User:OberMegaTrans/ss2024/Captain Cork/translation

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Captain Cork is a German website on the topics of wine, cuisine and tourism with its headquarters in Potsdam. It was founded as a blog by Marcus Johst (a German journalist) and Manfred Klimek (a German author/photographer) in 2009. Manfred Klimek was editor-in-chief of the blog from 2009 to 2014. After his departure, the site was completely overhauled, expanded and converted into an information platform. Marcus Johst has been the sole managing director since 2009.

In 2013, a book about wine was published in collaboration with the German publishing company Gräfe-und-Unzer. The main authors of the book are Manfred Klimek and Rainer Balcerowiak (a German journalist/author).

Aim and concept
Captain Cork is aimed at wine and culinary enthusiasts who are younger than readers of conventional wine magazines. The texts are entertaining and break with the usual writing style for wine topics. The editorial team has put forward five theses:

1. Good is what tastes good. 2. Many wine drinkers no longer dare to say what they like because the ubiquitous testers have intimidated everyone with their scores, glasses and descriptions. 3. Conventional wine descriptions are incomprehensible because they are written in a secret language that no casual wine drinker understands. 4. The wine drinker dares not object because they believe they know nothing about wine. But it is quite simple. You have to drink wine consciously, ask questions and trust your tastebuds. 5. Taking an interest in wine is worth it, because good wine makes you content. And being content is always good.

The German newspaper Der Tagesspiegel comments: “The Captain Cork team discusses wine entertainingly and disrespectfully. The typical technical jargon for wine? Not present. The readers like it.” What is especially emphasized is that the articles not only address experienced wine drinkers but also beginners.

Within the world of wine, opinions diverge especially on the assessments of wines from prominent wine makers. This concerns for example a predominant good review of the wines from the German actor Til Schweiger. Another example that caused uproar was the assessment of the wine from Hartmut Mehdorn, who was the boss of the Berlin Brandenburg Airport at that time. The editors tasted the wine together with the head of the Airport’s committee of inquiry, Martin Delius, who belongs to the fraction of the pirate party in the House of Representatives in Berlin.

Official reach numbers do not exist, because there are no numbers for digital products about the topic of wine that are verified by the IVW (comparable to the Audit Bureau of Circulation). According to a statistic by the analytical tool Alexa Internet, Captain Cork belongs to the most visited websites about the topic of wine in Germany.

International wine competition
Since 2019, Captain Cork is one of 26 German operators, who have the right to perform a state-approved wine competition and therefore to place awards on wine bottles (Kleberecht). This was published in an announcement by the Ministry of Agriculture, Regions and Tourism on 14th November 2019.

Critiques
The German wine fond (Deutscher Weinfonds), which works as the institution of marketing of the German wine sector, calls it “one of the leading platforms for wine enthusiasts on the internet.”

Weblinks
https://www.captaincork.com/