Steven Beaumont in General

Reads 3678 • Replies 37 • Started Wednesday, February 8, 2006 5:37:18 AM CT

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Message JorisPPattyn P admin beers 14322 º places 93 º 10:00 Wed 2/8/2006 Originally posted by SilkTork Originally posted by DrBill77 He is probably the second most influentual and respected person in the world of craft beer! He ranks up there with Roger Prost, Fred Eckhart, etc. Cheers doc I assume you mean in North America. He means little to us here in Europe. Do you think he’s more influential and more authoritative than RateBeer? Google hits for "Stephen Beaumont" are 27,900. Google hits for RateBeer are 1,070,000. People say he writes well and he’s a nice guy. But he’s got, what - 3% of the influence and authority of the RateBeer collective. And, just out of interest, there were 1,820,000 hits for "michael jackson" +beer. And 633,000 for CAMRA. And 16,900 for SilkTork. But I’m a busy bee on many different forums, so not all that is beer related! And is importance measured in hits by Google? Come on, Steve, that’s got little to do with it. I’ve met Stephen on a few occasions, and I respect his views. He might start to mean more in Europe, as he’s often over (even when not frequently enough to his own liking Joris
Message DerWeg beers 2175 º places 48 º 10:03 Wed 2/8/2006 Well think now, < 3 % of the hits of RateBeer is still as ’influential’ as one thirty-third of all people on this site combined. And how many individual google hits can there be for one person versus an endless crowd of RB contributors creating link-able web reviews? Tricky to compare the two, kind of like pitting Alan Edmunds ("Lemon Aid") against every used car listing on the web, for sheer web hits.
Message beerinator places 4 º 10:09 Wed 2/8/2006 Originally posted by SilkTork I assume you mean in North America. He means little to us here in Europe. Do you think he’s more influential and more authoritative than RateBeer? Google hits for "Stephen Beaumont" are 27,900. Google hits for RateBeer are 1,070,000. People say he writes well and he’s a nice guy. But he’s got, what - 3% of the influence and authority of the RateBeer collective. He may have 3% of the online influence and authority of RateBeer.com according to Google, but he also sells books in bookstores. Does RateBeer write articles for beer related magazines and brewspapers? Does RateBeer have anything on Amazon.com? I knew of Stephen Beaumont and his beer related writings before I knew about RateBeer or BeerAdvocate. Because he is a tangible thing that existed before this internet. How can we measure how many "hits" he gets in the real world? Someone could argue that Roger Protz means little to us in the US, but I guarantee you that many of us have heard of him and also purchased his books. Stephen Beaumont may mean little to you, but you probably shouldn’t include your entire continent when you are deciding how much he’s worth!

Message SilkTork P beers 7752 º places 111 º 11:02 Wed 2/8/2006 Originally posted by beerinator when you are deciding how much he’s worth! I’m curious because Ratebeerians made a little fuss over his comments on us. I did not know his status. People are saying he’s a nice guy and a half decent wordsmith and he was connected with a beer place in Canada. Fair enough. Then someone posts: "He is probably the second most influentual and respected person in the world of craft beer!" Which seemed an extravagant claim to make for someone who is little known outside of North America. So I did the google searches to see how that claim stacked up. I posted the results. Make of the results what you will. But it appears that in today’s global internet community, that RateBeer is a more influential and wide-reaching beer resource than Stephen Beaumont. Traffic ranking for his site is 687,460. Traffic ranking for RateBeer is 11,569. So however you want to look at it, on the worldwide web his thoughts on a beer count for less than the RateBeer community’s. And as most people are not saying that he is an acknowledged beer expert, I am assuming the comment that he is hugely influential was a tad over enthusiastic. Nice guy and a decent beer writer with a local following - yes. Influential and authoritative - looks like a no at the moment. But the jury is still out - there are more opinions to come in.
Message beerinator places 4 º 12:00 Wed 2/8/2006 Originally posted by SilkTork... Then someone posts: "He is probably the second most influentual and respected person in the world of craft beer!" Which seemed an extravagant claim to make for someone who is little known outside of North America. So I did the google searches to see how that claim stacked up. ... In your original post you asked if he was "someone who is highly regarded in the beer world in North America". Maybe that is "the world of craft beer" that the person you quoted was referring to?
Message OKBeer beers 1175 º places 34 º 12:22 Wed 2/8/2006 Originally posted by SilkTork Which seemed an extravagant claim to make for someone who is little known outside of North America. So I did the google searches to see how that claim stacked up. But one of your own countrymen, in this very thread, put him on par with Roger Protz. Perhaps you’re not very high on Protz, and that’s fair enough. Originally posted by SilkTork But it appears that in today’s global internet community, that RateBeer is a more influential and wide-reaching beer resource than Stephen Beaumont. Traffic ranking for his site is 687,460. Traffic ranking for RateBeer is 11,569. So however you want to look at it, on the worldwide web his thoughts on a beer count for less than the RateBeer community’s. I don’t know that that is a fair comparison. Stephen Beaumont is an individual. Ratebeer is a online community. Two different things. Though the traffic comparison is much better than google hits. Remember that every page on Ratebeer.com is included in that hit count. Beaumont’s website has far fewer pages. Originally posted by SilkTork And as most people are not saying that he is an acknowledged beer expert, I am assuming the comment that he is hugely influential was a tad over enthusiastic. Nice guy and a decent beer writer with a local following - yes. Influential and authoritative - looks like a no at the moment. But the jury is still out - there are more opinions to come in. One of his books (A Taste for Beer-written in 1995) has Michael Jackson himself quoted as saying the book was "investigated with the diligence I have come to expect from Beaumont. He’ll make you a more discerning drinker, and you’ll thank him for it." Does Jackson’s opinion count?
Message willblake beers 2654 º places 81 º 12:49 Wed 2/8/2006 One area in which Beaumont has a great deal more influence than most of us Ratebeerians is at the retailer level. I’ve frequently seen his writings in one or more of the trade magazines (Beverage Retailer or something like that). They always been well done and would be particularly useful in helping a beer buyer increase his craft beer interest.

