Weekly Wine Web Wrap-up: The "Hey, What Happened To Last Week's Edition?" Edition

(images: toyarchive.com)

Alright, alright, alright - so it's been a rough week, and rougher weekend, and Dude ended up totally missing last weeks' edition of W4. Maybe he had one too many brewskis. And maybe made some bad decisions at the bar while jammin' with his band homies.

Let's just agree to get over this awkward moment together, and continue with our professional relationship as blogger and reader, OK? Cool.

I give you the "Hey, What Happened To Last Week's Edition?" Edition of W4...


"When the Dust Has Cleared... And Victory Denied..."
When I say it was a rough week, I mean it - especially for our friends who are fighting the good fight against the three tier, monopolistic wine distribution industry. Wine and Liquor Wholesalers poured their big bucks into beating back legislation that would have allowed on-line wine sales in both Tennessee and Maryland. Never mind that both the public and the wineries of those states supported the legislation - what do they know about wine and the needs of wine consumers anyway, right? Obviously fear-monger organizations like StopTeenDrinkingTN.org know more and need to protect TN citizens from themselves. You can read about them on their "About Us" page - by the way, it doesn't mention that the TN wine and spirits wholesalers lobby likely funded their website (the Tennessee Wine and Spirits Wholesalers Association is the major coalition member). Pathetic.


Robot Bee Wine Tasters (You can't make this sh*t up!)
By far my favorite news article of the week. Australian researches are testing bees' noses to give them insights into how to develop robots that can sniff out quality wine. Since it's a small animal that lives in Australia, I'm assuming the bees are poisonous (hey - even the platypus has venom, people).



Single, Ginormous & Ubiquitous On-Line Retailer Seeks Wine Buyer. Did I Mention I'm Finally Profitable?
If you need a job, Information week reports that Amazon is looking for a wine buyer. Yes, that Amazon. But there's talk of Amazon's wine foray actually being a deeper partnership with Wine.com (who everybody loves to hate at the moment for their spurious actions in selling out their competitors to state governments, Communist-China-style).


A Case of Indian Sour Grapes
I'm not sure why I was drawn to this article from the Business Standard - I just found it interesting that India is now getting into the wine competition thing. Once we get the calm, meditation-&-yoga oriented cultures to become anal-retentive, competitive A-types like the rest of us, the world is sure to become a better place, right?

Cheers!