However, if you're talking comprehensive, authoritative or, dare I suggest, magisterial, the early version of the 2012 Halliday had definite shortcomings. When I went back earlier today to check if the anomalies were still there it seemed most of the ones I'd noticed had been fixed but you're still inclined to ask why they were there in the first place, which is where much of the rest of this commentary is headed.
We're talking reference material, so when you bring it down to tin tacks it's down to the ease with which the information you're looking for can be retrieved.
While the on-line version offers possibilities that aren't available in a hard copy, you are still, presumably, looking at a listing of wineries with individual entries that combine information about the winery and tasting notes. You can add bells, whistles and search engines along the way, but it's the summary about the winery and the tasting notes that are the important content.
There's room for entries about Wineries of the year and Best of lists, but, seriously, I'd question how often the average user is going to be consulting that content.
A glance at the Table of Contents in the 2009 edition (my most recent hard copy) has that content taking up the first fifty pages, followed by just under seven hundred pages of Australian wineries and wines.
I wasn't impressed when I flicked through the 2012 Companion in Dymocks in downtown Brisbane and noted what looked like a significant diminution in tasting note content. That's understandable. There are a growing number of wineries and a definite limit to the amount of space in a hard copy, so something's got to give. Actually, that's a good argument for shelling out for the on-line version, isn't it? No page limit constraints, and you can justify the expense by having access to the whole archive of tasting notes dating back to way back when.
On the other hand you have to find the content, and this is where a few anomalies kick in. I don't see any reason why the 2012 version needs to look or feel substantially different to the 2011, or why the online version can't be continually updated as new tasting notes go into the mix.
For that reason, I wasn't impressed when I went looking for information to help me put together an order from Cullen and found, when I looked at the 2010 Margaret River White, a rating of 89 and a note stating:
A full (and longer than usual) tasting note for this wine will be included in an upcoming book by James Halliday titled 1001 Wines Under $20, and will appear on the day of the release of the book, scheduled for 1 November 2011. There's a similar note under the Bloodwood 2010 Big Men In Tights and, presumably, under the other 999 wines that get a guernsey in the forthcoming volume.
I realize we're talking slightly upmarket everyday drinking wines, but, seriously, having shelled out $55 for a two-year subscription in July last year, you're telling me I have to wait till November to access information to guide purchases in August, September and October this year?
Some time in that period I'll probably be placing an order with Pfeiffers, and that order will undoubtedly include some of the current release Gamay, but go to the Companion and there's that note again. The Pfeiffer website still has the '10 Gamay on offer, and there are still three bottles sitting in my wine rack, so I'm probably going to be looking at the '11 when the order goes in, but still….
Seriously, if you shell out the bucks, and if you've done so more than twelve months in advance, surely you're entitled to get access to everything over the rest of your subscription.
In an operation like this one would have thought that the idea was to build the subscriber base and work on offering a product that'll be good enough to have them re-subbing when the current subscription expires.
I'd hesitate to talk about cash cows, but you probably get my drift.
If the product is good enough to start with there's no need to do exhaustive redesigns of what's on offer. There isn't too much room for variation, but changing the look, feel and avenues to access the data isn't likely to encourage people who're approaching the end of their current subscription to sign up again.
I've done a bit of this sort of thing, and while I'm not suggesting I'd be capable of looking after something like the Halliday site, and that task would require something more advanced than iWeb or RapidWeaver, I'm not a complete novice.
Helpful thoughts and constructive observations are, of course, most welcome.
Tuesday, 16 August 2011