This is a selection of recent popular blog articles from the Twinings
Tea Blog, where you will find the best tea blogs by tea lovers from
around the world.

Rooibos: Some Health Information
Elliot, at the Miro Tea blog, continues his examination of rooibos,
the increasingly popular herbal beverage from South Africa. Last time
out, he took a look at how rooibos is processed. This time around,
some thoughts on the potential health benefits of rooibos. For more on
rooibos and health, look here.

Teawa Chataku
What's a chataku? As Katrina pointed out, in a recent post at The Tea
Pages, it's "a saucer (coaster) that sits under the small handleless
Japanese teacups known as yunomi." Chataku are also known in China as
chatuo.

Wakamatsu-no-Mukashi Matcha from Ippodo
The Tea Nerd reviewed some matcha recently at his site and also
included some striking photos that documented the preparation process.
Matcha is a powdered Japanese green tea that's used in the Japanese
tea ceremony, among other things. For more about matcha and health,
look here.

"Stringing Tea": Intro & Part 1
If the phrase "stringing tea" doesn't ring any bells, it's because it
was apparently coined in an interesting post by Mellow Monk. The
introduction and part one of the multi-part post relate how a three-
person film crew from Europe's Arte TV network followed him on a tea-
buying expedition as part of their research for a documentary on
Japanese green tea.

About Twinings
The Twinings Tea Blog discusses everything to do with Tea; from the
fascinating history, the many different varieties, and special brewing
techniques to the latest health news, unique teapots and famous
tearooms. Nobody knows tea like Twinings. The finest ingredients
coupled with 300 years of experience makes Twinings the tea experts.
With nearly 200 Twinings blends to choose from, there is something
special for everybody - every one has its own special aroma, flavour
and character.

Original source: http://www.twinings.ca/?q=blog

Another lonesome blogger. Instead of talking about himself overthere
comes here and talks about himself over there. Or blindless computer
posting anywhere and everywhere the word tea is mentioned. Why did
you close down the US plant? Better yet where was the US plant
located? I'm one of those people who aint going to take it anymore
till I bend over to get my last tin of Twinings to add to the compost
pile.


Jim

On Jul 3, 3:14 pm, Space Cowboy > wrote:
> Another lonesome blogger. Instead of talking about himself overthere
> comes here and talks about himself over there. Or blindless computer
> posting anywhere and everywhere the word tea is mentioned. Why did
> you close down the US plant? Better yet where was the US plant
> located? I'm one of those people who aint going to take it anymore
> till I bend over to get my last tin of Twinings to add to the compost
> pile.
>
> Jim

Yeah, maybe I opened the door when I did it... but I only occasionally
posted something here from my blog if it was topical and things were
slow here to spur some discussion. I have stopped and only in the
rarest case would I do it again or if things were slow, but we're well
into tea time again and there has been no shortage of discussion.

I think we all know of your blogging for Twinnings now, Dennis...
however just as Jim stated we'd be happy to hear some info, insight,
and stories from inside Twinnings or pertaining to them and their tea.
It would be very interesting. Otherwise we could just go to the blog
to read up.

Thanks,
- Dominic

On Jul 3, 10:48*am, Dennis Pang > wrote:
> This is a selection of recent popular blog articles from the Twinings
> Tea Blog, where you will find the best tea blogs by tea lovers from
> around the world.

One of my posts was mentioned. I do not like how you wrote "from the
Twinings Tea Blog," as it suggests that I am somehow writing *for*
you, which I am most certainly not. If you were truly interested in
sharing my post, not just driving up your site's traffic, you would
have linked to the original source rather than your own site.

Brent

On Jul 3, 2:14*pm, Space Cowboy > wrote:
> Another lonesome blogger. *Instead of talking about himself overthere
> comes here and talks about himself over there. *Or blindless computer
> posting anywhere and everywhere the word tea is mentioned. *Why did
> you close down the US plant? *Better yet where was the US plant
> located? *I'm one of those people who aint going to take it anymore
> till I bend over to get my last tin of Twinings to add to the compost
> pile.
>
> Jim

You've encouraged me to open my box of Ceslestial Seasoning green tea
with lemon to see if I really want it to be there taking up space. In
the jar, it smells like lemonade, which isn't bad for July. I'll
report back. I saw at the grocery store 100 teabags for a dollar. I
don't think I'll try that. Toci

> One of my posts was mentioned. *I do not like how you wrote "from the
> Twinings Tea Blog," as it suggests that I am somehow writing *for*
> you, which I am most certainly not. *If you were truly interested in
> sharing my post, not just driving up your site's traffic, you would
> have linked to the original source rather than your own site.

