Stepping into a piece of history is always a pretty cool feeling.  The Napa Valley Opera House was built in 1880 and has served as the epicenter of the community for much of those 130 years, not to mention playing host to many talented artists.  You can learn more about this awesome venue just off Main St. here.  Having lived in Napa only since February, there are still many places we have yet to visit and an Opera House would’ve probably been fairly low on the list as the wife and I don’t often take in many shows of that style.  However, this week, I had the opportunity to visit twice and learned how versatile this old building really is.

3rd Annual Mutineer Magazine Red Carpet Party

After two years in Hollywood, the team at Mutineer Magazine invaded Napa in style on Sunday, November 6th, complete with movie premier spotlights not seen by this guy in decades.  Presented by Luxardo and Chinaco Tequila, once inside the party was already in full swing at the official start time as Ian Andreae was popping flashbulbs on the red carpet & requisite backdrop and young miss was passing around flutes of bubbly.  A square bar was set up near the entrance for attendees to witness some of the mix-mastery of the area’s top bartenders, drink makers and taste masters along with a single bar at the back of the room.  First up for me was a “Just in Thyme,” a fine blend of No.3 London Dry Gin, MARASCHINO ORGINALE LUXARDO, Cointreau, sugar on the rim and a sprig of time (and perhaps some other stuff, but I don’t recall – it was that delicious).  It was a real treat to try some creative and inspiring cocktails especially after a long weekend at the 13th Wine & Food Affair in northern Sonoma.

The winner of the cocktail contest was Michael Jack Pazdon of Solbar and his drink The King’s Waes Hail.  This guy was not only cool and clever in the mix, but all the while told a very interesting and hilarious story about the creation of the drink with historic tidbits along the way.  You can try the recipe for yourself found here at the Mutineer Magazine blog. Mutineer is following through on their promise of becoming the premier beverage journal for the next generation.  All beverages are revered (including wine) and the resurgence of the old-timey feel of mixology and the use of local, fresh ingredients and often home-made mixers is very slick (and tasty!) and took center stage at the red carpet party.

On this night Mutineer was also celebrating its inaugural “Inspired Voices of the Beverage Revolution” which included good friend Christophe Smith, of Titus Vineyards, for his Harvest Live show streaming live video of vineyard and winery activities for various wineries throughout Napa.  I was lucky enough to host one hour of his show last year at Chappallet and wholeheartedly agree and support this recognition for Christophe.

Parlatones and Johnny Hi-Fi Play Tankapalooza

Our good friends and business partners at VinTank as well as WineTasting.com hosted a thank you party of sorts for partners, thought leaders and clients as well as put on a show with Johnny Hi-Fi and a South African band named the Parlotones who also happen to produce their own wine.

They have both a red and white blend, and while you could tell the red really needed some time to settle after just being shipped, the white blend was quite good.  The “Push me to the Floor,” a blend of Chenin Blanc, or Steen as it is often called in South Africa, Chardonnay, Gewurztraminer and Viognier, was well-balanced, crisp with great texture in the mouth.  At R59.95, or about $7.65, it’s a decent value.  The wines are not available yet, but will be launching in the US in a few months on Winetasting.com first.

Ultimately, the event was to also unveil a plethora of enhancements to their VinTank Social Connect social media monitoring systems which are focused on the wine industry.  I continue to look forward to things from this organization to help wineries engage with their customers directly and better serve them.

There is a shift going on in the wineblogging world.  Or at least the subset that I have the attention span to pay attention to these days.  At first it was mostly about the wine, the label, the fruit-forwardness, the nutty characters and spicy finish for only $14.99 at the grocery store down the street, but not anymore.  Hell, that’s how I started my freakish blog.  Wine blogging has become so much more and the shift is on to better align bloggers with their audience and the wine industry and get away from the mundane wine notes.

Many were already there with the likes of Jeff Lefevre’s Goode Grapeand Tom Wark’s Fermentation and have been role models to look up to (Tom doesn’t do wine reviews either).  Others are recently finding their own niches that are resonating loudly with all types of audiences and are on their way to stardom such as 1WineDude‘s Joe Roberts and Hardy Wallace of DirtySouthWine, while still others (maybe myself included) are searching for their voice.  Most recently the WineWhore has denounced his previous “advertorials,” seemingly based on some very direct feedback from his audience, and will now be telling a different wine story.  Sure, hardly earth shattering events and some weak linkages I am trying to use to illustrate that things are changing and I think for the better.   What will happen next?  Will the Hosemasterfinally realize he is actually one of those very same bloggers he’s constantly berating searching for attention and finally use his tremendous wine skillz for good?  “Look at me!  I know more about wine than you do, so shut the F*** up!  See, I have a Wine Blogger Award Finalist badge on my site, but I really don’t care about this blogging stuff.”  — or maybe he’s been right all along? — it could happen, just sayin. 

