Reply to "Vaynerchuck or Parker?"

I am glad we have both. Parker is strictly a numbers guys for me. I don't read his mag and pretty much stumble across his ratings when buying wine ie: "RP 92" like many of us. That's about it for me with him nowadays. Too many sources on the Internet (wine boards, cellartracker etc.)to get my skinny on any bottle I want and have lots of opinions. Aside from big year Boardeaux and Burgundy for serious futures investing in a vintage (and even that is not a gimmie anymore), he's just not a big deal or necessary for me.

I do enjoy viewing many of Gary's videos (not all)as truly seeing a wine being tasted and evaluated in front of your eyes is pretty neat and a helluva lot more fun than a 3 sentence printed note with a score. At least for me - even with the over the top goofy antics, Gary knows his stuff without being snobby. When he gets down to it - he gets 1/2 way serious.

I don't care about or what his motives are or are not. I'm guessing it's a normal balance of heavy business and some pleasure doing it. It's nice to watch the tastings when you are drinking a good wine yourself and you do not want to put the TV on and just skip to the good wine parts in sideways...

Him doing these videos is a good thing - oh and don't forget they're FREE to view and free of obligation, which IMO gives him a long leash to not be overly criticized or have motives questioned. Don't like it. Don't watch.

As to the question from the beginning of the thread, I align with no one critic or taster more than any other. I agree with some and disagree with others.