Steven Beaumont in General

Reads 3645 • Replies 37 • Started Wednesday, February 8, 2006 5:37:18 AM CT

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TheArrogantBastard
places 1 º 09:57 Thu 2/9/2006

Video did not kill the radio star. Cassette tapes, then DAT, then MP3s & CD-Rs did not stop people buying new music. Books on tape, and now books on your iPod, did not stop people from buying physical books. Betamax, VHS, rental stores, movie downloads, Netflix, etc., did not stop people from going out to the movies. Online newspapers did not cause everyone to cancel their home delivery. Printing out a copy of the Mona Lisa on your home color printer does not negatively effect the value of the original painting. Cable, home video, TIVO, iPod video, etc., is not going to kill commercial TV (just yet).

As a new, valid, user friendly format for music & arts comes up, they often widen the audience rather then diverting the entire channel and shutting down the previous communication method.

For each format, channel, etc., there will be the entities that are at the top of their category. For online beer enthusiast/rating websites, there are two that clearly lead the category. Both are outstanding and offer their own style and character.

For beer journalism via books/columns/blogs, there are those that are leaders in that category as well. Stephen is one of those leaders.

I’m a believer in the "Mile of Cars" and "Restaurant Row" school of thought. Enterprises that group like that have found that they gain more by treating the others in their category as "compatriots" rather than as "competitors." Historically, one brand of car wanted to be far from the other as they felt they could better get a competitive advantage that way. However, car shopping for the consumer was difficult as it meant driving all over town. Now, customers can principally go to one location and walk from dealer to dealer to shop for their preferred car.

We employ this school of thought at Stone by working with other breweries and distributing other great beers in SoCal. And our restaurant, when it opens, will feature 32 beers on tap (meaning far more "Guest" taps than our own beers). I am personally thrilled to be in the same region as such highly considered breweries as AleSmith and Pizza Port. We are proud to distribute their beers, as well as other highly respected beers such as Ommegang, Victory, Hanssens, Bear Republic, Avery, Russian River and others. Additionally, at our restaurant, we’ll gladly serve on tap beers from breweries that we don’t distribute (as long as they are great beers, of course).

What I’m getting at is that as long as each enterprise focuses on providing great quality to their customers/users/readers, another great quality enterprise will likely bring more people into the fold overall...to the benefit of all.

-Greg.

 
MilkmanDan
beers 1942 º places 20 º 10:13 Thu 2/9/2006

Originally posted by SilkTork
Originally posted by MilkmanDan
If he wants to comment on beer, brewing, or this website, he’s sure as hell qualified to do so in my book.


Agreed.


And in my book I’m qualified to say that his star is fading while RateBeer’s is burning bright.

It’s each to their own, and if he wants to hold to the view that he’s more authoritative than RateBeer that’s fine. But in that very view he has shown how out of touch he is with what is happening. He clearly doesn’t realise that his importance has diminished with the growth of sites such as ours.

I don’t know if anyone has noticed but the days of the Encyclopedia salesman knocking on your door have long gone. People use the internet these days.

Beaumont is coming over like the old village witchdoctor claiming to know everything about the universe and beating people over the head with his knobbly stick when they log onto the internet and become genuinely educated.

And, given that RateBeer is a site for people interested in beer, and that he writes for people interested in beer, it seems odd that he should set out to criticise his audience. Or is patronise his audience a better expression?

Fooey. Double fooey, even. Have times changed? Yes. You go back 15 years and Beaumont was stunningly knowledgeable about craft beer. It was still a growing movement, and there weren’t a lot of beer geeks around.

I didn’t see Beaumont’s article as demeaning or insulting. He didn’t say "Oh, look at those silly internet people, why do they bother?" He commented on our best beer list, and how heavily weighted it is towards big beers and how it isn’t truly representative. You know what? He’s right. It’s not representative. The list is slanted towards big beers just as he said and you, Mr. Cask Bitter, should appreciate that

Stephen Beaumont has a history of beer appreciation unmatched by ANYBODY on this site. Do we, as a collective mass of beer geeks, have more knowledge than him? Undoubtedly, as there are thousands of us. Are there any of us as individually knowledeable about beer? Hell no.

Frankly, this and the other threads have been the pinnacle of Ratebeer arrogance, where people have more or less suggested that there can be no experts other than us and that it’s inconceivable that anyone should even want to talk about beer, as Ratebeer is all you’d ever need.

 
SilkTork
beers 7737 º places 111 º 11:33 Thu 2/9/2006

Originally posted by MilkmanDan
I didn’t see Beaumont’s article as demeaning or insulting.


I didn’t have a problem initially with his personal thoughts on his beer blog that others had (after all there are a number of writers professional and otherwise who have passed ignorant comments about RateBeer - Rory Gibson of The Courier Mail was another recent one - and I pay little attention to them). But I did wish to pass comment on him coming here and suggesting to a community which holds to the principle of SHARED experience being of greater value and authority than that of any individual (I assume - as you are a RateBeerian - you somehow hold this view as well), that we pay more attention to the views of an elite. At which point I would then reflect back to what he said in his blog about "professional beer writers like myself, Jackson, Protz and a host of others world-wide" being compared more favourably to us "reviewers" and our apparent "anonymity".

I wish to point out that I feel it was inappropriate of him to do that.

I wish to point out that I feel he was arrogant to do that.

I wish to point out that, whatever was the case back in Beaumont’s day, that RateBeer’s influence and authority today is huge and growing.

I wish to point out that I am not here to attack him, his books, his socks, his toes or his personal and private perversions.

People say he’s a nice guy and that he writes decent books and that to North Americans he’s on a par with Protz in Britain. I accept all that. At this point I’m not talking about these things. It was your final sentence in your initial post that caught my eye: "If he wants to comment on beer, brewing, or this website, he’s sure as hell qualified to do so in my book." Which I agreed with. But because the implication in that sentence is that it was OK for him to say incorrect things about us on our own website and that perhaps I was being impolite or something in querying what he said, I felt I needed to explain my position. Which I did. But it looks like you feel you need to defend his entire history. Let me make it clear - because I have always respected your views, and I don’t want you to get the wrong idea - I am not criticising the man or his books or his history; I am criticising his comments that RateBeer is less important today than Stephen Beaumont, and I am giving vivid images to back up my comments.

 
SilkTork
beers 7737 º places 111 º 11:38 Thu 2/9/2006

Originally posted by ClarkVV
I am RateBeer.


I too am RateBeer.

 
BuckNaked
beers 1230 º places 28 º 11:55 Thu 2/9/2006

Originally posted by StephenB
a) I never contended that my opinions were any more or less authoritative than anyone else’s, ratebeerians included. I was commenting only on the accountability of the Rate Beer survey;


Seriously, what kind of an arrogant asshole would take the time to clarify his position that he’s not better than anyone else on a website where he might have pissed a few users off who aren’t sure who he is? What a jerk!

 
muzzlehatch
beers 4975 º places 327 º 00:53 Fri 2/10/2006

Originally posted by ClarkVV
I am Steven Beaumont.


I am Providence.

Cthulhu lives!