Amazon Review
A further extension of the innovative
Good Web Guide series, this Wine volume provides the same excellent service as its predecessors have done for gardening, money, food, parenting, genealogy and other essentials. Essentially it comprises description and evaluation of dozens of Web sites around the world devoted to wine, its appreciation, its sales, its appurtenances and paraphernalia. In the standard and very useful
Good Web Guide style, sites are given a broad classification (enthusiasts, winery, commerce etc.), together with a number of star ratings for content, ease of navigation, downloading speed and frequency of updating. The reviews are clear and fair; the sites reviewed have been chosen judiciously (there is also a generous selection of "Other Sites of Interest"). The physical book is only part of the Guide--the inert terrestrial terminal of the project. The CD-ROM included with it gives access to the
Good Web Guide Web site, where links to all the reviewed sites are maintained, along with updated reviews and new sites added to the project. Despite the high-tech gloss, the approach is reassuringly non-technical, with few assumptions made about readers' surfing abilities. A handy glossary explains many of the most common Web terms. Tom Cannavan is a highly regarded figure in the world of wine, who himself maintains one of the best wine Web sites. Modestly, he does not include it; however, the publishers have sneaked a (rightly) rave review into the Introduction. --
Robin Davidson
Synopsis
A simple search for wine-related subjects on the Internet will confirm that wine has adopted the web in a fashion unlike any other food or drink subject. The downside is a cyber-space so crowded with wine-related sites that it makes for a time-consuming and often frustrating surfing experience. This book contains around 100 in-depth reviews of related websites. It is aimed at everyone who is frustrated by the confusion of material on the Internet, much of which is misleading and uninformative. Readers are pointed towards concise and authoritative information about the specific wine areas they are interested in. "The Good Web Guide to Wine" casts a knowledgeable and critical eye over the world of on-line wine, pin-pointing those sites that really deliver the goods and sifting out those that merely flatter to deceive. The Internet has been scoured for the best sites in a number of categories including wine appreciation, wine sales, regional guides, on-line magazines, educational resources and those sites that simply celebrate the joy of wine. To qualify for inclusion, not only must sites have the highest standard of content, but they must be up-to-date and easy to use.
