#DWCC14: Campaigns – one reason I blog

 Damien Wilson

The 'anti-blogging' session, chaired by Damien Wilson, at the 2014 DWCC was largely disappointing. Louise Hurren's presentation stood out as being interesting, useful and thoughtful. Evelyne Resnick appeared to be thinking that she was talking to a group of producers and the conclusions she presented following her three-year study into bloggers were rather banal and elementary. 

Louise Hurren

   

Evelyne Resnick

 

Etienne Hugel 

Etienne Hugel was interesting initially but his presentation was overlong, self-indulgent and became an embarrassing piece of self-promotion, including promoting his wife and her activities. The concluding presentation from Robert Joseph was sadly largely glib and facile.
 

The session did, however, make me reflect on why I blog.  

Robert Joseph

One of the strongest reasons is that it allows me to campaign. I use 'campaign' in a broad sense. Most obviously this applies to investdrinks, which exists to try to warn people of the potential pitfalls and to highlight companies from whom I would not buy wine nor the carbon credits, diamonds, graphene, plots of land etc. that some companies also punt as investments.

Campaigning is an aspect of wine blogging that gets very little attention. It certainly didn’t feature in the DWCC’s ‘anti-blogging’ session.  

Yet the Internet can be a powerful and very useful tool. Not only can the net be a means of getting information and warnings out but, equally important, it can be a brilliant source of information. Quite how brilliant only became clear after I set up my investdrinks website in 2000. I have frequently had an initial tip-off about companies on the ever-growing list from whom I would not buy. Often it is an enquiry about whether I have heard about a particular company, although sometimes I am given more details. Either way this then allows me to look more closely at a company - see who the directors are, when the company was set up and look at their website if they have one.    

Having the freedom to write about anything that interests me is a great plus. This means that when I visit a producer I can write about them irrespective of their size. I can blog about producers or events too small or too local to be of interest to a magazine. This gives me a lot of freedom when visiting producers as I can always write about them or include photos of them on Jim's Loire or possibly Les 5 du Vin. 

This freedom is equally useful when warning about dubious investment companies or wine companies such as 1855 that defraud their clients by failing to deliver wine they have ordered. Certainly magazines, newspapers, broadcasters etc. do run news stories on these companies and features on investment but there is limit to the number of times they can publish such stories or news items. With a blog or your own website there is no such restriction. For instance I can and have posted frequently about 1855’s fraudulent behaviour.

Does the politicians' pizza party threaten UK press freedom?

Press reaction to the legislation passed on Monday is growing. The deal thrashed out over takeaway pizza in the early hours of Monday at the offices of Ed Millband is coming in for increasing criticism, especially over the threat of exemplary damages for newspapers (even bloggers) who have not signed up for the new press regulation body. It is not yet clear whether this will apply to bloggers. There are suggestions that it won't apply to individual bloggers, especially if they don't make a profit. But what of cooperative blogs or blogs and websites, like Jancis Robinson's site, that employ or use a number of contributors?  

There is always a danger that legislation cobbled together and pushed through parliament will turn out to be bad law with unintended consequences.         

Some recent press comment: 

'Peter Preston: This pizza-box press regulation is a sticky mess
Leveson dreamed of a voluntary regime, not an expedient political compromise imposed at two o'clock in the morning.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2013/mar/23/pizza-box-press-regulation-sticky-mess'

'Press regulation: newspapers bridle at 'historic' deal
Protests from industry as David Cameron, Nick Clegg and Ed Miliband agree to create powerful regulator in late-night talks

A shellshocked newspaper industry was struggling to come to terms with a sudden all-party agreement to create a powerful new press regulator designed to prevent a repeat of the phone-hacking scandal.

The independent regulator will have powers to impose fines and demand prominent corrections, and courts will be allowed to impose exemplary damages on newspapers that fail to join the body.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2013/mar/18/press-regulation-newspapers-furious-deal'

'Thanks to Leveson the job of journalists has become that little bit harder

Foreign experience shows harsher press rules in the UK will play into the hands of the rich and powerful.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/press/thanks-to-leveson-the-job-of-journalists-has-become-that-little-bit-harder-8547103.html'

The position of bloggers – liable or exempt under the new act?

'It’s down to the House of Lords to save the bloggers

Sebastian Payne 22 March 2013 18:24
On Monday, Parliament will decide the future of blogging in this country. As the government’s press regulation proposals stand, blogs big and small would come under the new press regulator. This would make bloggers liable for significant compensation sums (aka exemplary damages), fees for joining the regulator as an ‘associated member’ (newspapers join as full members) as well as for increased legal costs.'

http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/2013/03/its-down-to-the-house-of-lords-to-save-the-bloggers/

'We need reform and a free press. This will require both time and opennessGive a new regulation system a year to bed in before we act. A royal charter should seal the deal, not describe it

by Alan Rusbridger

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/mar/24/need-reform-free-press-time-openness'

The French, wine and the internet – a couple of thoughts on new survey

La Revue du Vin de France

Baromètre SOWINE/SSI 2012 study
(see details of the study here)

For 'this blogger' the headline news from this study into the French, wine and the internet is that the net is now easily the first source for read/viewed information. At 20% it is far ahead of specialist guides such as the Guide Hachette (8%) and magazines – both general like Figaro Magazine and specialist such as Revue Vin de France or L'amateur de Bordeaux, which each attract only 5% of those surveyed.

There is, of course, more to it than the headline data. There are a multitude of internet sites, especially blogs on wine, in comparison to just a few specialist wine magazine titles. This is likely to mean that a specialist wine magazine will still have a greater readership than an individual blog or website and have greater impact. Also most printed media now also have their own website as is the case with La Revue du Vin de France, so they may well also count within the 20% who use the net as a source of wine information.

The figures certainly illustrate the general decline in the circulation of the print media that can be seen not just in France but elsewhere. In the UK the sales of national newspapers have declined significantly over the last 5-10 years.

The other finding that caught my attention is the marked fall in the popularity of on-line wine merchants such as 1855.com and vin-malin. Since their popularity has dropped by 25% since 2010 – from 40% then to 30% now – it is tempting to think that the scandalous failure of 1855 to deliver en primeurs ordered to its customers has a more general effect than to just besmirch is own reputation. Although this may well be the case, again it is not the whole picture as the survey shows the growing popularity of 'sites de ventes privées' such as vente-privée.com and 1jour1vin.com, who either offer sales direct from the producer or bin-end sales. Also 1855 has its own section offering ventes privées. The popularity of these sites has jumped from 40% in 2010 to 50% now.

vente-privee.com

It's encouraging and, perhaps not surprising, that the most popular option for the small percentage (only 12%) who do order wine through the net is to buy direct from producers – 57%. Internet wine sales from supermarkets remain small.

La Dive Bouteille (29th-30th January) and 8 years of blogging from San Francisco

Château de Brézé hosting La Dive Bouteille

Details here of how to get to and from Brézé by public transport.

Brézé's moat

Elsewhere in the Loire finally a few cold nights forecast for Epeigné-les-Bois with night-time temperatures dropping below freezing until it gets milder again on Wednesday. 

**

Reflections on 8 Years of Wine Blogging by Alder Yarrow 

'Eight years ago, I decided that instead of giving my friends the same advice over and over again about my favorite wines and restaurants, I would start a blog -- both so that I would have someplace to send them, and so that I could learn about what a blog was and how it worked.

And that, as they say, was the first day of the rest of my life. I've been writing about wine almost every day since then, pausing only to go on my honeymoon, hang out with my new baby girl, and go fishing in Alaska this past August.

It's been quite a ride.'

Read the rest here: