The Spirit World

This is the problem with the ‘blogosphere’. It’s a lazy person’s journalism. No one does any real research, but rather they just slap some hyperlinks up and throw a little conjecture at the wall, and presto! you get some hits and traffic…
- James Molesworth, Wine Spectator Senior Editor on WS Message Boards

Well-known wine aficionado magazine, Wine Spectator, was called to the carpet this week for giving an award to a fictitious restaurant, Osteria L’Intrepido, for their fake wine list. The restaurant was an elaborate creation by a man named Robin Goldstein to see if the Wine Spectator’s awards are legit.

Obviously, in awarding the prize to a fake restaurant with an equally fake wine list, the magazine failed. They failed to show a proper level of care and attention in choosing their winners. They also failed to show an adequate level of oversight in their processes.

But it’s in their post revelation fracas that they failed the most.

Wine Spectator tried to spin the situation in a thread on their message boards. Executive Editor Thomas Matthews wrote a lengthy message explaining the magazine’s process for selecting its winners and admitted that the magazine makes what they consider reasonable attempts to verify the restaurant’s wine list before awarding anything. However in this case, they were unable to get anyone on the phone at the phone number provided on the application, but did get an answering machine that said the restaurant was closed. Also, he noted that there was a live website and even reviews to be found around the web.

Fine. Mr. Matthews gave a good response that really did give insight and make me think maybe, just maybe their offenses weren’t so bad.

Then came Mr. Molesworth, who needs his snarky, defensive self to be kept behind the scenes.

Now, mind you, I think that there were some people who vilified Wine Spectator before the magazine had a chance to respond. But the fact is that no matter how duplicitous the scam was, Wine Spectator did not do a sufficient job of verifiying the eligibility of the restaurants and their wine lists on its list. Plain and simple. The point was to show that the Wine Spectator awards don’t hold a lot of weight. And in that, the fake restaurant won.

For Mr. Molesworth to turn around and call the entire blogosphere “lazy person’s journalism” is as bad as when Pete Wells said that all food bloggers did was write mundane passages about eating cheese sandwiches. Look at the uproar that caused. In many ways, this is worse. “No one does any real research,” he goes on to say. I beg to differ. There are plenty of thinking, researching, fact-checking bloggers and web writers out there who are working their butts off to bring quality to the net. Meanwhile, there is a magazine that never actually spoke to a live person before handing out an award. Did they leave a message and not have it returned? Wasn’t that a red flag of sorts?

To deflect the shortcomings of Wine Spectator’s verification process with vain shots at the blogosphere and lackluster excuses is pitiful. Have some dignity! Have some self-respect! This is a mea culpa situation. Mr. Goldstein set up an elaborate test and the magazine just failed.

Perhaps instead of taking shots at the blogosphere, Mr. Molesworth might spend more energy on renovating the awards process so that it means something. After all, that is what bloggers are complaining about, isn’t it? And truly, the awards mean nothing if a fake restaurant can fool an entire editorial team.

Was Goldstein right in his actions? I don’t know. I tend to lean towards a pat on the back rather than a slap on the wrist. He exposed a huge flaw in these so-called awards (honestly, if they are basically given away like this then can they really be called awards?). That is the type of thing usually reserved for entrenched journalists and high-powered anchors. But his scam was so deeply rooted that I tend to think he did take it ever-so-slightly too far.

Was Wine Spectator scammed? No. They were tested. And they failed miserably.

Time to buck up and be future minded, Wine Spectator. Start by overhauling that “award.”

(Thanks to Arthur for the heads up.)