this one...
Jasper
Besides the name of the wine as an identifier,
for scraping it would be necessary to recognize a
wine from a description for those who don\\47t use
the id. That is pretty hard and a lot of work
Philip J.
michael - you\\47d pay to use this
Ted M.
unique ID\\47s would be nice though
Tim E.
the site would need robust data import tools for
batch uploads and some sort of entry form for one-offs
Ted M.
think about iTunes & music identification
Michael M.
Can someone tell me why a central repository/DB
is necessary. Seems to me all we really need is a
mechanism for record linkage between various sites...
Philip J.
beyond contributing, somehow the db would need $ to survive
james
if there was a central database, a URL could be the ID.
Michael M.
e.g. a standard naming convention/XML format
Michael S.
No, but I would contribute to the upkeep if others were doing the same.
el j.
MAC addresses for wine...
Tim E.
longer term, support for vinoXML and microformats would be needed
Jason C.
WineLog id ;)
Mar 8Philip J.
ok, so this is back to the failed iswn then...
james
jason: what are your DB credentials :-)
Ted M.
IMO, you could do this whole thing *in* Wikipedia
Tim E.
why not SCSI addresses, jefe ;-)
Jason C.
Jefe, any insight as to why producers don\\47t use
universal ids I\\47ve heard smaller folks don\\47t use
UPCs because they only ship a small number of
wines directly to restaurants, members, etc.
el j.
doh!
Michael M.
UPCs cost money
Jason C.
ah
james
URLs are much more human friendly than GUIDs or numeric IDs.
Philip J.
jason - even gallo dont use the upc properly. i
spoke to someone there a week ago and called him
out on this, and he said they didnt care.
basically they used the same upc across vintages for a wine
el j.
UPCs cost money and the stores etc. that use them
want to re-use them for the next vintage
Jason C.
Right.
Philip J.
only varying them when they released an expensive
wine that they wanted to track by vintage
Ted M.
UPC\\47s are worthless
Jason C.
(anyone else have the feeling that this is a
conversation that happens every 6 months or so with no progress)
Michael M.
yea, we\\47ve done some investigation... no winery
(that I know of) changes UPCs for different vintages
Ted M.
imo :)
el j.
bar codes also take away from the pretty label (seriously)
james
the centralized system would have to generate the
IDs/URLs so they would be consistently applied.
Michael S.
I don\\47t know much about the iswn - i am looking
at the site now - but, it seems unnecessarily complex.
Tim E.
alright have we exhausted the first question who wants to go next
james
and it\\47s not human friendly
Philip J.
it gets worse. the small wineries copy gallo\\47s
upc structure to save time, so a whole host of
upc\\47s use gallo\\47s string, but are family vineyards
el j.
philip - that is common and driven by the retailers
ward
James and I talked about the differences between microFormat and vinoXML
Philip J.
el jefe - youre right. the retailers dont always store all the digits!
Tim E.
ok, shoot ward...
el j.
yup
Hugo (.
I have a question: what happens if a winery tries
to sue for a user generated bad review
Hugo (.
oops, save it for later
ward
Seems to me that vinoXML has more "legs" for a DB application
Tim E.
they get hammered by wine blogs and bad stuff is
on the first page of google about them
Ted M.
reviews are opinions
Philip J.
i can nix my question - it was about the DB. my
take on the answer, people would love it to
exist, and we\\47d contribute, but the wineries and
retailers probably dont care enough. thanks
Hugo (.
But they don\\47t generally know that at the time
Tim E.
ok, let\\47s focus on ward\\47s question now
Jason C.
(as an experiment, I can add microformats to
WineLog pages during this discussion... and maybe
I\\47ll be indexed by Scrugy better)
Mar 8james
IMO, vinoXML is more of an interchange spec and not necessarily a storage spec.
james
yes you will!
Tim E.
is it vinoXML and microformats or vinoXML or microformats
Michael M.
I\\47d say AND
Michael M.
microformats and XML are two different things
james
yep, "and"
Michael M.
serve different purposes
Jason C.
