I wonder how long he is tied to the organisation under the terms of the sale?
Too bad Julian Assange and Wikileaks haven’t shown any interest in this vital document.
While his scoring was rather Buzzini-esque (“just subtract 3”), there’s still no way this is anything but a loss for the WA.
It’s a gain for me, though, as it reminded me that I have been meaning to turn off the auto-renew on my subscription, and let it lapse in a month (which I have now done). There are still some solid critics at the WA, but the lack of CT integration, the moribund state of the forum (I haven’t even lurked for several years) alone are serious drawbacks. I’ve also found myself increasingly annoyed at the way the home page has gotten cluttered with the sort of content more apt to Food & Wine (or worse), e.g. articles on “The Three Styles of Chardonnay for Mother’s Day” (with a non-critical reference to Rombauer) and “The Wines of Trader Joe’s”. Besides, between my own 22 years of experience, and the widespread citations of reviews by retailers, I can cope just fine without a subscription.
If Dunnuck were smart he would introduce a new subscription model based on CT-access only, at a significantly reduced price. I won’t be paying $100 for his new site, but I would probably consider paying $20-25 for access to his reviews through CT, even if, for example, they were uploaded with a delay of a few weeks.
What I find rather bizarre is the fact that there has not been a press release from WA regarding the matter, especially considering the fact that WA released their month end report today and no mention about Jeb. Is Lisa too pissed to be able to comment or does she not have a clue as to what to say?
I hope he got paid up front rather than on an earn-out!
I don’t find it bizarre that they said nothing. Why should they advertise it?
Not even to their customers? This is a pattern for Lisa. I bet there is a thread there now with people asking about it, I bet Jeb has posted a gracious farewell, I suspect either Neal or Monica or both has posted, and I bet Lisa is pretending it hasn’t happened.
In fact yes, both Mark and Monica have posted very graciously. I did not see any comment from Lisa or Neil yet.
I’m shocked.
clearly you havent seen the thread regarding suckling from last week and the 400 point wine 
/s
When the “Heir Apparent” leaves, I would think they would acknowledge it. I certainly would not expect them to “Advertise” it.
What is awesome though is that in the WA email they sent to subscribers today, they pointed out that their print version will now have lots of pictures, in case we didn’t know what a vine looks like, and urged web subscribers to upgrade to include that ‘value add’ too.
So subscribers have lost Jeb’s reviews, assuming they liked his taste, and especially his vertical notes, but have now gained lots of pretty pictures instead of those pesky word filled tedious wine tasting notes/reviews/estate commentary.
Also they alerted subscribers to read their ‘Wines for Outdoor Grilling’ article, which I’ve haven’t clicked into, but seems vaguely like a USA Today infopic headline.
For now, even though I buy very little Spanish/Chilean/Argentine wine, I do like reading Luis Guittierez. And I also like Neil Martin’s comments, even if my tastes don’t line up with his so much (I think). So those two alone make the subscription worth keeping. Maybe they can sublicense Lermonth or Mayberry for the Rhone as a stopgap, til they identify another contributor.
I wonder how soon before WA becomes instagram only.
They don’t have to “announce it” or make a big deal, but the obvious thing to write is something like “Jeb Dunnuck has decided to go out on his own again. We thank him for his X years of service here and wish him only the best. We would like to assure our readers that efforts are already underway to bring on an outstanding replacement.”
And in his announcement, he says he’s going to be covering the same region he was supposed to be reviewing for them in an upcoming issue, so I wonder if there’s going to be another one of those dust-ups as to who owns the reviews. Their ability to handle the slightest bit of controversy is non-existent so now they just have this awkward phase where they don’t say anything.
I don’t think they can poach anyone from WS or WE at this point as both of those seem to be in better financial shape, so maybe there’s an even less well-known blogger than Jeb was who might be available.
Or there’s Mark. Say what you will, he’s a decent critic.
Well, he doesn’t have to use the same review does he? He has the same information and he can rewrite again in different words right? Unless WA is going to argue that all information gathered during his employment is their intellectual property…
But still did the travelling and visiting and got the intros on their dime.
Didn’t you hear, I’m making a comeback. PSYCH, I like retirement (a lot).
DoctorJay
Wait. Hold on. I apologize ahead of time as I am still fairly new here. You’re the same Jay Miller? Why do I feel like I am part of some Candid Camera episode?
Yup, lol.
Always throws me for a loop cause we have another Jay Miller here, too!
The more, the merrier.