I have been attacked in the BN's show about mash efficiency

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Kaiser

Kaiser

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All,

Some may have already noticed it, but recently I found out that Jamil attacked me in one of his shows. He called me an arm chair quarter back who doesn't do his own experiments. This is a link to the episode: http://thebrewingnetwork.com/shows/564.

The accusations were prompted by a discussion we had here on HBT. In particular this thread: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f36/mash-thickness-confusion-138511/

I decided to post a lengthy comment in the BN forum: http://www.thebrewingnetwork.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=17578&start=0

Kai
 
Kai, I'm sorry to hear about this.

I will not speak for homebrewers; I'll speak for myself - I'm sorta half-assed when it comes to my process/methods/measurements, etc; which is obviously why I'm struggling with some of my efficiency issues.

but for someone like you to be called out - is strange - you do a heck of a lot of scientific method-type work for the data that you present.

keep up the good work - and I (and many other HBT'ers) would buy a homebrewing book that was writing by Kai :mug:
 
Shrug it of Kai. I have read through your site 4 or 5 times and I still find more to digest every time I visit. You have a a great deal of valuable information there. I have yet to learn anything of significance from Jamil's show. In my opinion they should condense it to 5 minutes to get to the f'n point. I rarely listen at all any more. Basic Brewing Radio is far superior IMHO.
 
With all due respect to Kai and others, I don't understand the way some people on this forum (likely a vocal minority) act like 12-year-old girls going crazy over the latest boy band. I know a couple professional brewers, and they are very down-to-earth, like the majority of people here.

This is a hobby for most of us; it is supposed to be fun. Swelled egos and hissy-fit cat fights aren't a part of it.

Sorry... Just ranting.
 
Nice. I have little to no respect for people like this. I dont care what you presume to know, I dont care how good you are at what you do... if you are a jerk, you are a jerk.

Kai, you are invaluable here and I personally have learned much more from you than I have from any of those hacks.

I am conditioning my malt on my next brew and mashing thinner to reduce my sparge water and hopefully reduce my lauter eff. and brewhouse eff. to a degree.

I have been using your first wort gravity chart and now your spreadsheet to track my efficiencies. You are appreciated here and have done more to further the science behind the hobby than any hack with a podcast.
 
I knew it was your quote as soon as I heard Jamil reading it. On one hand, I understand that putting on a show like that opens them up to all kinds of nit picky scrutiny and it's gotta be hard. However, it comes with the territory and they have to be a little more thick skinned and civil about it.

The weird thing is the moment someone suggests that you might want to scrutinize your efficiency a little bit to know what's going on in your process, they pull the RDWHAHB routine.

Also, Jamil had all sorts of smug tone when he was reading the quote which wasn't necessary at all. If you want to address criticism, do it with a little class and you'll get a lot more respect.
 
I noticed this when listening too. I thought it strange because usually they will just say "people have been saying this and that" to get the idea of what the online community thinks about a topic. I think this is the first time I have heard them use a direct quote, which kinda does seem like him calling you out.
 
Thanks guys. I'd like to point out that is is not really an HBT vs BN thing again. And we should handle it like this. It just happened to be a discussion on here that he is referring to.

Kai
 
Ahhh the “Brew Gods” having a battle on the interweb. I just knew it was going to come to this. Next up….. Battle of the Beer!!!
Kai
That was a very well thought out response to a (if I understand it correctly) somewhat of a personal attack. I guess I just don't really understand the reason for them calling you out like that. I don’t listen to the show (I just don’t have that kind of time) but what was the point for the attack?

Cheers
Jay
 
It's simple really. I read Kai's posts to learn. I listen to Brew Strong to kill time on boring commutes. :D

Jamil does have some seriously tasty recipes though...
 
