Judgement of Paris without George Taber?

If George Taber, who was a reporter and editor for Time magazine, wasn't at Steven Spurrier's blind tasting of Californian and French wines in 1976 would anyone have cared about it?
 
Probably the French still. They were quite outraged. You might want to give a bit of a background and synopsis for those who aren't familiar with it
 
You might want to give a bit of a background and synopsis for those who aren't familiar with it

It was a blind tasting where a British Wine merchant/oenophile managed to get a number of highly regarded French people including sommeliers and restaurant owners and other important wine people to taste French and Californian wines. As a blind tasting the ingrained prejudices about the French wines being the world best didn't come into play. The Californian wines won both red and white tastings.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judgment_of_Paris_(wine)

Probably the French still. They were quite outraged.

I think the French were outraged because Taber publicised the results worldwide, Time had a circulation in the tens of millions, meaning tens of millions of people now knew that Californian wines were world class. If another reporter without such global reach did the reporting I think it would be buried, much like a tasting conducted in the US 6 months earlier.
 
I think the French were outraged because Taber publicised the results worldwide, Time had a circulation in the tens of millions, meaning tens of millions of people now knew that Californian wines were world class. If another reporter without such global reach did the reporting I think it would be buried, much like a tasting conducted in the US 6 months earlier.

The French had all sorts of excuses for the earlier tasting, as I recall. The wines hadn't been treated properly, it was subjective...possibly others I don't recall. Would it be enough to kick the French into looking into methods, do you suppose? Without the publicity, it's hard to imagine.
 
The French had all sorts of excuses for the earlier tasting, as I recall. The wines hadn't been treated properly, it was subjective...possibly others I don't recall. Would it be enough to kick the French into looking into methods, do you suppose? Without the publicity, it's hard to imagine.

The earlier tasting didn't get the breakthrough that Taber got with Time which makes me think that if he hadn't been at Spurrier's tasting his tasting would also been a footnote in wine history.
 
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