Enjoying & Rating Beer

Rating and reviewing as many people have noted are two different things. I need to review a beer to provide a decent rating. Sometimes just rating combines aspects of voting for homecoming queen, dissing someone you don't like for reasons other than their beer, and heaping accolades on the local hometown brewer. Reviewing expands my knowledge of the beer and my own abilities to perceive and enjoy beer. I understand that some poor brewer is trying to make a living. I'm not poking holes in somebody's livihood to embellish my ego. I'm trying to relay my personal experience with their beer. Some brewers may listen and probably most won't. In other industries people pay money for those opinions - my wife worked as a product taster for a while - frozen pizza, popcorn, and what not. This industry benefits from passionate people who provide reviews for free.

 

I have friends asking me about beers all the time. I help them out, and it's the ability to differentiate between styles and examples that ultimately helps them the most.

 

Yeah, you don't see too many thought-out reviews (whether they are good or bad, objective or subjective) that give a single beer straight 5s or straight 1s. On 'hads' or 'ticks' or whatever you want to call them, not so much.

 

That's perfectly fine nobody is saying you have to write reviews, nobody is forcing you either. Everybody enjoys things in their own way one isn't better than the other.

 

well that's just one of many threads on here, with some specific criteria for posting and moderating if you post in there ( which is in flux or has been in the past ).

 

I never review the first one, unless it's awful. I only review beers I like so the first one is for enjoyment only, the second one I'll take the time to review. It's enjoyable to me and I'm ending up with a nice list of my favorite beers.

 

I have no personal use for nor desire to rate or review beers (or read ratings or reviews of beers for that matter). However, my feelings on this are not because of fears of shooting holes in someone's hard work. Brewers, as much as I am impressed by how much better their beer is than mine, aren't people I would feel bad about if I were to negatively comment on their work in an online review. It's a luxury product and I have many choices. If your beer sucks, your beer sucks. I wouldn't have any problem writing that in a review that, presumably, people were reading because they regarded my opinion on the matter valuable (again, that's if I reviewed, which I don't). Of course, if their beer sucks, I'm not going to go find the brewer and tell her/him that their beer sucks. I'll simply stop buying it, which sends a more important message.

 

Yes. Great post, thank you. There are so many other industries which face similar scrutiny; I don't think brewing should be any different. I share your feeling on why I review pretty much exactly. Its just that I enjoy it (which I do), but also to help other people out who might not have any prior experience with a beer.

 

When I first joined BA, it was to track the beers I tried so I would remember what I liked. I very quickly realized that just because I didn't like a particular beer didn't mean that it was "bad" and that my low rating was therefore unfair. Instead, it often meant that I didn't know the style guidelines. I immediately got a set of the BJCP guidelines and use those to review styles I'm unfamiliar with. The unfortunate side effect of this is that I often give high ratings to beers I don't particularly like, which defeats the purpose of my joining BA in the first place. However, the act of writing notes about the beers I'm tasting forces me to think about what I'm seeing, smelling, and tasting. In turn, that caused my palate to expand tremendously and my overall appreciation for different beer styles has gone through the roof!

 

I understand what you are saying. At the same time how does not providing feedback / review provide beneficial input to the brewer or possibly other site users?

I've started reviewing beers more frequently due to the changes on the sites rating system and now requiring reviews. It has made me put a bit more thought into my rankings and rating relative to other beers I have rated (don't get me wrong I am still not a fan of the new system). I try to post what I like and do not like about the beer and compare it to other beers or qualities about those beers as some reference for the brewer and other BAs. I.e. I note what I find enjoyable about the beer and other area's where I think there could be improvement. I'm sure not all brewers read reviews or necessarily trust them, but those that choose to have a look through could potentially target some areas for improvement to make an even better end product.

I don't review to coddle any brewer, but rather provide the pluses and minuses of the beer, in my opinion, which the brewer or other BA's can use as they see fit. This includes taking it with a grain of salt and saying that guy is cray cray

 

If you are making anything for public consumption you should be willing to face criticism. Artists, actors, writers, cooks, bartenders, vintners, brewers, and many more people. I literally loathe that some people are willing to consume anything on no information. I think this is effectively why we have so many crappy Hollywood movies. They can make garbage, advertise the heck out of it or feature a well-known star, and cover the film cost opening weekend before anyone has seen a review. Rinse, recycle, repeat. In fact, I'd say we have a system that makes it far more likely for a bad film to make more money that a good film. Life's too short for me to waste a couple hours and my money on crap. Whether it's a movie, a restaurant, or a beer.

With that said, I'm way more willing to take a chance on a beer. It's a small commitment. Although I'd rather do small pours if it's something I haven't had before. It sucks to buy a $6 pint that's undrinkable. Well, almost undrinkable is probably more accurate in my case.

 

I like to rate/review on BA as time allows, and hope to do more in the future. I have kept written daily beer logs for years (type A personality and anal retentive...) because it is fun to me to do so...nevertheless, I always enjoy drinking beer and talking about beer, whether in person, or now in these forums. Enjoy beer. Enjoy life. Cheers!

 

I consider myself to be positive and open minded. I'm fairly generous in how i rate and review beers. Mostly I do it for myself to get my thoughts out and to learn more about the art of tasting and of the nuances of different styles. If I truly don't like a beer I'll politely state my reasons and conclude simply that "I'm not a fan" or "I won't have again". Nothing mean like "this sucks". That said, I doubt Budweiser's feelings will be hurt if I trash their beer. They don't need my money anyway.

 

Perhaps before people rate beers they should have to spend a considerable amount of time on the Beer Judge Certification program's style guidelines web page:
http://www.bjcp.org/stylecenter.php

I can't tell you how many times I have seen timeless classics, benchmark of style beers get low rates because "I don't like hefes" or whatever. I don't think rating a beer should be entirely subjective, I think one should also consider how well it adheres to the intented style. Also if you don't like a particular style, don't rate beers in that style.

 

I find a great deal of reviews offensive, and more often misguided. I am guided by reviews that aren't ostentatious and jammed with rhetoric - but rather provide with enough description and benchmark references to help me understand if the beer is my kind of beer. As a rule I stop reading when the word "forward" is pulled out more than once...as in "mango-forward" or "malt-forward".