It's unfortunate that the self-proclaimed cognoscenti of homebrewing have made a personal comment in what should have been a strictly objective discussion. That cabal seems to exhibit a less-than-open mindedness to anyone who dare to question their point of view. Thanks for doing all that work, Kai. Please continue. :mug:
 
Having learned an immeasurable amount from both Kai and Jamil that has without question allowed me to make better beer, I'm sorry that this has happened and hope it ends in a virtual handshake somehow...
 
Jamil who?

I've read quite a few posts where "Jamil says", "Jamil does", "Jamil's method" and "according to Jamil" are sprinkled about. I'm not knocking the guy as I don't know who the hell he is. But why do people take what he says as gospel?

I agree with the post above that describes this as a hobby. The thing I understand less than the brewers that think they are beer gods are the brewers that worship them.

There are enough opinions, ideas and ways to skin this cat on this forum alone I can't see going with the way one person feels it should be. Beer has been brewed for centuries with less than what we have to work with and less knowledge of the process than we have.
 
Personally, Kai, sometimes the amount of research you put into various aspects of brewing make me think you have a problem of some sort.:ban:

Haven't hear Jamil's program and I doubt I will except by accident, but when you post on a thread, I rarely have anything to add.
 
Yuri_Rage said:
Here's a short wiki entry on Jamil: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamil_Zainasheff

Perhaps that helps shed some light on why folks want to emulate him.
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Maybe. But valuing the opinion of a person is one thing, emulating is another. Were everyone on the Internet emulating any one person, the growth of the hobby would stall. Like I said, I'm not knocking the guy, just never cared to look up who he was.
 
I think Jamil just took Kai's comments wrong. I think it is a simple misunderstanding. I love the science behind everything, but many don't. Both sides of the table are correct. Beer does pretty much make itself, but at the same time a better understanding of your process will never hurt you. I feel that I am a much better brewer because of hte things I have learned from Kai. I have a lot of respect for both guys. Maybe JZ just hope up grumpy that day, or maybe he had been receiving some nasty grams and finally cracked... either way, I wouldn't take it personal Kai. You have a large number of people who really appreciate what you do.
 
Yuri_Rage said:
Here's a short wiki entry on Jamil: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamil_Zainasheff

Perhaps that helps shed some light on why folks want to emulate him.
Click to expand...

So the guy wins lot of contests (maybe he needs everyone's approval to boost his self-esteem?). Doesn't prove a thing if I don't like his brews.

BWT, didn't PRB win one or two also???

I got Best of Show from the first competition I entered...still doesn't prove a thing...

Let's do a Cali roadtrip and kick some Jamil butt!!!! :D :rockin:
 
I think Jamil is a good guy and has generally nice tone and outlook IMO. Everyone should be entitled to a bad day or a slip of the tongue. I know I have said things here to people that I have regretted, doesn't mean I am an ass bag just because I was in a bad mood one time.

I think Jamil offers a lot to the hobby. So does Kai. I use more of Kai's knowledge, but both have helped me greatly.
 
Bobby_M said:
The weird thing is the moment someone suggests that you might want to scrutinize your efficiency a little bit to know what's going on in your process, they pull the RDWHAHB routine.
Click to expand...

RDWHAHB is the best advice ever uttered regarding homebrewing.

Your're right, tho, it can be used as an excuse to ignore process improvements. But the long journey to the perfect brew is a lot rougher without a little RDWHAHB.
 
homebrewer_99 said:
So the guy wins lot of contests (maybe he needs everyone's approval to boost his self-esteem?). Doesn't prove a thing if I don't like his brews.

BWT, didn't PRB win one or two also???

I got Best of Show from the first competition I entered...still doesn't prove a thing...

Let's do a Cali roadtrip and kick some Jamil butt!!!! :D :rockin:
Click to expand...

I'm pretty sure someone else wrote that Wikipedia article, not Jamil.

He doesn't strike me as the type who's in it for others' approval (at least no more than most of the rest of us who enter competitions), and seems like a genuinely good guy.

