Podcast and Seminars

 The year 2012, besides marking our tenth year of activity, brings many novelties. The first one of them, announced two months ago, is the Android application DiWineTaste Mobile, which can be freely downloaded from Google Play Store. On this regard, I would like to thank all of our readers who expressed their appreciation with their mails, most of them including good suggestions as well. The Android application has been the first of the events and novelties with which we are going to celebrate our ten years. it is, of course, a young project and, as such, subjected to future development: the journey has just begun. DiWineTaste Mobile for Android will not however be alone, as we are already working on the development for other systems, including Apple's iPhone and iPad. Not just because we want to satisfy the many requests we had from readers using these systems, but also because it is a natural evolution for a software project that, since the very beginning, was intended to be released for other systems as well. We decided to start with Android and, of course, it is just the beginning.

 It is however the first initiative with which we want to celebrate our ten years of activity and enter our eleventh. Internet, since the times it has been available to the “mass” using a personal computer, has spread in an incredible way and the its use has gone far beyond its initial goal. It should be noticed it was a project started at the end of 1960s and only at the beginning of the 1990s reached a planetary success, in particular, thanks to the huge development it had in universities and research institutes, largely done with Unix systems. The spreading of the “Mother of all Nets” has reached a planetary level - the addressing system is showing evident limitations since a quite long time - and the way with which it is being used has gone far beyond the “simple” computers for which it was destined. Mobile devices and GPS navigation systems, as to provide simple examples, offer to the user specific services realized by means of an Internet connection. Users, this in undeniable, like to have Internet always available, first of all, on their mobile phones.

 DiWineTaste Mobile has been developed in order to satisfy this need: to offer the possibility of using our Guides, reading the magazine and using our services, when the user is away from a computer and however likes to get information about a wine or a place. I like to think this new tool capable of satisfying the needs of our readers when they are moving from one place to another, while they are planning a pleasing evening with friends and are looking for a wine or a place. Or when they are, for example, in a train or in a bus, while they are going to their work places or going home, and - eventually - they have ten or fifteen minutes available while waiting to get to the destination. Many things can be done in this period of time: you can read - and this is always wise to do - listen to the radio or, nevertheless, listening to a show dedicated to wine, even broadcast through a podcast. The idea of publishing a podcast about wine is on my mind since many years. With the release of the application DiWineTaste Mobile, this idea became stronger and stronger, and I could not wait any longer.

 It is my pleasure, therefore, to announce the birth of DiWineTaste podcast, available both in Italian and English languages, which I see as a further development for the mobile application. In the near future, this is unavoidable, it will be available and integrated to DiWineTaste Mobile. For the moment, you can listen to our podcast by using any software developed for this purpose, both on your computer as well as on your mobile device. You can find it on Apple's iTunes, or in the main podcast directories available on the Internet, and, of course, in our web site as well. The podcast is hosted by me, with episodes thought to be quick and practical, not so long, in order to give simple and essential information. DiWineTaste podcast will not have a fixed schedule. The episodes will be released with a variable scheduling, according to the subjects. Our readers can simply subscribe to the our RSS podcast channel or entering the URL in their favorite application: http://www.diwinetaste.com/podcast.php?c=1 for the Italian language channel, http://www.diwinetaste.com/podcast.php?c=2 for the English one. Alternatively, you can simply click the button available in the home page of our site.

 There is more. It is now about twenty years I am working in the field of education related to wine sensorial tasting, distillates, tea, coffee, beer, olive oil and cheese, as well as classes about subjects related to cooking, service and restaurants. When DiWineTaste was published, all of my events have been organized with the endorsement of my magazine, with a monthly schedule for our readers and historically held in Perugia - the city where our offices are located - at the Locanda dei Golosi, a restaurant successfully managed by my friends Emiliano, Manuele and Roberto. November will see the inauguration of a new kind of events for our readers and friends: Five Diamonds Seminars. It is about events dedicated to the study and tasting of wines and wineries which had at least one of their products awarded with Five Diamonds, therefore, wine and wineries of excellence, representing the highest enological expression. The city in which our seminar will make their debut is Milan, also because we wanted to meet the many requests our readers from Northern Italy sent to us. In fact, they are not events dedicated to Milan and Milanese people, indeed, they are event for all of our readers, in particular for those living in Northern Italy.

 Five Diamonds Seminars will be inaugurated with one of the most prestigious and important wineries of Italy and its excellent wines: Arnaldo Caprai and Sagrantino di Montefalco. I wanted it was a winery from Umbria - among the highest enological expressions of the region and of Italy in the world - also for the fact this is the region where I was born and of which I am very proud of, likewise, I am proud of Sagrantino too, an unique and immense wine. A tribute to my land. The first seminar is scheduled for Sunday, November 11th, 2012 - 4:30PM, at Vinodromo in Milan. Seminars have a limited number of places and, just like our events, reservation is obligatory. You can find more information and book the Five Diamonds Seminar at the page events in our web site. Podcast and Five Diamonds Seminar are then added to the other services we are currently offering to our readers, wishing they will meet your interest and satisfaction. I will wait for you in Milan at our Seminar and, of course, in Perugia for our next Event dedicated to Cantine del Notaio. Subscribe to our podcast and enjoy it!