Everybody's tea blog is on there, it seems. It's Twinings Canadian
website that is using a blog aggregator to catch tea blog posts from
quite a few different sources. There are links to the original blog
and original blog posts on the site. When you click the "print" button
though, you can see the full post without going to the original blog.

If other tea-related websites want to use blog aggregators, guess you
can't blame them for that.

Everybody has a blog but me. Hell my email address aint correct. I
recently watched a CSPAN discussion by bloggers on bloggers with the
required college journalistic professor. Do I have to identify myself
as a blogger when I am with regular news media? Is anything 'off-the-
record' if I am a citizen journalist. From what I see it is another
group climbing the media food chain. Its all spin even the facts.

Jim

Dominic T. wrote:
> On Jul 3, 3:14 pm, Space Cowboy > wrote:
> > Another lonesome blogger.
....I delete me...
> Yeah, maybe I opened the door when I did it... but I only occasionally
> posted something here from my blog if it was topical and things were
> slow here to spur some discussion. I have stopped and only in the
> rarest case would I do it again or if things were slow, but we're well
> into tea time again and there has been no shortage of discussion.
....I delete you...
> Thanks,
> - Dominic

On Jul 4, 11:58 am, Space Cowboy > wrote:
> Everybody has a blog but me. Hell my email address aint correct. I
> recently watched a CSPAN discussion by bloggers on bloggers with the
> required college journalistic professor. Do I have to identify myself
> as a blogger when I am with regular news media? Is anything 'off-the-
> record' if I am a citizen journalist. From what I see it is another
> group climbing the media food chain. Its all spin even the facts.
>
> Jim

I came from a writing background so I have always had a web page,
site, or blog in some manner since the beginnings... as for blogs I
think it is just an outlet for what I'm thinking or doing for anyone
interested. I think it is a bit overblown and over-valued though and
will eventually die off. The whole SEO crowd really ruins it for me,
and sites like Digg/Reditt/etc. who cater to it and perpetuate it. The
idea is good but it all just becomes buzzwords and hot topics that
appear day after day, top 10 this, top 72 that, Obama, Britney, Ron
Paul, and the usual top digg/reditt stories. Journalism is suffering
as a result and you can't believe or trust anything with viral ads and
paid for bloggers. It's the bad side of the 'net and it just seems to
keep slipping and slipping to commercialization and ads.

It's the one reason I love Usenet, and truly personal blogs.

- Dominic

>*From what I see it is another group climbing the media
> food chain. *Its all spin even the facts.

These are just regular tea people - people who know about tea - like
you, me, and everyone else on here. They write a few posts on their
blog about their favorite topic, then publish it to their tea blog.
Then, a dedicated tea website (or tea vendor) uses a blog aggregator -
and picks up all these blog feeds about tea. So then that tea website
has instant access to all kinds of tea-related information posted by
these tea bloggers, who happen to be people in-the-know. So it's not
actually a tea website or tea vendor hyping about tea - it's the
aggregate tea drinkers (with a dedicated tea blog) hyping what they
love - tea. And that makes it more believable. So it's a bonus for the
website. It's kind of cool really - tea lovers posting about tea - and
you get all the latest news aggregated in one site.

Now the interesting thing is... when you post some little-known facts
about tea and someone comes along and data mines all this tea info -
and you later see your info in print, published in a book - with
someone else's name on it - and someone else gets the credit. Now
that's the low point.

I could post a heck of a lot of info about tea - but I don't.

Since I noticed this thread I have been trying to get the OP to remove
my blog from the Twinings blog aggregator, but so far he has fed me BS
about how he can't because of the way the software is set up. Come
on, seriously? He then sent me the following:

"By having an RSS feed, you should expect that your blog will be
syndicated with or without permission. So long as the original source
is cited and you are directed to the original source of the
copyrighted material in question, you are not breaking any sorts of
copyright rules by syndicating a blog. Anyways as it currently stands,
copyright rules with RSS feeds is huge a grey area right now as nobody
is even aware of the legal aspects and whether or not they’re
enforceable. Even if the blog serves you no traffic, the link exchange
is valuable in helping to increase the number of backlinks to your
site, which is a very important SEO strategy."

Ugh. These people really get on my nerves. Compare this crap with a
site like TeaCritic (no plug is intended, I just want to make a
comparison with a good blog aggregator), which is an entirely
voluntary opt-in system, vs. Twinings' which has no consideration for
blog authors' wishes.

Brent

Also, since it was brought up, I'm just a hobbyist blogger. I don't
make any money (quite the opposite!) from my blog, I just work on it
in the hope that it helps or entertains someone however briefly. I
don't expect anyone to take it all too seriously, it's just a blog
after all, but I still don't like being ripped off.