On Wark’s Fermentation, Joe Robertslooked into his crystal ball and opined about how wine bloggers should use their influence  — check out question #11 as Joe responds: “Now… what are [we] gonna *do* with our influence?”  Yes, this makes the bold statement that wine bloggers have influence, but VinTank already stated “Bloggers, Blobbers, Whatever, They Got Some Power” in their now infamous social media report — and we better live up to that statement.  For more on blogger influence and wine marketing overall, check out John Corcoran’s Facebook site — he’s a blogger, a believer and backs it up.

The Wine Blogger’s Conference in July certainly showed there was interest in social media by the wine industry (as well as their marketing agents, ahem) and their ability to take advantage of it.  The big question still out there is can it really work or is it going to be like the Dot Com boom a decade ago where money will be thrown into this blackhole with no value, in terms of real return, coming out the other end?  That remains to be seen.  This represents yet another shift with wineries like Murphy-Goode, St. Supery, Bonny Doon, Twisted Oak and Eagles Nest Winery among others taking the lead to show that social media can at least extend brand reach and develop communities of evangelists for product, story, personality, etc. 

How can wine bloggers continue to add value to YOU, our dear reader and fellow wine-lover… and YOU our friends the winery, winemaker and wine industry?  How can we get together around the campfire and sing “kumbaya” all whilst sharing and enjoying our favorite grape juice?  Or is that just pie in the sky talk?  Find your niche, speak your mind and love what you do…  the force is strong in this one.

It has been a long and arduous journey, but chasing your passion is never easy.  With 16 days still left in the application period as of this writing, I have learned quite a lot, “met” a lot of great and interesting people and have never felt more driven to do something I really love: Work at a winery in the wine country.

For those of you who don’t know about the Murphy Goode Wine Country Lifestyle Correspondent competition, go here to learn about it:  http://www.areallygoodejob.com/.  If you’d like to view my video application, click on the video graphic in the right sidebar and vote if you think I deserve it.

As with everything in a social networking community, I have had help along the way and I’d like to acknowledge some institutions that have given me their support in this endeavor:

VinTank is an industry leader in wine, technology and Web 2.0 strategies and have put their full support and endorsement behind the Murphy Goode – A Really Goode Job campaign as well as the VinTank 4+, who are specific individuals who have demonstrated exceptional Social Networking skills.  Fortunately, I was selected as one of those candidates, so I am grateful and pleased to have VinTank support my work and look forward to working with them in the future.  Please visit the sites of the VinTank 4+ in the right sidebar under the HOTLIST.

Michael Bryan, Executive Director of the Atlanta Wine School was my instructor for the Certified Specialist of Wine (CWS) program I completed.  He was the first to see the value I could bring to the Murphy Goode position and quickly offered his support, which includes a feature story in the June newsletter due out this week.  AWS host tastings, wine courses and are part of the Society of Wine Educators.  Thanks, Michael for your support and I hope to continue growing in the ways of wine following your lead in the community.

Me and my wife met Bob, the owner of d’Vine Wine Bar & Shop, a few years back and really loved his quaint wine bar with a great selection, menu, music and overall ambiance.  He is an avid wine collector who opened his wine bar after a successful career with IBM/Peoplesoft.  With backgrounds in technology and a passion for wine, it was easy for all of us to get along and strike up a conversation over a glass.  By the way, d’Vine has been voted the #1 Wine Bar in Atlanta 5 years straight by CitySearch and was the 2008 Best Neighborhood Bar in Dunwoody by Atlanta Magazine.  Thanks, Bob!

Being a Phi Kappa Tau fraternity man is a mark of distinction in which I take just pride.  The organization helped chisel me into the person I am today during those developing college years, building character, a sense of self, a focus on community and service, as well as humility.  They have supported me in many ways and here is a feature article on my quest in The Link.

 Montaluce Winery & Estates is a Tuscany dream-come-true right in the foothills of North Georgia, just 60 miles north of Atlanta.  Many thanks to Rob Beecham and the entire Montaluce family for providing many picturesque weekends at the blossoming community and now many more with wine produced from their very own state-of-the-art winery, which just produced their 1st release.  They support my cause in the world of wine.  Please visit them here.