James, which spec should I use The blog post you made a while back
Tim E.
please explain, michael m
james
jason: sure, that\\47ll work
Michael M.
microformats are embedded in HTML/XML to make
things easier for computer parsing... XML is pure
markup, e.g. for exchanging data, etc...
Michael M.
basically, you\\47d use microformats in a blog post
Michael M.
you\\47d use XML for an API
ward
microformats seem to be favored by those
scrapping sites; vinoXML is more for classical syndication, I think.
Michael M.
microformats.org has a pretty good explanation
Tim E.
who would use vinoXML then
Tim E.
what types of site
james
well, vinoXML may be used by the universal DB we
were talking about earlier as an API that we\\47d all use.
Michael M.
if you wanted to exchange data (e.g. download a
list of wines/prices from WineZap) you\\47d use XML
Jasper
What is the advantage of using microformats for
computer to human communication
james
there\\47s also wineformats.org
Jason C.
right. thanks.
ward
Advantage Right now they are easy to implement in blogs.
Jason C.
we\\47ll see if I can do this and stay tuned into the chat.
Mar 8Tim E.
ok, let\\47s move to another question... if you have one jasper please post it now
ward
But, with a little work, you could have a vinoXML
editor that produced the some sort of human copy that the microformat does.
Joshua
if jasper gets stage fright, i have one to offer
Joshua
i know the pressure can be intense
Jasper
Go ahead
WineQ M.
:)
Jasper
It is...
Tim E.
i just wanted to go to him next as it\\47s almost 02:00 there...
Joshua
oh, i don\\47t mind waiting
Tim E.
alright, joshua, fire away then
Joshua
please, jasper, didn\\47t mean to elbow in
Joshua
ok
Joshua
here\\47s a question only a wine retailer could love. but we do love it.
Jasper
NP,Still going strong
Joshua
What are the most common reasons you decide to
buy a new wine (when you\\47ve not already tasted the wine)
ward
Recommendation from a trusted source!
james
+1
Joshua
thinking back to the last few times you\\47ve bought
a wine (untasted), what prompted you to buy it
Tim E.
recommendation from a friend/wine blog/retailer
ROB B.
bingo
Michael M.
same
Joshua
trusted source ... got it. what else
Ted M.
define trust
Ted M.
:)
Tim E.
reputation of the winery
Tim E.
what the buzz is on eBob, etc.
el j.
reputation is usually the result of inputs from trusted sources...
james
curiosity. exploring a new region or varietal.
ROB B.
wine friends, retailers you trust, etc.
Tim E.
i wanted to try the region or varietal
Jason C.
WineLogger recommendation, the winery/label was
cool (Twisted!), 100pt ratings, Gary V. recommendations.
Jasper
Surprising my friends with something unexpected
ROB B.
reviewers you trust
WineQ M.
security and variety
Tim E.
sometimes pricing also factors in... i\\47m a sucker
for $25 Barolo, for example ;-)
ROB B.
yes
Jason C.
In PA we have "chairman\\47s select" which is often
a good deal. Though I\\47ve heard people say the
wine is discounted because something may have
happened to it... e.g. stored in hot warehouse.
Mar 8Joshua
ok, if i could be permitted a follow up... what
qualities do you look for in a "trusted source"
Mar 8el j.
a sommelier, perhaps untrusted, who agreed to take it back if I didn\\47t like it
Joshua
hehe
james
someone with a similar palate
WineQ M.
a wine blogger
ROB B.
that the wine recommendations are actually good
Tim E.
ususally wine is discounted because the winery
has too much inventory and wants to release the next vintage
ward
What I would like to see is a process for
"calibrating palates" so that I could get
recommendations from folks who share my palate.
ROB B.
or that\\47s the stores model
ROB B.
cost +
Jason C.
psychologically, people may trust recommendations
that they had to pay for (magazines) vs. free ones (blogs)
WineQ M.
we are working on palate-mapping from DNA
Joshua
hmmm, good point, jason
el j.
your source likes four wines that you also like,
and she recommends a fifth wine...
Joshua
shhhh, marshall
WineQ M.
;)
WineQ M.
hehe
el j.
you are likely to buy that fifth wine
Jason C.
ward, good point. something I\\47ve been thinking about. maybe my question...
