TobaccoRatings.com !

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brando71

brando71

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Apr 12, 2010
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I would like to introduce this new no-commercial tobacco ratings website:

http://tobaccoratings.com

I developed this project in the last 8 months and I feel that now it's the right time to present it to the world. The idea is to be a tobacco site where a pipefriend can rate a pipe tobacco with no need to write a full review nor a comment. A quick way to know how much the visitors appreciates a blend. The classic review/comment features are also actives. In this testing months, it received already more than 700 reviews and more than 1500 ratings.

Most of the main brands are present and I'm adding new brands/blends all the time. The website is multilingual and the visitor can help with the translation. Please feel free to take a look. Any comment/suggest will be fully appreciate. Have fun!

Luigi
 
Very Nice!!! Now I have something to do at work!!!! Jk It'll have to wait till I get home.
 
Luigi,
Thanks for a new site with obviously a lot of work done on it !! Unfortunatly your translation button does not seem to work with IE Explorer as all I can get is the Spanish version :p
 
monbla256":ztupkurn said:
Luigi,
Thanks for a new site with obviously a lot of work done on it !! Unfortunatly your translation button does not seem to work with IE Explorer as all I can get is the Spanish version :p
Click to expand...
Dear friend, I do not understand. The website is native in english. You means that the spanish translation don't work?

If you see the spanish version on your first visit, please hit the english flag and you will be directed to the english version, which is native. I didn't found any IE issue but I can be wrong.
 
Sorry,
I did not realize I had to click on Spanish to get the English translation! When I first went on it all the headings were is English, but the reviews were in Spanish :p Now I click on Spanish and get headings in Spanish and the review in English !! :p It works !!
 
monbla256":px1obtcw said:
Sorry,
I did not realize I had to click on Spanish to get the English translation! When I first went on it all the headings were is English, but the reviews were in Spanish :p Now I click on Spanish and get headings in Spanish and the review in English !! :p It works !!
Click to expand...
Yes, and not. A review is posted in the native language the reviewer published it. So if you read something in spanish, it was because a spanish spoken guy written it in his language. I'm working about an automatic reviews translation but the result may be ridiculous, you know how bad Google Translate works with pipes and tobaccos slang...
 
calipuffer":f8yuc2df said:
So if my rating changes due to age/tin airing, how do I update my rating?
Click to expand...
Just drop a note and I will allow you to re-rate again! Another way is to re-rate using another computer or another IP...
 
Muy excelente!

Finally, FINALLY, someone has a "Family" category where you can choose combined components of tobacco that share a common bond. Granted, I know that we won't know exactly what's in the mix, it's a great way to narrow it down.

This is a brilliant undertaking, and I hope it takes off. I'll be on there quite a bit!

Great banner collage of old tin lids and graphics, by the way.

Really impressive project.

8)
 
I've just spent a few minutes using the site...the live search works great, the pictures of the product are there, and the rating system is sound. The interface is easy, well-organized and uncluttered.

I like this site! :D

C&D's "Pirate Kake," is with a "K" rather than a "C"... had trouble finding it. :p

8)
 
Thank you, Kyle. In fact, in all this years collecting pipe tobaccos, I found that the existent reviews websites lacks of some classification system of the blends. For this reason I grouped the blends into general categories (american, aromatic, english blends, etc.) and family classifications by the main tobaccos that the blends contains. After some experimentation, I found that this families well catalog the mayor part of the blends.

Of course, I stay away from some polemic classification such the Balkan mixtures. I would like to add some more categories, eg. danish blends, but the information about the contents is so kaleidoscopic that I had to abandon the intent. The only cagetory I'm doubtful is the Scottish blends, for this I just included the blends that self declares as scottish ones into descriptions. My opinion about this blends is that a Scottish blend is the one preferred by the Scottish pipemen :)
 
Kyle, in each blend section you can follow the right arrow links in order to get the ordered list with the related criteria. In the case of C&D, the brand list is

http://tobaccoratings.com/cornell-diehl-blends/

where you can find all the brand's blends in alphabetic order and listed by cut, strength, category, family, flavor and packaging. By the way, I corrected the name of the blend you couldn't found and now is listed as Pirate Kake :)
 
Oh I found the mix eventually, I was busy using your "Search" text box to see what I could pull up instantly. Browsing would have worked, but hey, gotta test drive the site a little. :)

I follow you and agree completely--it's so hard to determine even things such as "English," which seem straight forward, but then "Balkan" is just asking for trouble. I mean, is it "English" by the fact that it has no additives, or it it "English" by American standards wherein there is use of Latakia and Virginia? Even SG's "Balkan Flake" has only Latakia and Virginia--but has no Oriental tobacco, is made in England, but is...a Balkan? :lol: It's rough to try and start classifying such things, and we've all read the arguments trying to "clear up" such things (which, usually makes it even worse). :lol: I truly commend you for your approach and categorizations.

I'm VERY critical about people's websites. Clutter, pointless features and bad organizations make me hate using the Internet...I try and make my few sites easy to read, understand and navigate--this is exciting, and I hope others find it just as cool.

8)
 
My classification for categories is all about contents, and for the English one I determined that the best combination is

Virginia, Latakia, Oriental/Turkish and others (++) [the order defines the proportions]

in this case, if you switch the condiment tobaccos, you get the Oriental Blends

Virginia, Oriental/Turkish and others (++) [with/without Latakia]

Well, may be my personal way to see the things, but I think it works and at least, it worked for me. One more line about the english blends, we have to remember that are the American pipemen that created this classification, you know, if you talk with an English smoker, he can't gave you an exact explanation about what an English Blend means. It is like some international dishes, if you talk about the Florentina Steak with a friend from Florence, he will says that don't know such a beef cut and he call it simply Steak.

About searches, you can try the advanced search as well in order to buid your own listings. Thank you for your comments, any suggestion will be truly appreciated.
 
One thing that's going to be naturally tough is ratings based on people's taste versus the tobacco by itself, in an objective manner.

Take any of the Lakeland heavyweights, with the "soapy" flavor--I don't like soapy flavor, at all, I find it vile, but that (to me) doesn't make the tobacco bad, it might be perfectly good tobacco. Unfortunately, most people don't rate objectively. I won't rate G&H Rum Flake at all, even though I smoked it and hated it, because it might be an awesome tobacco in its own category. I can't very well give one star to a tobacco in certain categories when I couldn't get past a few puffs. :lol:

I think your system will help more clearly rate tobaccos based on common points--hopefully people will be fair.

8)
 
Anyway, one can choose to integrate his rating with a review as well. The website started eight months ago in spanish, http://catasdetabacos.com is the original site, there some spanish spoken friend written some hundred of reviews, but I decided to not include these reviews in the english version because the automatic translation was ridiculous and it is such a lot of work to translate them all by myself...
 
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