What is setting the wine Twittersphere atwitter this Summer?

Three considerations: (i) the residual good feelings resulting from the very successful 2010 Wine Bloggers Conference in Walla Walla, Washington; (ii) the hard-upon-us PinotNoir Twitter Tasting and Smackdown; and (iii) The Summer of Riesling.  I will reprise these considerations in this post.

The 2010 Wine Bloggers Conference, held in Walla Walla from June 25th - 27th, provided wine bloggers from across the country the opportunity to: visit Washington-area wineries; attend seminars covering a range of pertinent topics; and, most importantly, from some perspectives, interact with their peers (I had signed up to attend but had to cancel due to a bi-annual family gathering on the same dates.  Failure to attend said gathering would have resulted in permanent banishment from all such future gatherings -- a fate worse than death.).  Judging from the number of laudatory (and self-congratulatory) posts hitting the web at the conclusion of the event -- and the number of tweets released into the Twittersphere before, during, and after the event -- it was an untrammeled success.  Early Twittersphere preparation is already underway for the 2011 edition of the event which will be held from July 22nd - 24th in Charlottesville, Virginia.

The second event that is highly trafficked on the 'sphere is the July 15th PinotNoir Twitter Tasting and Smackdown.  This event, the brainchild of Ed Thralls, will bring Pinot Noir lovers the world over together, both physically and virtually, for a 2-hour Pinot Noir taste-off.  Participants will gather at their homes, in bars, in restaurants, and in wineries and will share their experiences live on Twitter.  The event will be from 5:00 pm to 7:00 pm on the west coast and 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm on the east coast.  The event provides a great opportunity for wineries to connect with Pinot Noir fans from all around the world (and, to that end, Ed has provided a special set of participation suggestions for wineries) and for Pinot enthusiasts to have a worldwide party with like-minded individuals.  The 'sphere has been atwitter with Twitteristas setting up parties, making connections, and determining exactly where, and with whom, they will be at Smackdown time.

By going for Tweet volume, @terroirNY has singlehandedly lifted The Summer of Riesling from a wine sommelier's dream to a series of live, New York City events and significant Twitter updates on these events and other Reisling-related initiatives.  The scope of Terroir's Summer of Reisling initiative is aptly captured in its tag line: The Tastings! The Concert! The Queen! The Crawl!  The crawl looks like it will be a lot of fun.