Ted M.
that\\47s collaborative filtering
Tim E.
the ratings on wineq and winelog, etc. also play
a role i think as i load wines into my queue.
Ted M.
we did that at TiVo for TV recommendations
james
in order to calibrate a palate you need much more than basic tagging.
Jason C.
Yeah, at WineLog we compute a "similarity score"
between users. Then find wines common in logs of users similar to you.
Tim E.
but it doesn\\47t work in my house for some reasin ted (2 tivos and counting)
Jason C.
(These recommendations are not yet available, but should be soon.)
el j.
I want to read WHY they liked it and see if the reasoning works for me
ward
Yes, it is collaborative filtering but I\\47ve not
seen many folks try to achieve it.
Ted M.
:)
Tim E.
amazon and netflix filtering tends to work better for me
Ted M.
amazon filtering is collaborative filtering too
Joshua
good point, jeff
el j.
bingo tim
Ted M.
it only works well for mass-market products
ward
I don\\47t think amazon and netflix approach really work for wine.
Jason C.
I write about why collaborative filter may be
hard (or easy) for wine vs. books and movies
here: http://allmovie4u.com/…
Ted M.
otherwise, correlation vectors aren\\47t strong enough
el j.
not so mass Ted
Tim E.
so why is that a better predictor than what tivo
does for programming (there is a wine tie-in here)
Mar 8Jason C.
not enough overlap in wine (i.e. everyone saw
"Terminator 2", not everyone has drunk _____ wine)
Jason C.
wine is perishable, changes over time...
Ted M.
when collab vectors fails, tivo falls back on genre weighting
Jason C.
is only available for brief periods of time, etc.
Tim E.
joshua will disagree with your point in a moment, ward
Ted M.
in wine, that would be varietal weighting
el j.
bingo jason
Ted M.
it\\47s not enough
Jason C.
there are things to combat this, and I think CF can still work...
Philip J.
music i think music\\47s more like wine - lots of
variety, and there arent that many songs everyone listens to
james
anyone familiar with pandora and what they\\47re
doing with music can the same be done for wine
ward
Music doesn\\47t change from hour to hour.
Jason C.
music is better I suppose. There is also more of
a notion of "taste" in music vs. movies and
books. There is obviously a "taste" in wine.
Ted M.
the nice thing about CF, is it doesn\\47t require a
user to state why/how they like something
Ted M.
just that they do
Jason C.
James, I\\47d point you to Jefe\\47s cheat sheets.
Jasper
The "head" in music is also much bigger than in wine
Tim E.
right, philip, i think the music and wine analogy
is a good one because both are very fragmented
Ted M.
wine needs a "thumbs down" button
Tim E.
ha! good one, ted!!
el j.
http://allmovie4u.com/
Tim E.
i\\47ll implement that on my next wine blog
ROB B.
it does...it\\47s called doesn\\47t sell.
Ted M.
everything gets sold eventually
Ted M.
doesn\\47t mean anyone actually liked it
ROB B.
discounted
Jason C.el j.
it\\47s an 83...
Tim E.
not all the time, rob; there is some good juice
out there that doesn\\47t sell and bad juice that does
Ted M.
to some, 1-star means kind-of-liked
Ted M.
to me, it means it sucks
ward
Speaking of selling: how do you apply Wine 2.0 concepts to wine retailing
james
mobile is going to be key
Tim E.
embrace rss and social media
Jason C.
(James, maybe quick question. Sorry to post here.
Should I re-copy the wine details and hide them
for each review e.g. I have a wine info page
with the wine info once and 3 reviews on it.)
Tim E.
i agree james, mobile is key and michael s is
leading the way on this at winezap
Jason C.
Tim E. I released WineLog Mobile and no posts
Mar 8Jason C.
:(
Mar 8james
jason: you can "include" the same wine data in
multiple hreviews. corkd does this.
el j.
maybe using social networks to develop potential
fans, then meeting with them to try the product...
Jason C.
I think I\\47m with Wine Messenger (forget the name)
that Mobile isn\\47t so important YET. But it will soon.
Tim E.
well i was recording this podcast with jason calacanis...
Tim E.
