Dunnuck leaving WA to launch own website

[Ken_V]

@Neal.Mollen

Once I un-subscribed their fate was set.

FWIW I ran across your “See Ya” thread over there. I posted “What Neal said.” since I am letting my subscription lapse (after 30 years). Several people, including Dan Kravitz and Philippe Camps, added their thanks for your posts over the years.

Then Mark closed the thread.

[Neal.Mollen]

@Ken V

@Neal.Mollen

Once I un-subscribed their fate was set.

FWIW I ran across your “See Ya” thread over there. I posted “What Neal said.” since I am letting my subscription lapse (after 30 years). Several people, including Dan Kravitz and Philippe Camps, added their thanks for your posts over the years.

Then Mark closed the thread.

Ha! No kidding? That’s just perfect. (Thanks for letting me know about Dan and Philippe)

[P.Sunesen]

But Ken, Neal is long gone there, and the thread was posted in February with 40 or more posts. So nothing “political” or censorship here.
Unless you need to paint it black…

[Ken_V]

@Neal.Mollen

@larry schaffer

Here’s the other thing that intrigues me - Jeb’s first reviews are expected in July and they will cover Santa Barbara County . . . My guess is that these were supposed to be part of the WA, no? How might he be able to do this?

Cheers

Didn’t this happen with Antonio as well? There was a dispute about whether TWA owned a series of CA reviews he had done

Yes, but it was a dispute about how far that went. That is, Antonio had planned on producing certain reviews which would be published on erp and his new site, but in the end, a larger set of reviews were published on both. Antonio had gone in with the agreement that he would always own any content he produced.

[JeromeHan]

@AlexO

Some good questions have been posed. A couple of thoughts:

• Very front and center that his reviews would be integrated with Cellartracker (I know that was a big gripe for some that WA wouldn’t do that)

Sounds like a smart move by him on that one to grab that market instead of trying to compete on his own with another app or something.

[Brad_England]

Congrats to Jeb.

[Jorgen_Lindstrom_Carlvik]

I wish Jeb the best of luck. Sort of weird that it was made official elsewhere before Lisa et al told “us”; subscribers beforehand. But as @neal.mollen has pointed out about a hundred times previously, consumer care is… well, not that great.

[Bruce_Krug]

@Neal.Mollen

@Ken V

@Neal.Mollen

Once I un-subscribed their fate was set.

FWIW I ran across your “See Ya” thread over there. I posted “What Neal said.” since I am letting my subscription lapse (after 30 years). Several people, including Dan Kravitz and Philippe Camps, added their thanks for your posts over the years.

Then Mark closed the thread.

Ha! No kidding? That’s just perfect. (Thanks for letting me know about Dan and Philippe)

Someone had the audacity to respond to your post, and Squires apparently couldn’t stomach someone having the audacity to reopen this old would. Said something like this "post has now been idle for months and the OP is long gone.

[Robert.A.Jr]

Best wishes to Jeb. A truly nice guy with a sincere passion.

[Jim_Clary]

I love Jeb’s reviews, and he is a great guy on top of it. When nobody else over there cared enough to address customer questions, he took it on himself to become the de facto customer service department. I wish him nothing but the best and will be an early subscriber.

[GregT]

Wine Critic Jeb Dunnuck Announces Launch of JebDunnuck.com

I wonder what happened. Makes you wonder how WA is doing if they can’t keep their main US critic.

And I can’t believe that launching another wine review site is too lucrative, especially for someone who isn’t well-known outside of the industry. But then what do I know. Good luck to him.

[ybarselah]

http://www.wineberserkers.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=141226

[GregT]

Link isn’t working but I assume it’s already posted? Duh!

Sorry everyone.

[Neal.Mollen]

Dunnuck leaving WA to launch own website

[GregT]

Good guy or not, how does one make a living as another voice in an increasingly crowded field, especially as he will have to start reviewing areas he knows nothing about? He needs some financing. Or else he does it as an avocation, like he used to, and limits himself to regions he knows, which would probably give him more credibility IMO.

I wonder if Parker ever has second thoughts about Lisa.

[Ken_V]

@Neal.Mollen

Dunnuck leaving WA to launch own website - WINE TALK - WineBerserkers

http://www.wineberserkers.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=2281634#p2281634

[Neal.Mollen]

@GregT

I wonder if Parker ever has second thoughts about Lisa.

I have no idea what he got in the sale, but I am almost certain that he has felt personally harmed by what she has done to the organization. You could tell by his posts after the ill-fated saki episode and a few other oblivious-to-ethics occurrences. He was pissed.

[Arv_R]

@P.Sunesen

@Arv R

It’ll be interesting to see if he will have the clout with local Rhone producers to rustle up the verticals he has been writing, which I’ve found quite interesting. I can understand participating in those if it was WA sponsored, but a single guy with a website seems dodgier.

It might not be so unlikely that they’ll serve him, cause only weeks ago Jeb told us (the subscribers, via the “morgue” of a forum) that these very useful restrospectives were “put on hold” by the administration.

Perhaps the straw that broke the camel’s back?

Interesting color. Although I subscriber, I never go over there since Squires complained about my avatar.

[Peter_Kleban]

@Neal.Mollen

I’ll say this: he was always the most willing participant in their morgue of a board, and was always the one to answer the criticisms and complaints about abysmal customer service, even though I doubt it was in his portfolio. Lisa, who is the boss of them all, simply had no time or use for dialog with the people who were paying her salary.

I feel for Neal and Monica, and, to a degree, for Bob. Lisa seems to be doing everything she can to run that outfit into the ground, and I have rarely encountered someone who seems less well suited to the role she has cut out for herself. When Parker posted about the horrific customer service, it was really just a shrug of the shoulder. “Not my job any more.” And when you are worse at customer service than Bob Parker, you are setting records indeed.

What has Lisa been doing that makes you say that? Just curious (I left eBob some years ago and haven’t kept up).

[NoahR]

Best part of the article:

So why leave, then? “The single-voice model that was so dominant in the past in wine criticism has faded,” Dunnuck says. “Everything has moved toward a brand-driven, team-based approach. There aren’t many people out there with a single voice covering multiple regions. I think that’s a shame.”

He’s right that the leading U.S. publications that score wines on the 100-point scale have virtually all become team-based. Wine Spectator (where I used to work) has long relied on a team of critics, never on a single voice. (One of its longtime critics, James Suckling, founded his own publication, JamesSuckling.com, which remains based on his sole voice but has never gained much critical influence.)