Wine Spectator hoax, “Osteria L’Intrepido”, what do you think?

[Peter11216]

I searched for "wine spectator" in previous threads, but didn't find anything that addressed this issue. My apologies if I missed something obvious, since the actual incident took place some years ago.

I listened to this Freakonomics podcast, which describes the prank and interviews the prankster, who has also written a book about wine tasting.

The prankster, Goldstein, has a blog called "Blind Taste."

According to Goldstein, he submitted a fake wine list to Wine Spectator from a fake restaurant, and won the magazine's excellence award. According to him, when Wine Spectator called to announce the award, they also suggested he take out a full page ad in the magazine advertising the fact that his restaurant got the award. From the podcast, Goldstein said, "I wasn’t sure going into this that I would win an award. There were two questions being tested here. One was, do you have to have a good wine list to win a Wine Spectator award of excellence? And the second was, do you have to exist to win a Wine Spectator award of excellence? So I thought that it was quite possible that my experiment would fail. . . ."

Evidently Goldstein also included, on the reserve list, wines that were rated very badly by Wine Spectator itself, again from the podcast: "One of them was a 1982 Brunello di Montalcino, which the magazine had given 67 points, or a D+ rating, calling it "barnyardy” and “decayed." He listed another vintage that Wine Spectator had reviewed as “Unacceptable … sweet and cloying … [and] smells like bug spray.” Then off his application went, with the fake wine list and a real money order."

His blog also has interesting observations on wine tasting, and the influence of price on how people report their enjoyment of wine.

What think you? And does this suggest any experiments that should be done with CA, or similar?

[Colt45]

What think you?

I don't know.....

The magazine does not try to hide the fact that restaurants must submit their lists in order to be considered for an award, which I guess

requires a certain amount of integrity on the part of the candidate.

This person falsified a list, and went as far as creating a fake website for the restaurant in order to perpetrate his hoax. While I understand

the angles - rating subjectivity, etc - for me it comes off as kind of Sacha Baron Cohen....

[Rushman]

Completely off topic but towards the end of a 12 hour stretch at a poker table at Hollywood Park in LA, I realized for the last few hours I was sitting next to Sasha Baron Cohen. He was harder to spot as he wasn't in character.

As to the wine hoax, a pox on both their houses.......the guy for faking it and WS Mag for bad research and not realizing or not caring several of his "reserve" list wines were poorly rated by their mag.

[Peter11216]

As I understand it, Goldstein didn't set up the hoax because of anything to do with rating subjectivity. He set up the hoax because he believed that the the two hundred and some dollar submission fee was the thing the magazine wanted, and secondarily maybe more importantly, a chance to sell ad space to the restaurant. It's worth noting, Goldstein wasn't a candidate, who lied about his restaurant, though some restaurants may lie about their wine lists, he wanted to see if Wine Spectator would at least verify the physical existence of restaurants they give awards to.

If one reads that WS says a restaurant is excellent, doesn't one expect that someone has actually visited the restaurant? Wine Spectator was under no obligation to grant the award, and had opportunity to, say, call food and wine critics in the region to find out about reviews of the restaurant, even if they were not going to actually visit the restaurant. It's not that the magazine gave an award of excellence to a restaurant based on their subjective judgment which might not be in line with other people's, it's that they represent themselves as having evaluated the restaurant based on more than looking at a wine list, menu, website and listening to a telephone message.

If you found out that a restaurant guide didn't actually have reviewers go to the restaurant to try the food and talk to the sommelier, but instead just gave out awards based on a website & menu submitted with a $250 check, how seriously would you take the award? Let's say one went looking for “Osteria L’Intrepido”, would one really think, "gosh, someone tricked Wine Spectator," or would one think, "Why on earth did Wine Spectator give an award to a restaurant that didn't exist"?

The problem is discussed within the context of freakonomics concern for functioning free markets. Later they discuss the problems with the wine industry controlling information about wines, and Goldstein has some links on his blog to explanations for why this can happen.

I'm interested in this kind of hoax because sorting out information about non-Cubans is very difficult. I'm not sure if the cuban industry is more transparent.

I don't know.....

The magazine does not try to hide the fact that restaurants must submit their lists in order to be considered for an award, which I guess

requires a certain amount of integrity on the part of the candidate.

This person falsified a list, and went as far as creating a fake website for the restaurant in order to perpetrate his hoax. While I understand

the angles - rating subjectivity, etc - for me it comes off as kind of Sacha Baron Cohen....

[Peter11216]

How'd Cohen do? Does everyone just play hold 'em in CA card rooms now, or can you still get good stud games?

I don't get why it was bad for the guy, Goldstein, to "fake it." What he was doing was testing the magazine to find out how it actually operated, because he suspected its awards were given out for marketing and advertising reasons, not because of the quality (however defined) of the actual restaurant.

Completely off topic but towards the end of a 12 hour stretch at a poker table at Hollywood Park in LA, I realized for the last few hours I was sitting next to Sasha Baron Cohen. He was harder to spot as he wasn't in character.

As to the wine hoax, a pox on both their houses.......the guy for faking it and WS Mag for bad research and not realizing or not caring several of his "reserve" list wines were poorly rated by their mag.

[Rushman]

How'd Cohen do? Does everyone just play hold 'em in CA card rooms now, or can you still get good stud games?