;-)
Tim E.
i\\47ll get to it jason c
Jason C.
(As much as I hate to do this, I\\47ll take a look at what cork\\47d\\47s got. :)
Ted M.
http://allmovie4u.com/…
james
the right mobile app doesn\\47t exist yet, IMO
Jason C.
np
Ted M.
i agree with james
Ted M.
but, WineZap is cool
Jason C.
Ted, nice. SMS is next on the list ofr us.
Tim E.
i think the way winezap uses sms is the right app, but that\\47s just me
LENNDEVOURS
has entered the room
Tim E.
so maybe sms is the killer app here
Tim E.
welcome lenn
Michael S.
just fyi - winezap has 2 mobile products:
LENNDEVOURS
(sorry for being so late)
Michael S.mobile@winezap.com a wine name and
vintage, we send you back the pricing info
Michael S.winezap.com on your mobile and you
will see a striped down version of our wine search engine.
james
sms is just what we have to deal with today. with
wifi support and better mobile bandwidth, it will all change.
Philip J.
sorry - wandered off. I\\47m Wine Messenger!
Jasper
I think SMS is too much a hassle and lacks interaction, not the killer app.
Tim E.
is that a wap site, micheal s
ROB B.
Michael, on #2, whose technology
Michael S.
no, just stripped down hmtl. I am looking at xhtml.
Tim E.
the european doesn\\47t like sms
WineQ M.
Michael, that is really cool.
Philip J.
i have to jump off. it was a pleasure. Is there a
way to get the rest of the transcript
WineQ M.
Philip, it\\47ll be posted by someone, i\\47m sure ;)
Jasper
That\\47s right, not for getting wine info that is
Jason C.
fwiw, winelog.mobi
Jason C.
you can log in as me without a password (username: jason)
Tim E.
i\\47ll post the complete transcript at the wine 2.0
google group and link from my blog
Michael S.
I wish Eric L. from CT was here - I think he is
on the cutting edge on some of this stuff.
Mar 8james
please explain
Tim E.
which sites, michael
Michael S.
cellartracker.com - He has a user contributed
wine name database and has been mobile for several years.
Tim E.
oh, right, i\\47ll have to rope him into the discussion...
Jasper
(micro)browsing is a different story.
http://allmovie4u.com/
Tim E.
i thought CT was the state and not the site ;-)
Michael M.
too bad CT\\47s interface sucks.
Tim E.
man, eric takes flack all the time for that ui, but i agree with you
Michael M.
(so does ours, though...)
Tim E.
ok, who would like to post the next question
Tim E.
james
Tim E.
either micheal
james
uh, ok. i\\47ll go.
Tim E.
michael (sorry)
Michael S.
How big is our market ie. how many people are
online who would use our service
Michael M.
Michael S: i think the market is bigger than a lot of people realize
Tim E.
hmm interesting question michael...
Michael M.
I saw the discussion about music earlier... I
think the market is more like books, actually
Tim E.
are you referring to winezap or your other auction site
Michael M.
in terms of market size, fragmentation, the type of people who are buying
Michael M.
price, etc.
Mar 8Michael S.
I mean\\47t "our services" - the business we are all
in. Wine retail in the US is $20-60BILLION, but
much of that is the casual wine drinker.
Joshua
Funny you should ask about market size, Michael
Stajer. When we were researching WineQ and trying
to get a handle on market size, your blog post on
the subject was the first intelligent discussion we found.
Hugo (.
Sorry guys, have to go. But thanks for the chat.
(i\\47ll be more involved next chat) =)
Tim E.
see ya hugo!
james
we\\47re just talking about online, tho, right
Tim E.
ok, i think that we are in the low single digits here michael s
Tim E.
as a percentage of the total market
ROB B.
agreed
el j.
I would disagree Tim.
Joshua
Michael, my hunch, based on back-of-the-envelope
calculations, is that the current market for online wine sales is around $1M.
Jason C.
what\\47s that stat that a few people buy all of the wine
Hugo (.
has left the room
el j.
I think you\\47ll find that the use of the web to research any purchase is way up
Jason C.
so we don\\47t need everyone to be our user, just those few power users.
el j.
joshua - show us your envelope!
