iFoods Weekly Episode 1

This is the first ever episode where the guys talk about the hot topic on the internet food scene at the moment which is the battle between tastespotting and foodgawker as well as discussing Barry’s recent visit to the Fat Duck Restaurant. The guys also introduce us to the charms of Average Betty.

Is Tastespotting making a comeback?

A news flash has just arrived from Tastespotting! As most people at this stage know it was suddenly and unexpectedly shut down last Friday the 13th (coincidence?), with nothing but a post it note on a bare site to say goodbye. Much speculation followed as to the reason of their overnight departure, with copyright issues over the images on their site, or the infamous Tastespotting stalker being pushed as the likely reasons. This speculation has been quashed with 2 new notes, firstly assuring us that while there are legal issues, it is not copyright related, certainly has nothing to do with stalkers and that they hope to be back online soon! The second note is alerting Tastespotting lovers worldwide of a new addition to the NOTCOT family. Liqurious (Great Name!) is a tastespotting for drinks and it looks just as cool as tastespotting did. We wish them all the best and hope to see Tastespotting back up alongside it asap.

Tastespotting clone FoodGawker goes live

With the ashes still simmering on the corpse of the much loved Tastespotting site it was inevitable that copies of the site would start popping up within a couple of days and that is exactly what Foodgawker is, a carbon copy of the site whose closure is being mourned around food blogs on the Internet. I applaud the creators of this site for getting the new version up so soon and providing a resource for the many foodies missing their daily hit of "food porn" but I have to admit I am worried.... Tastespotting was clearly taken down due to copyright infringement which is a shame but part of the modern world we live in and although they seem to have flagged in their T&C's that no infringements will be tolerated but although I am unable to compare to tastespotting's T&C's as they no longer exist but I would Imagine they would have covered themselves pretty well. So what worries me is that I can't see what Foodgawker are doing differently and why the big bad lawyers who probably closed down tastespotting won't be knocking on the door over at foodgawker very soon! The second aspect that worries me is that the slighted Tastespotting which is part of the NOTCOT series of designs sites would not take offense themselves are somebody blatantly ripping off their site and profiting from all their hard work. Foodgawker are claiming that they want to provide a refuge for all the poeple missing the original site but also claim a couple of lines later that advertising will have to be displayed in order to cover costs. Fair play to them for getting the site up so quickly but I am pretty sure we haven't seen the end of this one and don't be surprised to see Foodgawker go the same way as the magical tastespotting pretty soon if those lawyers get their claws out again!

Update:Another clone has just been spotted in the form of Newtastings

Tastespotting Is gone!

Something strange has just happened to a website I love and one that’s been becoming very popular for foodies on the net. Tastespotting.com has left the building! I tried to get on there this morning, as I have a look at it at least once a day, and it just had a note posted on it saying ‘Thanks for a great 18 months! In light of recent legal complications, NOTCOT will no longer be operating tastespotting’. I’ve scoured the web to find the legal complications and there are two possibilities being offered:
1.Copyright infringement reasons around the photos used on the website; and strangely
2.Some commenters on blogs are questioning whether it could be down to the mysterious tastespotting stalker
I’ve heard some things in my time but a food blogger stalker?? It’s a crazy dangerous world wide web out there. I would imagine that copyright laws have been violated somewhere along the line and that they published something belonging to a company with big nasty lawyers behind them! As far as clean design and a tool for driving traffic tastespotting was second to none and will hopefully pop up again under under a different name or with their issues solved.
If anyone knows the real reason let me know as I’m really curious as is nearly every foodie who’s ever used it.