Anyone can brew:
Without the right soil and good weather, even the most talented vintner can’t produce great wine. Beer offers competitors a level playing field. Most brewers—commercial and amateur—get their hops and malt from a handful of suppliers, so terroir plays a minor role in the quality of the final product. The only real wild card is water, which can always be manipulated with a little chemical know-how. If everyone starts with the same resources, the best brewer should win most of the time.
The judging is more egalitarian as well:
If you Google "beer rankings," the first hit is BeerAdvocate.com, the site that gave [ the unofficial best beer in the world] Pliny the Younger its fame. Although Beer Advocate takes its name from Parker’s Wine Advocate, the approach is entirely different. You won’t get the opinion of a single supertaster, or even a panel of experts. It’s a raucous compilation of thousands of opinions from ordinary schlubs just like you. As the art critic Clement Greenberg noted "[Q]uality in art is not just a matter of private experience. There is a consensus of taste." The beer world takes that consensus seriously.
The Dish 