Brent

I had a professor in college who said if I couldnt say what I meant in
25 words or less I still didnt know what the hell I was talking
about. You can imagine my blog, I kinda like drinking tea. Thats
about it. Editorial: I have to pay the speculators for oil but not
Puer.

Jim

Dominic T. wrote:
> On Jul 4, 11:58 am, Space Cowboy > wrote:
> > Everybody has a blog but me.
....poor thing...
> I came from a writing background so I have always had a web page,
> site, or blog in some manner since the beginnings... as for blogs I
> think it is just an outlet for what I'm thinking or doing for anyone
> interested.
....blogoshear...
> It's the one reason I love Usenet, and truly personal blogs.
>
> - Dominic

On Jul 5, 8:59 am, Space Cowboy > wrote:
> I had a professor in college who said if I couldnt say what I meant in
> 25 words or less I still didnt know what the hell I was talking
> about. You can imagine my blog, I kinda like drinking tea. Thats
> about it. Editorial: I have to pay the speculators for oil but not
> Puer.
>
> Jim

Then you my friend need to sign up for a "Twitter" account ASAP. It's
like a blog but short blurbs, sometimes just a word or two or maybe a
sentence. I personally don't get it but all the cool kids are doin it.

I also have to say you snips on your quoted text are some of the best
I've ever seen in my day. Brevity is your forte sir.

- Dominic

niisonge > writes:

> [...blogs and aggregation...]
>
> Now the interesting thing is... when you post some little-known
> facts about tea and someone comes along and data mines all this tea
> info - and you later see your info in print, published in a book -
> with someone else's name on it - and someone else gets the
> credit. Now that's the low point.
>
> I could post a heck of a lot of info about tea - but I don't.

And, I guess, the reason you don't is you don't relish the thought of
being used without permission or credit?

/Lew
---
Lew Perin /
http://www.panix.com/~perin/babelcarp.html
recent addition: Pei Huo

Brent > writes:

> Since I noticed this thread I have been trying to get the OP to remove
> my blog from the Twinings blog aggregator, but so far he has fed me BS
> about how he can't because of the way the software is set up. Come
> on, seriously? He then sent me the following:
>
> "By having an RSS feed, you should expect that your blog will be
> syndicated with or without permission. So long as the original source
> is cited and you are directed to the original source of the
> copyrighted material in question, you are not breaking any sorts of
> copyright rules by syndicating a blog. Anyways as it currently stands,
> copyright rules with RSS feeds is huge a grey area right now as nobody
> is even aware of the legal aspects and whether or not they’re
> enforceable. Even if the blog serves you no traffic, the link exchange
> is valuable in helping to increase the number of backlinks to your
> site, which is a very important SEO strategy."

Wow, I hate dealing with acronyms like SEO that are almost as ugly as
the concepts they stand for. I remember when IP meant Internet Protocol...

/Lew
---
Lew Perin /
http://www.panix.com/~perin/babelcarp.html
recent addition: Gan Si

"Dominic T." > writes:

> On Jul 5, 8:59 am, Space Cowboy > wrote:
> > [...short is sweet...]
>
> [...]
> Brevity is your forte sir.

No, it's mine.[1]

/Lew
---
Lew Perin /
http://www.panix.com/~perin/babelcarp.html
[1]Sorry, couldn't resist!

> And, I guess, the reason you don't is you don't relish the thought of
> being used without permission or credit?

That's right. Now I only post non-information.

Brent wrote:
> Since I noticed this thread I have been trying to get the OP to remove
> my blog from the Twinings blog aggregator, but so far he has fed me BS
> about how he can't because of the way the software is set up.

Here's a thought: post a lot of headlines in BIG BOLD TYPE about how
awful Twinings is. I predict that his software will be modified with
great celerity. (And he'll probably threaten a libel suit, which threat
you can also post.)

-DM

On Jul 6, 6:42*am, DogMa > wrote:
> Here's a thought: post a lot of headlines in BIG BOLD TYPE about how
> awful Twinings is. I predict that his software will be modified with
> great celerity. (And he'll probably threaten a libel suit, which threat
> you can also post.)
>
> -DM

Heh, I had considered it, but it's not worth putting junk content on
my blog. I'll just keep filling his inbox with complaints, for now.

Brent

For the record, I did email you when we decided to aggregate your
blog. In fact, you had no issues with that at the time and were in
fact quite happy. I even said that we'd be using some of your content
on your site from time to time. So we picked your blog post to review,
because it was a great article. We even linked it back your original
article. I have since removed the review of your article from the
site, however I am unable to remove your blog from the aggregator.
Whether or not you want to believe it is completely up to you as you
have a right to an opinion. If you want to keep emailing me, that's
fine. I can't however guarantee a response if you're just making the
same request to which I've already addressed. End.