Some social media “experts” fawn over the Web 2.0 revolution of the internet over the last few years… “It’s so wonderful that millions of minds are connecting on twitter to solve the world’s problems!”

Opinions are like A-Holes…

It seems from my vantage point that the further down the internet rabbit hole you go, the less value you find… There are a million web sites on any subject, no matter how useless the topic is. Generally, 10 websites on any genre of life (news, sports, weather, politics, food, religion) is all you need to visit, or else you’ll lose your mind (or your spouse).

Chris Kimball is editor of Cook’s Illustrated and Cook’s County. In my opinion (see what I did there?)  America’s Test Kitchen is the best cooking resource around. They test every recipe 70 or 80 times until near-perfection is reached. He is the author of the following quote:

The shuttering of Gourmet reminds us that in a click-or-die advertising marketplace, one ruled by a million instant pundits, where an anonymous Twitter comment might be seen to pack more resonance and useful content than an article that reflects a lifetime of experience, experts are not created from the top down but from the bottom up. They can no longer be coronated; their voices have to be deemed essential to the lives of their customers. That leaves, I think, little room for the thoughtful, considered editorial with which Gourmet delighted its readers for almost seven decades.

To survive, those of us who believe that inexperience rarely leads to wisdom need to swim against the tide, better define our brands, prove our worth, ask to be paid for what we do, and refuse to climb aboard this ship of fools, the one where everyone has an equal voice. Google “broccoli casserole” and make the first recipe you find. I guarantee it will be disappointing. The world needs fewer opinions and more thoughtful expertise — the kind that comes from real experience, the hard-won blood-on-the-floor kind. I like my reporters, my pilots, my pundits, my doctors, my teachers and my cooking instructors to have graduated from the school of hard knocks.

He was discussing the death of Gourmet Magazine. It’s a good article. Check it out.