Top 100 from 2010. My how we've grown...

The thing that stands out right off is that a rating of 4.16 cracked the top 100. Today, it takes a rating of 4.32 to get into the top 250.

I wonder how many beers dropped in ranking due to ratings inflation alone.

 

Haha...that's what I remember when I joined. Trading was so so much easier and fun back then. Once RRBC starting bottling Pliny in 2009, it landed you anything along side with the Abyss. $4$ and the hell with all this "Trade Value" bullschitt. I remember Heady in bottles, and ISO Westy and Kate the Great, which were the two that always alluded me.

What a difference six years makes. So many new and amazing breweries and options!

Thanks for bringing me back for a moment. Cheers!

 

Wayback Machine is trippy sometimes...

 

Referring to your thread title: Have we grown or fallen? I don't know.

 

None.

The formula for calculation normalizes the ratings and so controls for any inflation. More likely sources of change are an increased number of breweries producing top notch beers and the change in the number of ratings required to make it onto the list at all. Basically the top 250 list is set up to allow popular beers to rise to visibility and to be dropped off the list or not as larger numbers of people try them.

 

Thanks for the info. I did not realize that the formula was that sophisticated.

Math at any level above intermediate algebra makes my brain hurt.

 

Don't feel bad about having your brain hurt. As soon as someone throws the word "Bayesian" into the analysis it causes brain hurt for many of us....

 

Its amazing how many of the top 50 from back then are not even in the running now. 5 years from now things are gonna get even more interesting...

 

It does really make it clear how much less stylistically diverse things are now. Most of the Belgians have taken nose dives and, man, the Germans... Weihenstephaner Hefeweissbier from 20 to 137, Celebrator from 25 to 225, Schneider Aventinus from 30 to just hanging on at 247. Yikes.

 

Oude Tart w/ Cherries was the #2 rated American Wild Ale!

 

There was even an English beer at 59! Very cosmopolitan!

 

Hey, this reminds me... I recently noticed Bar Harbor Cadillac Mountain Stout on the Beers of Fame, and lookie, it used to be on the Top 100 as well. Somehow I'd never even heard of this beer before. What do people know about it? It looks like it still gets a reasonable stream of reviews. How hard is it to come by?

 

Havent even heard of Masala Mama IPA at 21

 

Oh, how the mighty have fallen, indeed. On a good day, it still peeks onto the bottom of the Top 250.

 

IMO, it's still the best irish dry stout around. Very flavorful. I use it to convert Guinness drinkers, since they tend to think it's the best irish stout ever (that or Murphy's). I give them a Cadillac Mountain and it's never failed to cause someone to gush over it. Only thing that comes even close is probably FFF black sun (but it's been years since I've had it).

It's easy to get, shelf-beer status in the Boston area at least. It should be available anywhere in the Northeast, even down as far as the Carolinas I'd say.

Dope

 

Rogue chocolate stout is one spot below Hunahpu's. Ming boggling

 

Yeah that is what I noticed as well. Much less appreciation for European beers. I'm not sure if that is American beers have really stepped up over last 5 years or our tastes and opinions (whether legit or phoney) have changed. Considering big Belgians and all the Germans styles have slipped considerably, its hard to tell.

 

Ah....brings back memories of my first trade and trying to get a Westy 12. I got it 2 years later and she will get cracked open this year.

 

I think there's some amount that's just that we have far more beers available to us from American breweries (making American styles) now, but the selection of European beers that we can buy is largely unchanged. Pretty much every region of the US now has a handful of breweries cranking out top notch IPAs and barrel-aged stouts, and to some extent the surge in the number of beers available in those styles is just overwhelming the relatively more static number of beers in other styles.