I don't get why it was bad for the guy, Goldstein, to "fake it." What he was doing was testing the magazine to find out how it actually operated, because he suspected its awards were given out for marketing and advertising reasons, not because of the quality (however defined) of the actual restaurant.

Dunno,

Long time ago. Most tables are hold em, a precious few Omaha or mix games.

---

I am here: http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=20.630167,-87.069661

[Wil]

I don't get why it was bad for the guy, Goldstein, to "fake it." What he was doing was testing the magazine to find out how it actually operated, because he suspected its awards were given out for marketing and advertising reasons, not because of the quality (however defined) of the actual restaurant.

I agree. Mags like WS and CA give the impression that they rate objectively. So if they don't, it is misleading consumers.

[Wil]

Great thread by the way. Should generate some interesting discussion

[Ken Gargett]

as one of the judges for the aussie wine list of the year, which seems to have a good rep and is very well supported by restaurants entering it, i have some sympathy for both sides.

i have no idea if those behind it (ultimately 'fine wine partners' who sponsor and arrange the organisation of it) charge to enter (i will ask) but if they did, i suspect it would be just to cover costs. as for advertising, the agt wine mag is one of the sponsors i guess as well but, and a mag for which i write, there is no charging or pushing for ads etc. we cover it and will do short profiles on various section winners etc (it was through that, that i discovered one place in brizzy with rayas 1990 at $240 a bottle instead of the more usual $1500 so a group of us drank every bottle we could get - and it was spectacular). fine wine partners are distributors here but there is no pressure on entrants to stock a majority of their wines or even any (i'm sure that the reason they do it is to push their products in the long run and good luck to them). none of the judges would have a bar of it.

as for a fake list, if someone is really that bored to go to the trouble, then for me, they have done nothing but shown that they really are small minded time wasters. these groups are not the fbi filtering out terrorists. it is a wine list comp, for christ's sake. go and bore someone else.

of greater concern is that there is the real risk that restaurants do not have all the wines on their lists. hard to police that and as colt says, a degree of honesty necessary. on one occasion, there was some concern a restaurant was doing that and it was checked (as it happened, it was run by people i knew and i knew their cellar so they were fine - we usually do not judge lists from our own states to reduce the inevitable problem of knowing places and people and judging 'friends').

as for expecting the judges to have visited every place, if you stop and think about it, it soon becomes obvious that it is impracticible at best. who the hell pays for it? flying all over the country, checking lists? we have the lists forwarded to us - over the internet now. even if we went to a restaurant to check, they would hand us a list. are we expected to go down into their cellar and check every bottle? think of the enormous time involved in that. and they may have honestly and genuinely sold out of a wine before we get there. what then?

if they are lying about their lists, it will soon piss customers off and word would get back quickly.

for me, the bloke submitting the fake list has not exposed any nefarious activities or anything of the sort. he has just shown himself to be a complete tosser.

[Wil]

for me, the bloke submitting the fake list has not exposed any nefarious activities or anything of the sort. he has just shown himself to be a complete tosser.

Maybe not nefarious activities, but sloppy journalism.

Ken you obviously know a hell of a lot more about the industry than I do, but I think it's healthy to have a bit of skepticism about the ratings in both cigar and wine magazines. They are businesses after all. That said, I buy them and enjoy reading them.

[Ken Gargett]

no disagreement re that helathy skepticism, even a touch of cynicism (poor old matty skinner got slaughtered for doing reviews before he had tasted the wines, even tho he based them on years of what the wines had been like).

but i don't see a fake wine list getting through as sloppy journalism. if someone wanted to set up something to fool our comp for wine lists, they could do it. the realities are such that if you wanted to do it, you could. we don't have the resources or time to do otherwise. in that case, should we just shut down the whole comp because someone might do this? that helps no one.

it really isn't following up sources for some huge political scoop or uncovering the next 9/11. it is holding a comp for the best wine lists, which in tuirn is a service to readers. and if the list is a fake, then readerrs are not going to even find the restaurant.

[Colt45]

It's worth noting, Goldstein wasn't a candidate....

I'd argue that he pretended to be by submitting a list - in essence lying about "his list". The "awards" are for restaurant wine lists,

and these days it's pretty common for a restaurant to post their list online. Again, if I understand correctly, this person went so far

far as to create a fake website and a phone recording.

Ken has made some salient points. And again, my personal opinion is that this is akin to "reality" tv - I don't find it overly real when

a situation is created that would not have otherwise existed.

[Wil]

Interesting piece on this from the LA Times

Getting the award, however, isn't exactly like winning an Olympic medal. This year, nearly 4,500 restaurants spent $250 each to apply or reapply for the Wine Spectator award, and all but 319 won the award of excellence or some greater kudos, Matthews said.

That translates to more than $1 million in revenue.

Tom Pirko, a beverage industry consultant who lives in Santa Barbara County's wine country, said the hoax would dent the magazine's credibility.

"This gets down to what the Wine Spectator is all about. It's not exactly Wine for Dummies; it's more Wine for the Gullible," Pirko said. "This gives the appearance of paying for advertising disguised as a contest."

Restaurants that win the award receive a plaque they can mount for diners to see and a listing as a wine-friendly establishment on the magazine's website. They typically use the award as a form of marketing and advertising, Pirko said.

And a more balanced perspective