And I really do like his beer; well, make that his recipes. I haven't had the opportunity to try anything he's brewed personally, but every recipe of his that I've brewed myself has been very good.
 
Boerderij_Kabouter said:
I think Jamil is a good guy and has generally nice tone and outlook IMO. Everyone should be entitled to a bad day or a slip of the tongue. I know I have said things here to people that I have regretted, doesn't mean I am an ass bag just because I was in a bad mood one time.
Click to expand...

My general thought: If someone has a bad day and fails to own that and make amends, then they are an ass bag. Everyone has a bad day or a poorly chosen set of words once in a while but the ass bags are the ones who don't man up and admit it afterwords.


No idea if this applies to the Jamil/Kai situation.
 
His accusation that you have not done the science is ludicrous. He should have taken a little bit more time to confirm his suspicion if he's going to call you out like that.
 
Rick500 said:
I'm pretty sure someone else wrote that Wikipedia article, not Jamil.

He doesn't strike me as the type who's in it for others' approval (at least no more than most of the rest of us who enter competitions), and seems like a genuinely good guy.

And I really do like his beer; well, make that his recipes. I haven't had the opportunity to try anything he's brewed personally, but every recipe of his that I've brewed myself has been very good.
Click to expand...
OK, I guess you're not used to my sarcasm yet...I have his books also... I feel certain everyone else got it.;)

In all seriousness, the article is kind of short for someone who may have written their own bio...I know mine would be much longer. :D
 
Yeah, my sarcasm detector was broken this morning, sorry. ;)
 
I've had some email correspondence with Jamil, whenever I asked a follow-up question to something he said on his shows. I won't say that I know him, but he does seem like a good guy, and he does a lot for the hobby. Additionally, he responds to a lot of questions more nicely than some forums (NOT this one) do. So, we can do this without the name-calling. The Brew Strong on mash efficiency never even got into mash thickness, which was what much of the discussion here was about, but instead, as Kai said in his BN post, pretty much went back over a lot of the same data about fly vs. batch sparging that was brought up here when that show ran in August. I wanted to hear Jamil and Palmer talk about mash efficiency in more detail, and was a little disappointed. Brew Strong is a geeky show, and I had presumed that it was for folks who didn't just want to RDWHAHB, but who wanted to really dig into the science at hand.

As for reading the posts out loud, I was a bit surprised by that as well. He read them by way of defending Palmer, but it was still a step outside the generally collegial spirit of homebrewing that Jamil has often said inspired him to write his book (which has been helpful to me). Kai's research is based on experiments, and on poring over brewing texts in multiple languages, and we here at hbt gain a lot from his participation here. His information has made my brewing better, especially as I work the kinks out of my AG system. So, I tend to think that an apology is in order, not for reading the posts, but for misrepresenting the knowledge base from which the posts were written.
 
david_42 said:
Personally, Kai, sometimes the amount of research you put into various aspects of brewing make me think you have a problem of some sort.:ban:

Haven't hear Jamil's program and I doubt I will except by accident, but when you post on a thread, I rarely have anything to add.
Click to expand...

It would be quite difficult to add anything of worth to a post by Kai. Winston Churchill loved his topic when he wrote the history of England and did an astounding amount of research, do you think he had a problem of some sort?

I pay as much attention to the two J's as I pay anyone else here, but everything they have to say can easily be found in any home-brewing book as far back as the 80's. Kai, on the other hand, has done reseach that has great value to the brewing community and shares it humbly in a gentlemanly attitude. I can't see a problem with that....:)
 
Thanks for the overwhelming support guys. I'm pretty much over the whole thing. What has been said had been said and Kabouter might be right that he may have had just a bad day and snapped. But the similarity of that show to another show keeps me thinking that it was planned as a response to our discussion.

