And here's what VegasTripping.Com's Chuck Monster said:
You see, as much fun as the first night of operations and all the partying was for journalists, insiders and others who visited with free access to food and entertainment, it was something of an operational disaster for people who actually stayed here. Check-ins were delayed, food servers were slow, various bits of cool technology like the touch-screen slot machine finders didn't work. Read Chuck's account. I've heard several tales of woe just like it. It doesn't take much to find on Twitter if you search.
This was NOT a "smooth landing," Review-Journal. At least not to those who were actually spending their money here. I just heard from someone who was locked in a stairwell last night. Seriously.
As Laura Martin, often a Twitter nemesis of mine, rightly noted last night: "I don't trust Vegas reviews from journos. Intoxicated by access."
There's lots and lots to like about the shiny new thing on the Strip and I'll get to that. In fact, I'm now late to recording Vegas Gang with Dave Schwartz, Hunter Hillegas and Jeff Simpson, and we'll mull all of that. They've done a nice job physically.
But none of that matters when someone like Chuck is telling his considerable audience not to stay here because there are so many functional troubles. That's harsh, especially since Chuck was incredibly patient with Aria when he had repeated service issues there.
Did you find any of that in the Review-Journal? The Sun? On the TV news? On KNPR? On Nightline?
Of course not. Thank goodness for the blogs.
6 comments:
If getting news from many bloggers continues to mean having to sift through lousy, rambling and totally off-point leads -- such as this one that details a crush on a girl the writer knew in seventh-grade -- I'll try to stick with the MSM writers. No good editor would let stuff like that see the light of day.
Bloggers absolutely have their merits, no doubt. I just wish their good traits were more-often married to the positives that are more common in the MSM, such as accountability, better writing, editing, presentation, etc.
The ideal world would merge MSM's best traits with best attributes of a blogger, which generally include timeliness and a lack of corporate influence.
Yes, Aria opening was a disaster as well. A certain amount of snafu has to be expected in an opening, and one only wonders why Vegas properties always do big "soft" openings, making people think that all the kinks are already worked out. Oh yeah, forgot, they wanna make money.
Anyway, any hotel is going to have hitches. I don't understand the point of the headline on R-J. Maybe they just couldn't think of anything else to say.
Oh of course your gonna hate it 'cause your Steve Wynn's byotch!
Actually, Anon, I'm generally very impressed with Cosmo. What I'm not impressed with is a media that doesn't pay attention to the experiences of actual people and gets caught up in hype. And, as usual, you forget that I panned Wynn Las Vegas viciously when it opened and within the past year I called Wynn a socialist and a foolish ignoramus on China. Too bad your view of the world is as simplistic and wrong as it is, but that probably explains why you need to be anonymous. Frown face.
I also think Chuck (while he had real issues, no doubt) blew things wayyyy out of proportion, especially considering his patience with Aria last year, as Steve points out.
I suspect (but have no actual evidence) that the real difference is: Aria let him throw the first craps roll last year; Cosmo never (apparently) responded to his many, many pleas to do the same thing.
Call me cynical, but my guess is that Mr. Monster is holding a bit of a grudge. And that's the real problem with bloggers compared to MSM journalists -- no editors to filter out personal bias.
(Of course, I am not claiming that personal bias never makes it into mainstream media. But it's a lot less common.)
Twitter nemesis?
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