Awards and citations:


1997: Le Prix du Champagne Lanson Noble Cuvée Award for investigations into Champagne for the Millennium investment scams

2001: Le Prix Champagne Lanson Ivory Award for investdrinks.org

2011: Vindic d'Or MMXI – 'Meilleur blog anti-1855'

2011: Robert M. Parker, Jnr: ‘This blogger...’:

2012: Born Digital Wine Awards: No Pay No Jay – best investigative wine story

2012: International Wine Challenge – Personality of the Year Award




Tuesday 15 November 2011

Michel Bettane: "producers who pay critics are idiotic"

Tasting notes...!!

In the light of Jumillagate/Murciagate, it is very interesting to see Michel Bettane's damning comments made at the World Wine Symposium reported in The Drinks Business:

 '“Producers who pay critics are idiotic,” he said. “They really shouldn’t be doing this. If 'critics' accept compensation for tasting wines, then I don’t believe them to be true critics. Corruption exists quite obviously in the wine world today."

Chairing the debate alongside Bettane, The Wine Advocate writer David Schildknecht said certain producers view critics like machines: “They want to find out how many points you will spit out if you insert your credit card.”'
  
Read the Drinks Business article here.


What, I wonder, does David Schildknecht, one if the key members of Team Parker, think of Jay Campo's Spanish circus?  




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2 comments:

Hervé Lalau said...

Bettane is right.
By the way, I once read that to make a good corruption, you need a corruptor and a corrupted.
Is our image as wine critics so bad? Do we really look like frauds?

Jim's Loire said...

Hervé. It shouldn't be that bad. Unfortunately as you know rot, if left unchecked, spreads rapidly...