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Comment by tejaswiy | Hacker News Reader

Slightly offtopic to the article, but is it just me or does anyone else think the wine culture and an iPhone app + game mechanics just don't go well together? I mean, the people that enjoy wine seem to be, well, just enjoying it without needing any additional incentive to have more of it?

"Sample five wines and you get X points with a 'Wine taster' badge!". Just doesn't sound quite right does it ?

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Actually it does, it sounds like you have't spent a weekend in the Sonoma or Napa Valley area (I don't mean this disparagingly).

A large part of what you do is drive around a large countryside tasting wines at various family owned and operated winery tasting rooms, interspersed with tasty meals. Many of the best wineries are way off the beaten track and there are many wineries who only sell their wine at their tasting rooms so getting traffic into them is crucial.

Something like what scvnger provides would be a great way for those who don't know the area to find some of those off the beaten track gems.

I agree with what you're saying, but I don't think iPhone apps driven by game mechanics are the right answer to this problem. It doesn't necessarily go with the relaxed Joie de vivre attitude of wine tasters. I feel it translates the experience from about enjoying wine to a mindless WoW quest like experience where all you want to do is to accomplish a set of objectives to get your reward.

One does need to keep in mind the target audience, especially when targeting niches. If you doesn't have personal experience or a good advisor who does, it's possible to miss the mark culturally. Products that do that stand out as contrived, or simply puzzle those who were intended to use them.

There are many different kinds of people that drink wine.

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