To be honest, an animosity between me and Jamil had been growing for a while. At least I perceived it as such. I often got the feeling that he missed my points when I sent him comments. It seems that he doesn't like to discuss things, at least with me. How much that is the result from constant criticism that one may attract by being out there I don't know. Most recently I sent a really long e-mail to Jamil and John about decoction mashing and my points. I took some time to write it and was disappointed when I did not receive a reply from either John or Jamil.

That growing animosity did lead me to the occasional stab ant John and Jamil but I did not think that I ever fell out of line.

But now it's all out and I can move on.

Dave, I know I might be doing more experiments that others although I can't be sure. But I just happen to pour all my enthusiasm about brewing into this direction why others use it to win competions. If I were to focus on winning competions to gain recognition in home brewing I would not have as much time and money to spend on the science part, so I just don't.

If any of you happens to listen to the Session tonight, let me know if they mention the issue. I don't have time to listen and don't want to install the Abacast player anyway.

Kai
 
I listened to it. I think they spent most of time fixing mistakes they made on their sparging show. They definitely made some more mistakes with the choice of words in this show. At least they weren't drunk.

-one of those guys that can't measure but can still get 90% efficiency [/jk].
 
david_42 said:
Haven't hear Jamil's program and I doubt I will except by accident, but when you post on a thread, I rarely have anything to add.
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I think you're missing out then. I didn't hear the broadcast that has caused all of this upheaval and Jamil may be dead wrong in that regard, I don't know. But the guy has been a great resource for homebrewers and has been very generous with his knowledge and time. He seems (from his shows) to be a genuinely nice guy.
 
StunnedMonkey said:
I think you're missing out then. I didn't hear the broadcast that has caused all of this upheaval and Jamil may be dead wrong in that regard, I don't know. But the guy has been a great resource for homebrewers and has been very generous with his knowledge and time. He seems (from his shows) to be a genuinely nice guy.
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+me .
 
I have no FM radio, TV or cell phone reception here, and since I have Sat. DSL, downloading anything is a chore. Plus, I really hate trying to track down readers for the hundreds of file formats out there.
 
david_42 said:
I have no FM radio, TV or cell phone reception here, and since I have Sat. DSL, downloading anything is a chore. Plus, I really hate trying to track down readers for the hundreds of file formats out there.
Click to expand...

Straying off topic, but if you are looking for something that will play almost any file format you can find check out VLC: http://www.videolan.org/vlc/
 
homebrewer_99 said:
No harm, no foul...allow me to buy this next round...:mug:

Where are you in KY? (I am NOT going to hunt you down...:))
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I'm in Louisville. And I have no fear, for I am armed with rabid weasels. :ban:
 
Kaiser said:
Some may have already noticed it, but recently I found out that Jamil attacked me in one of his shows. He called me an arm chair quarter back who doesn't do his own experiments. This is a link to the episode: http://thebrewingnetwork.com/shows/564.
Click to expand...

I just listened to this episode yesterday, but somehow I missed the diss. Does anyone have the time in the playback when this happens??

Kaiser, sorry to hear about this. Don't let Jamil's ego get your hackles up too much. A lot of people have noticed that he has a developed a big mouth and a big ego over the course of his brewcast 'career', and this is a pretty typical response for him. Not to be to taken too seriously.
 
FlyGuy said:
Does anyone have the time in the playback when this happens?.
Click to expand...

It happened more than once. You have to listen to it again after reading the other threads Kia posted. Kia is not making this up. It really did happen.

It also seems to me they read a few other threads at NB and reiterated the info as their own incite.
 
I'm going to take the mod's advice and remain civil in regards to my feelings about TBN (though I have posted my feelings in other threads about them), but wonder if it is more the fact that Kai has been a regular guest on Basic Brewing Radio than anything else.

Kai, I respect you immenesly, though half the time I can't understand what you are talking about :D but in the words of Hunter S Thompson, "Don't let the bastards get you down!"

You are good at what you do, you know you "stuff" and you help us a heck of a lot, so I just wanted you to know where I stand, buddy!

:mug:
 
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