Super Wine Search is Back Baby

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Last Fall, Google retired their “Googlebase” product which we used to get results for our wine shop search engine Super Wine Search.

We had plenty of heads up, but due to lack of time and some uncertainty about which API was the true successor to the Googlebase one, we had to take the site down for a while.

Well, it turns out that Google’s “Search API for Products” is a good successor and I had a bit of spare time… so Super Wine Search is back! I’m excited to try a bunch of searches to see how well the database has expanded. (Be sure to flag search results that come back funny so we can tweak our processing to improve our algorithm.)

The new API is actually very easy to work. I was able to swap things out pretty seamlessly.

There are a couple of things we had to nix. The Search API doesn’t include “size” and “vintage” data as a separate field like the Googlebase API would sometimes. So we are only able to grab this data if it is passed in the product title. Also the new API doesn’t seem to allow us to limit searches to “wine products” like we could before. These features shouldn’t be missed too much though because many merchants (most actually) didn’t provide this information. So we couldn’t count on them anyway… and we didn’t.

Super Wine Search was also used to gather pricing information on wines in your log. You may notice updates to your wine prices and cellar values.

I hope you’ll give Super Wine Search another try. This very simple technology, which basically wraps a bit of WineLog data around the Google shopping search is very powerful and competes well with the more robust wine search engines out there.

Facebook IPO Best and Worst Case Scenarios

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Facebook released their numbers in preparation for an IPO, showing 2011 revenue of $3.7 Billion and profits of $1 Billion. Speculation is the IPO will be valued as high as $100 Billion.
This would be a P/E of 100. That’s high, but then P/E’s are not as significant an indicator for young companies with a lot of growth potential. So can Facebook grow enough to justify a $100 Billion price tag? I’m not so sure.
The easy justification goes like this:

Facebook has been focused on user growth and they were still growing 100% …

Don’t Break The Code

Stranger Studios, Work Comments Off

Last Saturday at WordCamp Philly, I ran a session on “Building a Plugin in One Night”. Together, with about 50+ attendees, we brainstormed ideas for a new WordPress plugin that I could code that night.

The brainstorming went great, coming up with some good ideas… like plugins to:

  • Help first responders after a disaster (Big Idea!)
  • Add VIM (a Linux editor) shortcut commands to the Visual Editor
  • Disable the Visual Editor on a per-post basis (The Winner)
  • Allow users to create pages from the front end
  • Add easy donations
  • Log into WordPress via Google+ (Brian did it!)
  • Add syntax highlighting to the Visual Editor (Chris did it!)

The concept that the audience voted for me to work on was a way to disable the Visual Editor tab on a per-post basis. The motivation for this is the fact that the autoformatting of the Visual tab will sometimes break a complicated (or not so complicated) HTML structure ruining your code. Folks wanted a way to say, “Hey, WordPress, back off on this page/post”

And someone (you introduced yourself to me later, but I forget your name) came up with a kick ass name: Don’t Break the Code. It explains the purpose and also harkens back to my days at Haverford College, which has a strong social/academic honor code.

…

Why I’m a Buyer of Netflix Stock

InvestorGeeks Comments Off

Sometimes you look at a stock like Netflix when it was trading at $300+ and think “Here is a great company in a market with super growth, but how can I justify the price?”
Well, it turns out you don’t have to justify the price because the market is beating the shit out of the stock. It’s trading after hours right now at around $86, and who knows where the market will take it.
Hip Egg had the next level of support at around $60, so I would look for the price …

CharityGoal.com Launches, Support our Cause

Stranger Studios, Work Comments Off

I’m happy to announce the launch of CharityGoal. This is a site we built for a client whose goal is to enable anyone to raise money for any (legal) cause. CharityGoal gives you an easy way to accept donations online, a beautiful landing page, and quick access to social network sharing.

For those interested, the site is built on top of WordPress. “Causes” are custom post types. A custom plugin we developed allows users who have signed up to create new causes through a front end form and to manage that cause. The checkout code was pulled from the Paid Memberships Pro plugin (also developed by us and GPL) and tweaked to work specifically for this site.

So take a look. While you at it, I’d appreciate a donation to our cause:

 

Yes You Should Refinance. But How?

InvestorGeeks Comments Off

With mortgage rates dropping like a brick, it’s becoming a no-brainer for us to refinance our home loan. Even though we just got a 30-year loan 2 years ago at 5.875%, we can get 30-year loans now for around 4.5% or lower. You might be in a similar situation.