Tim E.
i\\47d have to look at some internet stats but not a
lot of folks are using the internet to buy wine
right now... i\\47m banking my career on that this
will change very rapidly, however
Ted M.
imo, we need to keep thinking "2.0" here.
Ted M.
all ships rise with the tide
Jason C.
Yeah, El J. Maybe I\\47m naive, but I feel like
people will use the web to research purchase
anything... so just pick a niche that isn\\47t saturated yet. Wine
Ted M.
and, consistency and interoperability will really help
ward
This is web 2.0: Has anyone here been involved
with simultaneous tasting of a preselected wine
and used something like campfire to share the
moment A "real-time" tasting with folks remotely located one from another
Tim E.
research, yes, but no
WineQ M.
ward, that sounds weird
WineQ M.
i wanna hear "ooohs" and "ahhhs"
el j.
slurps
ROB B.
isn\\47t that Virtual Wine promotes http://allmovie4u.com/
Tim E.
yes, there is an outfit in the uk called virtualwine doing that now
WineQ M.
slurping, spitting, etc
Ted M.
if we\\47re going to help de-mystify a fragmented
market, we need to do it in a consistent way and
embrace the discussion going on in people\\47s blogs, etc.
ward
Ya but: to have a tasting, you have to get folks
in one place. This way you can participate from your own home.
Joshua
My envelope, from memory: Stajer himself
estimated online wine sales to be around $500K
for 2004. They were unlikely more than $100K inWine.com and everyone else were
getting funded. That implies a growth rate of
around 50% per year. Extrapolate that out and you
get around $1M for 2007. Which isn\\47t too
unreasonable given that some wineries are
reporting 300% year-over-year growth in direct sales.
Mar 8WineQ M.
good point... but it doesn\\47t seem fun to drink
wine in front of my computer (not that i don\\47t do that all the time)
james
what about at a wine 2.0 enabled wine bar
Joshua
that 300% figure (again, from rough memory) is
based on some data that Nexternal published
WineQ M.
a cyber wine bar
james
yeah, a "connected" wine bar
Ted M.
Cinetopia, outside of Portland
LENNDEVOURS
What exactly goes on in this cyber wine bar
ROB B.
second life wine bar!
Tim E.
an interesting idea james, sort of like vino
venue with lcd panels above the wines
Tim E.
and blog feeds/reviews there
james
yeah, but it\\47s gotta be real. i don\\47t want any virtual wine.
Jasper
I\\47d say i would go to a bar to meet people, not to sit behind a screen
LENNDEVOURS
I think sometimes this group gets a little too
caught up in what can be done rather than what people actually want...no
james
who said anything about a screen
WineQ M.
what if the screen talked about the wine
Tim E.
right but i was suggesting a wine bar with
reviews, etc. next to the wines for people to
check out before making their selection
Ted M.
Cinetopia has the Enomatic machines (like
VinoVenue) and a terminal to help you choose what to taste.
Ted M.
Per LEN, I\\47m not sure whether people actually want it
Tim E.
right lenn
Tim E.
ok, let\\47s move to james and his question then
ward
Web 2.0 is about participation, right
Ted M.
community
LENNDEVOURS
Web 2.0 is about doing things online that you can\\47t do elsewhere too
Philip J.
has left the room
james
so ward posted a rant earlier today about reading
blogs and finding what he was really interested in reading.
james
anyone else share this frustration any ideas on
how to deliver wine info more effectively
Mar 8Ted M.
guys, this has been fun. Mike and I need to run. Blog-you-later.
LENNDEVOURS
I think blogs are a good way to deliver wine
info. Is searching on a blog any harder than
going through back issues of Wine Spectator ;)
Jason C.
peace out
Michael M.
peace :P
el j.
good point Lenn (hi)
Tim E.
later jason
Jason C.
(sorry. I\\47m still here. was saying buy to Ted M. and Co)
james
searching on each blog
LENNDEVOURS
Maybe ward can elaborate a bit more
Jason C.
good point, Len.
Tim E.
just use scrugy to find what you want then...
Jason C.