Message SilkTork P beers 7752 º places 111 º 13:09 Wed 2/8/2006 Originally posted by beerinator Originally posted by SilkTork... Then someone posts: "He is probably the second most influentual and respected person in the world of craft beer!" Which seemed an extravagant claim to make for someone who is little known outside of North America. So I did the google searches to see how that claim stacked up. ... In your original post you asked if he was "someone who is highly regarded in the beer world in North America". Maybe that is "the world of craft beer" that the person you quoted was referring to? Good point. I was originally more curious about his status than anything. Then my later reactions were coloured by Beaumont coming on RateBeer and claiming his views are more authoratative than the RateBeer collective. Nothing very strong, but it sort of tipped a negative in my mind. And then when someone made a huge claim about his influence I suppose I felt nipped enough to react. I’m not really here to put the guy down. Just wanted to know who he was and why RateBeerians were concerned, and then, later, why he felt he had to tell us that he was more important than us. I suppose there was a sense of hurt pride in there somewhere. But, as they say, he pushed first. And when people push, they tend to get pushed back.
Message CapFlu P beers 5136 º places 238 º 15:02 Wed 2/8/2006 Stephen seems like a nice guy. I think I met him once at the BeerBistro a couple of years ago; he’s a busy guy so I don’t blame him for only having a minute to talk to beer geeks like me. Remember, he is trying to run a business. But the fact that he takes the time to visit most every brewpub in Canada and write about the good, the bad, and the ugly... share travel experiences, and recommend companion food - that makes him a GOOD Canadian. Also, I’ve noticed that he generously shares some of his acquired beers with his restaurant staff - that makes him a caring employer. Now if Kimchee would only share those beers with me...
Message chriso P beers 7540 º places 736 º 15:07 Wed 2/8/2006 Originally posted by beerinator I knew of Stephen Beaumont and his beer related writings before I knew about RateBeer or BeerAdvocate. Because he is a tangible thing that existed before this internet. Someone could argue that Roger Protz means little to us in the US, but I guarantee you that many of us have heard of him and also purchased his books. And, although the posts are getting a liitle mangled up between the several threads on this issue, that was exactly the issue I was trying to address elsewhere. Several "professionals" managed to carve a niche by writing about beer, in print, before the web came along. All credit to them for doing so. But the world has changed and these guys are no longer at the cuttng edge, if they ever were. Sure, I’ll read Protz and Jackson, and would read Beaumont if his books were readily available over here in the UK. And they still have valid things to say. But the implication that what they have to say is more authoritative simply becuase they make a living from writing about beer rankles a little. I apologise if I’ve got hold of the wrong end of the stick but that is certainly the way Beaumont’s article read to me.