The power of the masses

posted by philip in Wine

I came across an interesting article yesterday that I’m glad to say i disagreed with 100%. It was on SFGate and was about how restaurants are losing business due to negative reviews from bloggers and users posting to message boards. The article features enraged restaurateurs attacking various bloggers’ abilities to review their businesses: “Everyone has become a food critic. They think they’re real big shots. They probably can’t even make scrambled eggs.”

What relevance does my cooking ability have to do with my tasting ability? If you expect me to pay (be it with time, attention, or even money) then don’t be surprised when I tell people what I thought.

I may be able to taste the subtleties between two different wines, but that doesn’t mean I know how to farm grapes.

Its sad to see such ignorance in the world today, but to me the answer is clear - the restaurants simply need to fix the problems, and then the poor reviews will clear up themselves. Provide good food, great service and charge fairly and no one will be upset.

Thankfully there are visionary’s like Seth Godin, who the same day, published a piece on the fact that there are no short cuts. Like he says “It’s not so hard. If you make great stuff, people will find you.”