There are ways to create custom search engines
(Google, RollYo.com) which search only certain sites (e.g. blogs).
Jason C.
I\\47ve been thinking of putting one together.
Tim E.
the alawine site already has one, jason
Jason C.
Basically, you would search Google for "Twisted
Oak Tempranillo" but it would only show results
from the set of sites predefined.
LENNDEVOURS
I think a wine blog-specific engine is a good idea actually
Jason C.
sweet.
LENNDEVOURS
Who on earth would search for a Twisted Oak wine
Tim E.
yes it is... james build one at scrugy and there is a google mashup at alawine
LENNDEVOURS
;)
Tim E.
i would
Jason C.
Nice. That site looks good. It is definitely a
useful resource. I\\47ve been waiting for someone
else to do it (as easy as it could be to make a basic one).
el j.
:)
WineQ M.
Your search is over: http://www.WineQ.com
james
well, searching requires pulling information.
what about the other direction delivering the
information that i\\47m interested so i don\\47t have to go looking for it.
LENNDEVOURS
I was just trying to wake El Jefe up a little Tim...
Tim E.
PD need to go to LI, jefe
ward
"Informat is Power!" No. Power comes from
effectively organized information that is put
into action. Reversed Chron blogs don\\47t meet that test -- that was my rant.
Jason C.
:) I would have used another wine if there was
another winery rep here. (is there)
el j.
roger that Tim
Tim E.
use google, ward; that;s what i do
LENNDEVOURS
If you take the reverse chron away from a
blog...it\\47s not a blog anymore, it\\47s just a website
el j.
it\\47s pretty easy to add a google search box to a
blog, but the blogger has to make the effort
Mar 8Jason C.
James, one thing we\\47re thinking about at
WineLog... Like some others, we really like how
Netflix works. One thing I think they do well is
the popup that happens whenever you add a movie
to your queue. The popup shows you related
movies. We\\47re considering similar things for when
people add wines to their log... show them
similar wines. That\\47s an example of something we
can "immediately" do to give people info they might be interested in.
Tim E.
alright, i\\47ve got to scoot to my daughter\\47s choir
performance so who has the last question to cap the evening
el j.
actually, it is still a content managed web site,
which is better than just a web site
WineQ M.
who wants to have a drink
ROB B.
virtually
LENNDEVOURS
There are lots of content managed website though Jefe...
LENNDEVOURS
I just mean that it\\47s not a blog anymore at that point
Tim E.
i\\47ve been drinking pinot...
LENNDEVOURS
no Tempranillo tonight Tim
Jason C.
Not drinking here... I have a question...
ROB B.
My Rieslings gone
LENNDEVOURS
I hear it\\47s the next big thing
Tim E.
no, i got to spread the love around ;-)
el j.
I\\47ve heard that too
Jason C.
 From the "maybe giving away too much
department"... Are people\\47s tastes in food any
indication of their tastes in wine
WineQ M.
i\\47m drinking lava cap 2003 cab
el j.
(actually a pinot sounds good)
Jason C.
Restated: "If you and I like the same kinds of
food, will we like the same kinds of wine"
LENNDEVOURS
I just put down a glass of marginal local pinot blanc
Tim E.
castel rock columbia valley 05 for $9... not too bad for the money
el j.
(Tim - remind me to tell you how much this web site is driving me nuts)
Tim E.
anyone have another question or is this a wrap
WineQ M.
Lenn, spare yourself that cheap swill -- Add some quality wine to your queue.
Tim E.
will do jefe
el j.
at some point I want to get into the blends vs varietals thing, but it can wait
Jason C.
Restated: "If you and I like the same kinds of
food, will we like the same kinds of wine"
ward
Thanks guys; this has been very educational and
you\\47ve given me much to think about. Blog on!
el j.
thinking is good, thinking and drinking is better :)
james
jason: i think going from wine to food is easier
than food to wine (for recommendations, that is).
ROB B.
Jason, I run into that every night with my wife
Jason C.
Oh yeah How so
ROB B.
we like the same kinds of food, but different wines with it
Jason C.
James, meaning "You like Merlot. You probably also like steak."
Jason C.