And, of course, I thank all my family, friends, colleagues and connections on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc. who have supported me throughout this effort.  I owe a lot to everyone.  I will be updating this page as more endorsements are forthcoming, so until then.  Cheers!

I know, this is a wine blog, but to satisfy the technology geek in me, I wanted to comment on a new tool I recently added to my site: Lijit as a recommendation from Andrea of Andy’s Goode Life.  I promise, I’ll get back to wine next time. 

Lijit is basically a search tool that allows your readers to search for and access content on your site and the sites of everyone in your social network (via blogroll) from one place.  It’s only been on my site for one week and I have not performed a super-detailed or formal analysis, I’ll leave that up to the gentlemen at VinTank.  These are just some thoughts I jotted down when playing around with the tool.  I would love to hear some other opinions.  By the way, you can access it from the sidebar to the right under the Links directory.

Pros:

1. Setup was pretty easy and they have a fairly extensive list of social networking sites they are able to integrate with.  Additionally, it automatically uses your blogroll to begin building your network the engine uses.  This is configurable via your user page on the Lijit site.

2. The biggest value I see is the ability to access other sites from one place, rather than having to visit each site and performing a search on each one.

3. It uses the Google Search engine (pro/con?) which also allows Google ads (pro/con?) on the search results page to be more targeted and reducing search “noise”.

4. The “Explore” feature is pretty cool, though, is a little disappointing graphically.  With all of the technology that is available (i.e. Silverlight) today, I expected more.  It displays your network in bubbles and you can click through your network and access sites that way.  This is a feature that could benefit from some additional features to create more value, like some integration with other blog tools or the display of additional information about those sites.

Cons:

1. It doesn’t seem to discriminate between the content of posts and text elsewhere on the site, like the sidebars.  So, for example, when I entered “Murphy Goode”, the results page showed all my posts, even though most weren’t about MG, because I referenced Murphy Goode on a link in my sidebar… not sure technically if there is an easy way to “fine tune” this?

2. You are required to select a tab on the results page for the views you want: Blog, Network, etc.  However, the default tab is configurable, so that might reduce the con-ness of this feature in my mind.

3. It was not easy to find the “Close” button for the Explore bubble graphic to get me back to my blog page.  I eventually found it way in the upper right-hand corner of the screen.  Also, see disappointment in graphical capabilities above.

4. In the Explore feature I could not find a way to get back to “home”, or my site after drilling-down several layers through the network, without drilling back up, which will be harder to do as your network grows.  Granted, I never read user manuals so maybe there is a way to do this, but I am pretty good with figuring technology out and this should be intuitive.

In conclusion, as I said before, I think the value here is really the capability of searching a network of sites from one place, which makes it very convenient for the reader.  Of course, the level of value will be dependent upon how deep a particular site’s network is as well.  Other than that, I think it has some room for improvement in the area of ease of use and GUI (see Explore).

Gotta give big props out to our wine world friend, Gary Vaynerchuk.  Though I’ve been into wine for over a decade, watching his work ethic and passion, helps me and other realize that if you hustle you can do just about anything. 

i.e. Applying for the Murphy-Goode opportunity (p.s. VOTE FOR ME!!!) to immerse myself in the wine world and business.

Today, via a chat on Ustream, Gary announced the pre-release of his new book via Amazon.com, which is posted to release October 13 , 2009.  It’s called Crush It!: Why NOW Is the Time to Cash In on Your Passion and I certainly want to cash in on my passion.  This topic sounds familiar to an early 90′s book written by Guy Kawasaki of Apple who wrote about Selling Your Dream, which I am currently reading.  Maybe I’ll learn something, and hopefully you will to.

Gary gave a quick response on my question about his thoughts on the Murphy-Goode campaign to which he said it’s a great idea, “a good thing”.  Oh, and he really wants to come to Atlanta, but just doesn’t have it on the radar just yet.  The world is on the bleeding edge right now as it relates to the Social Networking scene and what it can do for your business.  VinTank just produced a report, the first of its kind, in an attempt to get a picture of the current state of social networking in the wine world and take a stab at where it is going.  It’s really too early to tell.

Those of you just interested in wine, you probably don’t care about the report, but certainly you have a passion that drives you and invades your dreams.  Whatever it is, do something about it.

Cheers!