I just logged in to make a couple of posts and see that this is post 500. Seems like some sort of a milestone but I have to say that I’ll get to post 1,000 much faster than the almost 2 years it has taken me to get this far. In the past 684 days since I posted my first podcast here I’ve learned a lot about wine, made new friends and have finally found my voice as a wine blogger. As I reboot my podcast and expand what I’m doing here on the blog, I’m grateful there is an audience out there for what I love to do.

Thank you.

I’ve been asked to write an occasional educational article by the folks over at Openmarket Wine and they have posted my first effort today. Some of the articles will be cross-posted here and I won’t be doing any wine recommendations on their site. Openmarket Wine has an interesting business model of linking small wineries directly with customers over the internet that I hope gains traction.

I expect this will not be the only offsite writing gig I will be doing to promote Winecast.

I noticed fellow wine bloggers Andrew and Ryan putting the new Google Co-op custom search to good use today, so I couldn’t resist cobbling together my own version here. My search looks at most of the wine podcast sites and returns relevant audio and video results. It also gives you blog posts for some of us who do both. Let me know if I should add any other sites to the mix.

Cheers!

Being the “wine guy” with my friends and family I often get asked for wine recommendations. Of course I send them here to find tasting notes but with over 100 wines already blogged and rising, it can get a bit overwhelming.

So I’ve spent a few minutes while watching the Vikings game putting together a recommendations page (it’s also linked at the top of the blog). There you will find my standout wines rated 8.5 (now 85) or higher from the past year. Since I don’t usually publish tasting notes from my podcasts, I’ll be doubling back from my show notes and putting those up over the next few weeks. Going forward, I’ll post my tasting notes and tag standouts for this page dropping off notes older than 18 months or so.

For RSS savvy readers, I’ve also created a feed from this page. Sometime later this week I’ll post a tutorial on how to sync this feed with your iPod so you’ll have these recommendations with you on the move; like in the wine store, for example.

Enjoy!

…iTunes feed

After working with the man behind the curtain of the iTunes store, I have consolidated my feed to a single offering, the former “enhanced aac feed“. There you will find 39 podcasts that are perfect for listening on your iPod or right in iTunes on your Mac or PC. The mp3 feed has disappeared on iTunes and those who had subscribed to this feed will be automagically redirected to my full mp3 feed (just “Update Podcast” in iTunes to see the magic). If you are using another podcatcher, please re-subscribe to the new mp3 feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/winecast-mp3

I did this to reduce confusion and provide more podcasts on the feed that have been getting pushed off the main feed by my increased blogging. I’m also getting some much cleaner listener stats since my move to Feedburner. The only downside is losing some nice reviews, so if you left one (like Bill from Wine for Newbies did; hint, hint) feel free to leave another.

Thanks!

Just a quick post to let everyone know that I have added email to the subscription methods on the right sidebar. You will also notice a bunch of subscription chicklets for all the major blog aggregators based upon what people are using after checking my server stats. All these new methods are wired into my Feedburner account to help better count subscribers. If you haven’t re-subscribed to them, my old blog feed is being redirected. If you want all the podcasts, please subscribe to these new feeds and download as many shows the back catalog as you would like.

For all shows in mp3 format (most compatible):

http://feeds.feedburner.com/winecast-mp3

For enhanced aac format shows starting with Winecast 33 (for iPod or iTunes playback):

http://feeds.feedburner.com/winecast-aac

And while you’re at it, why not put a pin in my listener/reader map?

Thanks!

One of my goals here is to more directly involve the listening community of my podcast in the selection of topics and wines to cover on the show. After hearing Andrew Baron of Rocketboom speak over the weekend, one of his ideas struck me as simply brilliant: host a wiki on your website. After checking out the wiki’s available on my web host with one-click installs, I’ve selected the easiest for use here.

So I’m happy to announce the Winecast Community Wiki. You can check out the podcast themes I’m working on and change or add to this list as you see fit. You can also suggest specific wines to taste on the show or leave me feedback. Although I will retain overall editing control and delete bad language, SPAM or anything else I find potentially offensive, you are free to create new pages and edit everything on the wiki except the front page.

Have fun!

It’s back to L.A. for the Podcast Expo for me. Since my Macbook is in the shop being rebuilt, I’ll have to rely on public computers for posts here which will probably be fairly light until my return on Sunday.

If you are attending the Podcast Expo, look for me on the show floor. Oh, I look like this:

I was doing an upgrade to my polling plug-in and accidentally deleted all the results. If you have already voted, please come back and re-vote. Sorry about that… and for Wordpress blog owners, version 2.0 B52 of Democracy does not play well with the current stable version of Wordpress. I guess that’s why they call it a “beta” And good backup procedures are always a good idea…

Update: Seems it was my upgrade procedure and not the Democracy plug-in that caused my problems. I’m going to wait until the final release before attempting an upgrade, however. It will be right after I close this poll so my mistake will not be repeated.

One of my planned site improvements is to make it easier for listeners to get to my back catalogue of podcasts and for me to better track subscriber numbers. I think I have arrived at a “win-win” with the establishment of two new podcast feeds.

For listeners who prefer the versatile mp3 audio format, please subscribe to this feed:

http://feeds.feedburner.com/winecast-mp3

After you have clicked on the link above, you will see a number of “subscribe now” buttons for various podcatching clients, including Apple’s iTunes. Just click on these or paste the feed address into your software. Once re-subscribed, you will see all 68 podcasts and one episode of my Quick Picks podcast for your downloading and listening pleasure.

For listeners with iPods or who prefer to hear the show from within the iTunes software on their computers, please subscribe to this feed:

http://feeds.feedburner.com/winecast-aac

Once re-subscribed you will see my last 37 shows and the lone Quick Picks podcast along with my most recent promo for other podcasters to use on their shows. The reason there are fewer shows on this feed is all of these are enhanced with chapter breaks, changing artwork and weblinks which were not possible until about a year ago. Also note that the 5 shows from this summer missing from the feed have been added, so if you haven’t yet caught the mp3 version of the show, you will have some fresh Winecasts to listen to. My apologies for getting so far behind on this feed as I released podcasts this summer.

If you want every post, including both blog entries and podcasts, please subscribe to this feed:

http://feeds.feedburner.com/winecast

By using these feeds, I will more accurately track the number of subscribers which will help attract sponsors to underwrite the show. I really appreciate your support here.

BTW, everyone using iTunes who don’t want immediate access to the older shows can just stay where they are as I am in the process of migrating my iTunes channels to these new feeds. One day, you will notice all the older shows pop up in iTunes once this migration is complete.

Finally, I have a new poll on the right sidebar of the blog to help gauge demand for future site features. Please stop by and cast your vote when you have a chance…