Or are you referring to pairings
ROB B.
pairings
james
what rob said
Tim E.
alright, see you next time everyone; great chat
Mar 8james
later, tim
WineQ M.
Bye Timothy
ward
has left the room
el j.
thanks tim - cheers!
ROB B.
Cheers!
Jason C.
Ah I\\47m not thinking about pairings per say...
just that if we both like steak and brocoli does it mean we like Merlot.
LENNDEVOURS
cheers all...
ROB B.
has left the room
LENNDEVOURS
has left the room
Jasper
Interesting conversation. Good to see there are
more people around that think about these
web/wine related issues. Thanks, bye bye
Jason C.
Or if we like Strawberries and Apples does it
mean we both like Zinfandel (totally random examples)
el j.
has left the room
james
i just think that it\\47s easier to pair wines with
food than to draw the reverse conclusion.
Jasper
has left the room
Tim E.
please send me the transcript to post, joshua
Joshua
will do, tim
james
or put another way, we can both like the same
foods/styles but may like to pair different wines with that food.
Jason C.
thanks for the input. I don\\47t want to keep folks if...
james
i know i get that with my family
Michael M.
has left the room
Ted M.
has left the room
Tim E.
and thanks for hosting us again
Joshua
my pleasure, thanks for coordinating it again!
Jason C.
James, I should have the microformats stuff up
later tonight. Do you want to check it out
tomorrow and let me know if everything is kosher
james
will do. btw, do you have an RSS feed
james
of latest TNs
james
i can pull them in quicker that way. otherwise
the crawler takes more time to get live to site.
Mar 8Jason C.
kind of.
Jason C.
I have a "recent activity" feed that has
comments, logs, ratings, and wine adds.
Jason C.
That would probably work. You just want a list of updated URLs no
james
if the ratings are hreviews, i\\47ll parse them as TNs.
Jason C.
http://allmovie4u.com/
Tim E.
has left the room
Jason C.
Alrighty. Cool. I have some testing code going
on. Just making sure that no styles are being broken, etc.
Jason C.
James, do you mean hreviews in the feed or on the target site
Jason C.
(Just thought of that. Not hard to update)
james
both/either. i look for hreview in feeds and site crawls
Jason C.
Okay. I\\47ll look into adding to the feed also. I\\47m
assuming the microformats play nice with RSS too.
WineQ M.
james
WineQ M.
what do you do again
james
yep, they work just fine in RSS
james
software developer
james
wrote http://www.scrugy.com
Michael S.
Sorry I haven\\47t contributed much - I have been
reading along while in meetings. I have to drop
off now, but will monitor winecast\\47s blog for the next meeting.Thanks!
Michael S.
has left the room
WineQ M.
ohh cool
WineQ M.
where does the content come from
james
also trying to http://wineformats.org going.
Mar 8james
most of the content is harvested from about 5K
wine related sites and indexed on the site.
WineQ M.
can i add one :)
james
about 400 wine related RSS feeds are regulary monitored too.
james
can you add a wine site
WineQ M.
ah, i see a form on the site
WineQ M.
is WineQ.com appropriate for that
WineQ M.
we have a pretty active and informative blog: http://allmovie4u.com/blog/
james
well, i\\47m currently not indexing any
retail/shopping sites but for content and blog, i can crawl those separately
WineQ M.
i see
james
i\\47ll add your rss feed now.
Mar 8WineQ M.
cool, thanks!
Jason C.
James, I think I\\47m good on the content pages.
Example here: http://allmovie4u.com/
Jason C.
Looking into things, it would actually be a
little tricky adding classes to my RSS elements. So I\\47ll hold off on that.
Tr
People in this transcript

    * Bill Wilson
    * el jefe
    * gregoire
    * Hugo (OzWineShow.com)
    * james
    * Jason Coleman (WineLog)
    * Jasper
    * Joshua [same as WineQ Joshua, beIow]
    * LENNDEVOURS
    * Michael Malone
    * Michael Stajer (WineZap/WineCommune)
    * Paul
    * Philip James
    * ROB BARNETT
    * Ted Malone
    * Tim Elliott - Winecast
    * ward
    * WineQ Joshua
    * WineQ Marshall