Rule of Thumb
The rule of thumb I hear thrown around a lot is that if you can drop 1% off your mortgage rate, you should refinance. To get a more precise idea …

WBC11 Rioja Crawl Checklist

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Hello, Wine Bloggers Conference. I hope you are going to enjoy the Rioja wines and look forward to a chance to win some Rioja wine or a trip to the region… with Pia!

This is a little hacked together, but I hope it helps you log the wines and keep track of where you are. Logging the wines here and marking of the paper Pia gave you should get you entered into the drawing twice. Here are the steps:

  1. Signup for WineLog. You may want to link up your Twitter account from the account page.
  2. Visit the Rioja Microsite or just search for riojacrawl. Check the wines off as you drink them.
  3. Visit your Wine Log. You will be awarded the Rioja Crawl badge.
  4. Click where prompted to share on Twitter and Facebook please.

Live Blogging the 2011 Wine Bloggers Conference

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So I’m going to do the full Wine Bloggers Conference experience here with a live blogging of some White and Rose Wines.

We’re getting an update on the weekend’s schedule. I should be getting started in a moment…

First up is Andy Hicks from CalNaturale with an interesting wine in a tetrapack.

So I’ve actually decided to log the wines instead of writing in the blog. I’ll paste a wine list short code here, which should update with the wines as I taste them. Refresh every 5-10 minutes if you’re reading this in real time.

The Wineries of Master Chef’s Joe Bastianich

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tritonoKim and I are catching up on back episodes of Master Chef. One of the judges, Joe Bastianich, remarks in the opening about his 24 restaurants and 3 Italian wineries. I decided to try to figure out what and where those wineries were and if any of the wine is available online.

The Wineries

The first was pretty easy to find. A quick Google search brings up Bastianich Winery,a 70 acre winery in Friuli-Venezia Giulia, Italy. (Joe’s mug is on the “People” page.) They make a 100% Friulano white wine and 7 other wines. The Friulano varietal, named for the region, is one I had never heard of. The Bastianich site says:

Friulano is the most typical white wine in Friuli, the northeastern region of Italy. it is an indigenous grape variety grown in Friuli for hundreds of years. Our Friulano is produced in the Colli Orientali area of Friuli, an area known for its unique terroir and where world-class white wines of Italy are produced.

So to find the other “two” wineries, I checked Wikipedia, which says “Bastianich has established three wineries: Azienda Agricola Bastianich in Friuli; La Mozza s.r.l. in Maremma, Tuscany; and in Tritono Mendoza, Argentina.”

That first winery listed seems to be a longer name for Bastianich Winery. Must be an Italian thing.

La Mozza s.r.l. in Maremma, Tuscany, has their own website as well. The same picture of Joe is on the “People” page of this site… along with Mario Batali. Celebrity wineries! (Lidia Bastanich, a celebrity in her own right, is also listed on the La Mozza and Bastanich Winery sites.)

La Mozza has a red and a white wine listed on the site. Aragone is a red blend (40% Sangiovese, 25% Alicante, 25% Syrah, 10% Carignan). Perazzi is a Morellino (85% Morellino [the local name for Sangiovese in Maremma], 5% Syrah, 5% Alicante, 2% Colorino, 3% Ciliegiolo).

Tritono, the last winery, is in Mendoza, Argentina. Tritono makes a Malbec with a kick ass label (to the right). From the site:

In the glass, the intriguing dark scarlet hues foretell of depth and character Cinnamon and allspice dominate the nose with hints of plum skin and succulent prune. A first sip reveals a mélange of plum, prune, black cherry and hints of orange zest. Underlying flavors of fresh straw and wild mushrooms mingle with earthy, mineral nuances, nicely complementing the intense cherry and plum finish.

Get me a glass!

The Wines

To find the wines, I used what else but Super Wine Search to see if any of these were available online. And they are! Follow the links below to find some merchants offering Bastianich wines.

The Future

Wikipedia also says that Joe has “recently acquired the Brandini Estate in La Morra, Piedmont, Italy.” You can find some wine available under that brand/region. We’ll see what Joe does with it. In the meantime, we’ll be watching Joe school some noobs on Master Chef.

Let me know if you’ve tried any of these. Find them on WineLog and log them. Cheers!